Design

Indie fantasy author Ty Johnston’s 2012 blog tour is running from February 1 through February 29. His novels include City of Rogues, Bayne’s Climb, Ghosts of the Asylum and Demon Chains, all of which are available for the Kindle, the Nook and online at Smashwords. To learn more about Ty and his writing, follow him at his blogtyjohnston.blogspot.com.

 

Indie authors are all different. We write in different genres and styles. We each have our own unique plans to increase our readership. We each have different things to say, and different goals for success. Some of us want to be household-name authors like an Anne Rice or Tom Clancy, while others simply want to be able to make a career at our writing; some of us just enjoying the creative aspects and aren’t worried about the financial end of things.

 But we also share a lot of similarities. One such similarity is that each of us has to have a cover for our books and e-books, and we all want to have good covers.

Some might argue covers are not important, that what is behind those covers is what’s truly important, but they are missing the bigger picture (quite literally, when you think about it). Even if you believe good covers are not important, you would be hard pressed to argue that a bad cover can be helpful.

So why do we want good covers? Honestly, some of it is hubris. Writers like to brag about their covers and the cover artists. More importantly, writers who have even a drop of marketing sense in their blood realize the worth of a good cover.

A solid cover can catch a reader’s eye. This is important for obvious reasons. If readers never notice your books or e-books, then they will miss the opportunity to consider further whether they wish to read your book or e-book.

A good cover can hold a reader’s attention. Even if a reader passes on your book the first time around, a solid cover might draw them back again. A great cover can stick in a reader’s mind, and that can propel a reader to pick up your book at some future point.

Also, while there are those who might believe covers do not sell books, the truth is a good cover could be the tipping point for customers. If a reader is on the fence about whether or not to purchase your book, a good cover might just be the thing to convince them.

Traditional authors have the bonus of publishing houses behind them and the art departments that go along with them. Indie authors, however, are often on their own when it comes to creating good covers.

The most obvious choice for indie authors is to hire out their covers. There is a growing number of cover artists and designers on the market, and many of them offer quality work for a fair investment.

On the other hand, many beginning writers simply can’t afford to hire an artist. What to do?

Well, you can save up your pennies until you can afford an artist, which is not a bad idea, or you can create your own covers.

I can hear some of you screaming now, “But I’m no artist!” Perhaps that is true, but basic cover does not have to be fancy.

The first thing a beginning cover designer often asks about is the various software for creating covers. I prefer Photoshop because it does everything I need and then some. Obviously, if you can afford to buy Photoshop then you can afford to hire an artist. But there are other program available which can be used. I’ve known some authors who use Powerpoint for their covers; while this option sounds odd tome, whatever works works, right? Another option would be to download some free online software like GIMP, which is somewhat similar to Photoshop.

That’s the technical aspect. Use whatever you feel works best for you. If you have the chance, experiment with different software.

But what about the actual design itself?

Okay, I’m going to jump in here for a moment to tell a little about my own design background. I was a newspaper editor for 20 years, and publication design was a daily part of my job during that time. Sure, it isn’t the exact same thing as book design, but there are similarities and I did spend a fair amount of time over the years designing special publications and magazines, which are more like books than are newspapers when it comes to design. I tell you this so you will know I am not and do not consider myself a book design professional, though I feel I do have a leg up on design when itcomes to many of today’s struggling indie authors. What follows are my opinions, and someone who has been designing books for 20 years might suggest think I’m full of it.

First of all, you need to keep in mind you are not designing only a book cover. You are also designing an e-book cover and an icon that has the potential to be seen by millions across the Web. Remember that word “icon,” because what you want your cover to be is iconic. You want it to stand out from the crowd, to draw the attention of customers and readers.

In my opinion, simple is better. Yes, there are plenty of complicated, artistic book covers out there that look good in a bookstore, but how many of them look good on Amazon or Smashwords? How many of them are even legible on a website? Most aren’t, so simple is better.

As an example, take the cover of Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. No, I’m not here to argue about the worth of the novel itself or the movies, so forget the snarky comments. But go take a look at that cover. Stark black background with a pair of pale hands holding a bright red apple. The title is a little small, in my opinion, but it is spotlighted by the arms at either side. The author’s name is somewhat small, but that was appropriate when the original cover was created because Meyer was not that well known then.

