How to Create an Ebook Cover From a Digital Photo

This afternoon I decided that I wanted to try out a new cover for my novel, Mrs. Tuesday's Departure. I've actually been toying with this idea for quite some time because I'm one of those readers who really does judge a book by its cover and have had a long love affair with beautiful or compelling cover art. 

As lovely as this original cover is/was, I felt that it had a few flaws. One aspect of the shortcomings are simply due to the constraints of publishing as an ebook, where the picture of the cover is limited in size and by the graphic arts capabilities of yours truly. With my original cover, I loved the art work but felt that it might have been too dark given the small size and complexity of the picture. Then there was font that I used for the title and author's name...as pretty as they are, they are also difficult to read in the size presented on Amazon's website.

And of course, there's simply the fact that I love to tinker.

To start, I wanted to find new cover art. I considered using royalty free stock art and visited a few sites. Since I didn't find anything that immediately drew my interest, I began looking through my own digital photos. Which is when I came across this picture I took last winter.

The picture of the bird in winter ties in nicely with a compelling scene in the book and as a bit of esoterica, I will share that the original title of the book, during its first draft, was The Bird Feeder.

Once I'd chosen the photo, I went to my favorite site for fooling around with photos: www.fotoflexer.com and started working. I cropped the photo, sharpened the focus, and then added the title and author's name.

Then, thinking again of size, I made another version of the same cover increasing the size of the title and changing the color. I then uploaded the new cover to my book's page, replacing the original cover.

What is of greatest interest is whether the change of cover will have any impact on sales of the book. While the new cover may not be as 'pretty' as the original, I wonder if the larger photo subject and fonts will make it more compelling to browsers.

Of course, I change my mind again next week...it's very easy to create another cover or a variation of the original. Stay tuned.