Now, look at the cover of Twilight again. Study it. Putting aside your love or dislike for the story itself, isn’t that an awesome cover? Here is a simple cover scheme with an iconic image right in the middle of all that black. This is a cover that looks pretty good in the bookstores, but it also looks good online, even when seen only as a small image. Now tell me that cover didn’t draw the eye and help to build the author’s following?

Okay, I’ve talked about simple cover design. What does “simple” really mean? It can mean several things, but I’ll stick with a few of the most obvious. Simple colors, for instance; the fewer the better, in my opinion. Bold colors, that contrast with one another and stand out on a computer or handheld device. An iconic image, something fairly simple that pops out at the viewer. Remember that your name does not need to be large, at least not unless you become somewhat famous, and this will give you a little more working room. However, I am a fan of larger titles on covers because I believe they help to stand out more in the viewer’s eyes and mind.

Also, when it comes to e-books, you don’t really need a lot of small, extraneous type on your covers. I know authors love their blurbs, but unless you have one from Stephen King, it’s really a waste to put it on an e-book cover because it won’t be seen. Any type on an e-book cover beside the author’s name and the title should serve some purpose that helps the reader make up their mind whether or not they want to read the e-book. Information I deem relevant would include a blurb by the likes of Stephen King, obviously, but also could entail whether or not the e-book is part of a series, whether it is a short story or novella, etc. Skip putting a price on the cover, because prices can change.

One last thing. When working on e-book covers, remember that the image is going to initially be seen by viewers in a very small size. Allow this to direct your design for an e-book cover. If you want a more extravagant design, by all means consider doing so, but I’ll suggest perhaps having two different but similar covers, one for the book and one for the e-book.

Okay, I lied. Really this time, one last thing. If you continue to be stumped by book cover design, always remember to study the basic design of books you like. I’m not suggesting you outright steal, because that is wrong, but you can study the creativity of book covers you find interesting and learn from them.

I hope I’ve helped at least a few indie writers who struggle with their covers, and I’d like to say a big “thank you” to those behind the scenes (hi April!) at Publetariat for allowing me this space on the site today.

Most of us have heard that eBooks are now mainstream, yet are writers using them to their full advantage? According to James Moushon in his guest post “Real eBooks: Are We Still in the Stone Age?” on The Book Designer, probably not.

Here’s what James says about what a real eBook should be:

My contention is that REAL ebooks should be a different product than their paper counterparts. They should be formatted differently; sections arranged differently and in some cases they should have different covers. In short, to be a REAL ebook, they should not be just a copy of the traditional book version.

He goes on to give tips on exactly how to rearrange an eBook so it’s a “real” eBook, which includes moving large table of contents and author references to the end and including links to other books, especially the author’s other books.

While I agree with James, I admit that it’s difficult for me to actually do that. Writers are avid readers. Until recently we all grew up reading traditionally published paper and hardbacks. To layout a book in any other way seems like we’re trying to walk on our hands and eat with our feet.

However, James has a point. If you want a potential reader to decide to buy your book based on what he or she has read, you have to get them enough material from the book to read to make an informed decision. When online stores offer only a set percent of the front matter for a reader to view as a sample, it makes sense to make the most of it with the actual story and not a lot of added stuff they would probably skip anyway.

With the rise of eBook purchases, we need to do everything we can to make the experience a pleasant one for the reader so they become not just a one book buyer, but a devoted fan.

What other differences have you noticed between paper/hardback books and eBooks? What changes would you make?

 

 

This is a reprint from Virginia Ripple‘s blog.

My eyes are stinging and my brain is dizzier than usual. I just finished reading for my bookstore’s review two excellent young adult books for consideration of including them on our shelves and hand-selling them once we do. OK, so why the physical impacts?

Both books were interior designed using serif-less fonts. They’re OK for ads or internet usage, but they are horrendous for reading on paper. Why? and Why were they used? Ah, here is my best guess. It may all be about laziness on the part of the interior designer/typesetter. Follow along as I explain more:

Text fonts that use serifs are easier to read. The serifs, those little tittles that come to points on each letter’s lines, bring closure to the letters. They let the eye know what the each letter is (try to figure out if a letter is a capital I or a small L in a sanserif font). Reading the text in a book without that help is daunting at best.

The two books I read were The Eleventh Plague and Cinder, and both were excellent, except for the typesetting. I know whereof I speak. I am an interior designer for books and a design judge for the Ben Franklin Awards. Neither books would have made it to the Ben Franklin finals but would have been rejected out of hand immediately.

So, why would a designer use sanserif fonts for his text paragraphs? I don’t know for sure, but I’d guess it was done out of sheer laziness or for a publisher’s cost cutting guidance. Many people prefer using sanserif text fonts for computer screens, where serifs can become too complex for screen resolutions. For this reason, many ebooks are set with sanserif text fonts. OK, so the designer makes the ebook version first thing since they are cheaper, easier, and quicker to publish. Why go back through and change all the text paragraphs to serifed fonts. After all, they are wider (which may add to the page count) and may create some widows and orphans that weren’t there before (again screwing up the layout throughout the book).

It’s my guess that is what happened with these two books I just struggled through to read with my aging eyesight. I think that many self-publishers may fall into this trap as well (both these books were from major publishers). Give your readers a break and design your books correctly. There is a reason for every designing tradition and standard practices.

 

This is a reprint from Bob Spear‘s Book Trends blog.

I wrote about where to find free or inexpensive photos for your blog or book back in February 2010. Since that time I’ve mostly used Flickr and iStockphoto, where you can buy credits as you go and many web-size images are very inexpensive.

For the first time, I’m starting to use both Flickr and paid-for stock differently. Here’s why.

A few months ago I got a free month’s worth of downloads at Fotolia, the huge online stock photography and art site. They have websites in 11 languages and in 15 regions of the world.

What’s more important, Fotolia hosts 15,547,533 royalty-free photos, the last time I looked. I had a great time browsing images for covers, and found some great ones.

But what really pleased me were a couple of little interface enhancements. These types of things make a big difference. When researching images for book covers, it’s not unusual to look through 500 or 600 photos at a session. Something that’s inconvenient once becomes maddening when repeated enough.

Here’s the detail screen from iStockphoto. Just below that is the one from Fotolia.

Using iStockphoto I always have to calculate what the image is going to cost me, converting “credits” to dollars. Fotolia makes it much more clear, once you realize these are the lowest possible prices. Typically you’ll pay about twice as much if you buy credits as you go.

The best deal is the subscription, if you use a lot of images. During the month I had the Fotolia promotional subscription I used it a lot, since you could download as many images as you wanted, and most images seemed available.

The other enhancement is the hover tool. Placing your mouse cursor over an image thumbnail in search results gives you an enlarged view of the photo. Here are the hover boxes from both services:

The iStockphoto hover gives you the name of the image and little else. The Fotolia hover box includes the sizes available for license, the credit requirements for the smallest image, the number of times the image has been viewed, and the number of downloads. This can save an incredible amount of time.

Flickr Out in the Open

Another approach to saving time on image search is a nifty utility called Compfight (Compfight.com).

Using Flickr’s programming interface, Compfight has built a search utility that’s quite a bit faster than Flickr’s own advanced search.

Compfight is a beautiful example of a single-use interface that’s been refined by people who actually use it. With a few clicks you can set your search parameters and get a beautifully-presented and customizable screen full of image results, mostly from Flickr.

Notice in the search results that many images have a blue stripe at the bottom, indicating they are available on Flickr. Hover your mouse cursor over one of these, and Compfight will helpfully show you the image size in pixels, another great timesaver.

Compfight has become by far the easiest way to use the amazing collection of images on Flickr, and Fotolia has enough enhancements and beautiful images that it might well surpass iStockphoto. If you use stock images, make sure you take a look at these services.

Note: Be careful with the licensing of images on Flickr. Amateur photographers may not realize you need model releases from recognizable private individuals to use their likeness in commercial ways.

 

This is a reprint from Joel Friedlander‘s The Book Designer.

Okay, you’ve finished your book, filled out all your book metadata, and gone through the publishing process. Soon, your book will become available for sale online. For many authors, this is a critical time in the lives of their books.

Why? When your book is new, it’s the natural time to do a book launch. In fact, it’s possible to re-launch a book any time there’s a reason to do so, but the vast majority of book launches are, appropriately enough, at the time of initial publication.

 

The idea of a book launch is to turn the publication of the book into an event. Events, by their nature, draw more attention from the public. Your event is one-time-only, happening live, and the more ways you can attract attention during the launch period, the more eyeballs you will attract to your book (and your other books, if you have related books in print already).

Let’s look at the elements that can go into a book launch. You won’t be doing all these things, so don’t immediately become overwhelmed. Think of this more as a menu of options you can choose from.

8 Ways to Make Your Book Launch Take Off

First, decide whether you want to run all of your activities on a single day, over the course of a week, or extending to a longer time period. Any of these options is workable, and I encourage you to spread them out if your time is already at a premium. Remember that you’re in charge, so you get to decide the exact parameters of your book launch. Here are some things you might include in your book launch:

1. Media Kit – This is essential. It’s the established way for you to get your information to book reviewers, media contacts and other bloggers. I won’t go through the whole media kit here, but it should include your book launch media release (see below for more information), photo of your book cover, photo of the author, marketing information, sample interviews, and a concise cover letter.

 

2. Guest Posts – One of the best ways to bring your message to new groups of readers is by offering to write guest articles for other bloggers. This can be done as part of a blog tour or on its own. In any case, by introducing yourself and your subject to new networks of readers, your book will get more of a boost at its launch.

 

3. Book Trailer – Short videos that act like movie trailers for your book have become more and more popular in the last couple of years. Some books seem to lend themselves to this treatment more than others, and some of the most effective I’ve seen are for fiction, like thrillers and romances.

 

4. Media Contacts – One way to help your book get off to a good start is to get the attention of the media. This might be through an interview with the local newspaper or radio station about your book, or it might be articles you submit to magazines or online periodicals in your niche. Developing a list of media contacts who are interested or who have reported in the past about your topic will be very useful for this effort.

 

5. Book Reviewers – Planning your review campaign well in advance will allow both print and online reviewers plenty of time to prepare a review about your book. Although we can’t dictate the schedule on which these reviews are released, let reviewers know when the launch will be happening and other events scheduled for the time period of the launch.

 

6. Contests & Giveaways – One of the techniques that’s been used to good effect by lots of authors is to give away a set number of books during the launch period. These may be offered by lottery, for leaving comments on your blog, for posting Tweets about the book launch, or any other way you can dream up to attract people’s interest. Free anything is still a powerful pull for lots of people, and getting your book into as many people’s hands as possible is the aim of your launch, so get creative here.

 

7. Blog Tour – A blog tour organizes the guest posts, giveaways and blogger networking into a formal schedule during your launch period. Setting up guest appearances on blogs, which allows the bloggers to introduce you to their readers, is a terrific way to grow your own reader community and enhance your relationship with lots of bloggers in your niche. You can promote your tour schedule on your own blog and through social media to create some excitement for all the events you’ve planned.

 

8. Media Release – Although your media release is an integral part of the Media Kit I mentioned at the beginning, it’s really a key piece of your book launch as well. Why? A well-written and targeted media release will bring together all the best reasons people should be interested in your book, your subject, you and your book launch. And if your book legitimately addresses more than one audience, take your basic media release and re-write the headline and first paragraph to highlight the connection to other groups.

Taken together, putting together a book launch can be a lot of work. But there are a lot of tangible and intangible benefits you get from going through all this trouble. And while our basic aim is to sell books, if you’re in this for the long haul, you’ll recognize that these benefits will repay your efforts in many ways. For instance, by going through the launch, you can:

• Create better relations with other bloggers in your field
• Better understand your readers and why they respond to you
• Explore aspects of your subject that might be of interest to different groups of readers
• Learn which approaches work best in driving traffic, and interest, about your book.

Running a book launch can be a demanding, exhausting and exciting adventure. You’ll learn a lot, and you’ll be able to use that learning for your next book. So give it a try.

 

This is a reprint from Joel Friedlander‘s The Book Designer.

Here’s something that’s mystified me for a long time:

Most books about self-publishing look a lot worse than they ought to.

I’ve often said that it doesn’t cost any more to produce a good-looking book than it does to produce a bad-looking one, but people aren’t listening.

When I first started blogging a couple of years ago I thought one good service for readers would be to review books about self-publishing.

Like lots of things, I set out with good intentions, and had barely gotten started before I tripped up on those same intentions, and had to abandon the effort.

The first book I reviewed was such a shambles from a book design point of view, I couldn’t hold back from criticizing the author/publisher.

Afterwards, I felt stupid. What was the point of the criticism? I unpublished the article, one of only 2 I’ve ever taken down, and stopped reviewing the design of the books I was covering.

Lately though, with the onrush of more and more self-publishers, the flood of books about self-publishing has also reached a flood.

Michael N. Marcus Weighs In

A frequent commenter here on the blog, Michael N. Marcus has his own selection of bad books, although his aren’t just about self-publishing. He recently published a book of these under the title Stinkers! America’s Worst Self-Published Books. And boy, he’s found some doozies.

The book is basically posts from Marcus’ BookMaking blog, where he often skewers self-publishers and self-publishing companies for their bad practices, oversights and other errors and omissions. He’s added a number of sections in a Appendix including a glossary and various tips for new self-publishers.

Here’s the kicker: six of the nine books profiled in “Stinkers!” are about self-publishing. Isn’t that sad? And Marcus, who has tried to improve the look of his books, delivers this news in a book that is competent but very obviously the work of an amateur, if an enthusiastic one. Although he is strict about correcting errors in his text, graphically “Stinkers!” is nothing to write home about.

Like a lot of self-publishers, having control of lots of neat things like tinted boxes, type run-arounds, drop caps and automatic bullets apparently makes people think you need to use them all. On almost every page.

Perhaps they think that an unadorned page of type would, by itself, be so boring no one would read the book.

But it seems to me that all the books I remember most brilliantly, the ones I can never forget, are made up of unadorned pages of type. That’s because it’s the words and the story and the ideas that remain, when they are allowed to, not the fancy rules and type ornaments and drop shadows. That stuff just gets in the way.

Cluttering your book pages with stuff is pretty much the opposite of my idea of book design. I think self-publishers would do themselves a favor by creating very simple pages instead of fancy ones. Their readers will thank them.

Not Alone, No Sir

Books sold for the value of the information in them have often looked like they just came off a typewriter or were dashed off in Microsoft Word without any formatting at all.

The best of these books are clean and competent, done by a professional, although typographically uninteresting and generally uninspired. They deliver the information, and that’s about it. The only good looking self-publishing book I’ve seen recently is The Complete Guide to Self-Publishing by Sue Collier and Marilyn Ross, and that’s because it was not self-published, but issued by Writer’s Digest Books.

Left With a Question

So I suppose it’s the rule that books about self-publishing that are self-published themselves look bad because the authors are attempting to follow the DIY (do-it-yourself) route to show just how easy it is to publish a book.

And maybe that’s the problem: it’s dead easy to publish a book, it’s just a bit harder to publish one that looks decent, or one that looks just as good as a book from a traditional publisher.

But does that mean all these books have to use bad clip art, pedestrian typefaces, awkward layouts, three or four fonts per page, and covers that look like they came straight out of the template cover generator?

When I look at a book cover with 6 lines of type on it, and every line is a different font or weight, with type that’s been digitally distorted, with big chunky drop shadows, I have to take a few deep breaths.

And that leaves me with a question: Why are the self-published authors of books about self-publishing so unconcerned with how their books look? Why are they convinced they don’t need a book designer? Why don’t they want to create a book that looks great?

 

This is a reprint from Joel Friedlander‘s The Book Designer.

Phoster is a fantastic application for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, perfect to create posters, cards, invitations and, yes, ebook covers.

I’ve used the word “create” instead of “design” because it better describes what you’ll be doing.

You don’t need to design a layout, it’s already done by the developers of the application, folks from Bucket Labs – Phoster comes equipped with as much as 72 layout templates. All of them are top-level design. Thanks to that the application can be a very powerful tool to create professionally looking ebook covers.

Below I’ll show you how easy it is to create a cover. The general advise is to keep things simple and not to change the layouts too much. They are perfect as they are and there is no need to improve them.

4 steps of creating a cover with Phoster

I’ll create a cover for a book about mobile natives (I hope one day I’ll write this book).

1. Choose a template

I’m sure you’ll find a template which is closest to your needs. Layouts differ in selection of fonts, position of text boxes and a general style. For each of the template, in a next step you can add a picture. You can also leave a background as it is or just change its color – this would make a nice non-fiction book cover.

When you’ll be selecting a template just keep in mind that you can’t add any more text boxes. So, pick up the template, which is closest to what you want and has enough number of text fields positioned where you want them to be.

For my book I’ve chosen the template below. I like simple design and I want to use a picture which will work best with the title aligned to right. I also need only three text boxes – two for the title and one for the author.

After choosing a template, tap on a Next button at the bottom right.

 

 

2. Insert a photo or choose a color of the background

Use an icon of a camera to add a picture, either directly taken or from a photo library. You can make basic color adjustments within the application (brightness, contrast and saturation) by tapping on a slider icon.

Remember, you can always use one of the photo applications, which can give a stylish look to your picture. I’m sure you have one of them: Instagram, PictureShow, Camera+ or Hipstamatic.

Second option is not to add a picture, but only change a background’s color. To do that, tap again on a slider icon – you’ll see at the top a set of predefined colors to pick up from.

I’ll be using for my cover a photo previously edited in PictureShow (by the way, you can see a #1picstory made with it). As you see it’s dark enough to use against white letters and there is a lot of space in the upper right corner. That’s where I’ll place the title.

 

3. Type the text

To change text tap on a “T” icon. An edit box will appear, where you can replace the existing text with your own title. Use Previous and Next buttons to switch between text boxes. Alternatively you can open the edit box if you quickly tap on the text.

You can change the color, the size and the font style of the text. There is a plenty of typefaces to choose from, but I recommend to keep the predefined style. Any major change may break the original design idea of the template.

If you want to move a text box, tap and hold it until you see a shadow.

I moved the title a bit to the right and higher. As you see, I didn’t change anything else.

 

 

4. Choose the effect

After you’re finished with texts and pictures, tap Next to move to the last step – applying the effect.

This is the most enjoyable part of the work. There are 19 style available. You can select one of the vintage styles, including paper and dust textures, or you can decide to use color stripes or patterns (see picture below).

I’ve selected a simple pattern and the cover looks like this. What do you think?

Although Phoster is positioned as a tool to create posters, cards, invitations, I think it’s an awesome way to create professionally looking ebook covers. It’s one of those mobile applications which redefine our approach to creation. You can focus solely on finding a concept and big picture, leaving the craft to the application itself.

Phoster costs $1.99 (iTunes link). Consider it as a money spent for a professional cover artist, who gives you 72 proposals of the layout.

Remember to include credits to Phoster in your ebook. Write down a link to both the application at iTunes and the developer’s webpage: http://www.bucketlabs.net.

Read also about another great tool, Wordle. You can use it to create great-looking covers based on a word cloud from your book.

 

This is a reprint from Piotr Kowalczyk‘s Password Incorrect.

The price of a book is what really matters to readers. It’s where self-published authors can compete with traditional publishers, as the examples of Amanda Hocking or J.A. Konrath show.

Many Kindle Store writers choose $0.99 price tag. They can afford it, as the cost of publishing an e-book is close to zero. E-bookstores equip the authors with the online tool – the dashboard – where they can publish a book in a few steps, and it usually takes a couple of minutes.

I’ve been testing many e-book platforms and their publishing dashboards. My favorite ones are Amazon (Kindle Direct Publishing), Smashwords, Feedbooks and Narcissus.

At a basic level the only thing you’ll need to prepare is a perfectly edited and formatted text of a book, in a proper file format (mostly required are doc, rtf, txt, html and epub). You don’t even need a cover of the book. Some platforms, like Feedbooks, display a default book cover with a title and author, if the cover file was not uploaded by the author.

Most authors do want book covers, though – and they are perfectly right. But if you can’t afford to hire a professional cover artist, you can always check what technology has to offer. One thing to remember: if you are not planning to print a book, the size of a cover doesn’t have to be high and it will have a screen resolution anyway. It’s where possibilities are.

First, you can download and use Gimp, a free and simple to use image editing program. But what if you’re not very much into design? There are still some solutions. You can, for example, use one of data visualization tools – they can do a design work for you. Some time ago I described how to use Wordle, a tag cloud generator, to prepare a book cover. A good thing about such a cover is that it’s at the same time a tag description of your book (see example, below right).

Another idea for a cover design – use photo applications on your smartphone. You can make a picture and apply one of cool filters, which will bring a tonality and feel you want. Applications I recommend for iPhone and iPod Touch are PictureShow, Camera+, PhotoStudio and Hipstamatic. PictureShow has also an option to insert a text, so you can in fact design a cover completely on your cellphone. 

And here comes the technology again. Formats like epub or mobi allow text to be adjusted by the user of a specific device or application. That means that if you read in a Kindle application on your Android tablet, every book will look the same – according to preferences you selected.

In other words: you don’t need a specific page layout design, unless you really want it.

Next thing, most important one – editing. The most popular way is to ask for help a fellow writer, but there are also very interesting tools, which can help you go through this process for free.

The most known and successful one is Bite-Size Edits. It’s a crowdsourcing platform where other writers can edit the text you submit, sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph. This service is both fun and useful and what’s even more important – it’s a smart way to connect writers and readers.

 

This is a reprint from Piotr Kowalczyk‘s Password Incorrect.