Creating a cover for my webcomic books

Creating my webcomic book cover for print on Amazon KDP

I have all the pages set up for the book and ready to go and then at the end it's like "oh right I still need to create the cover for the book!"

I don't know why but this part always makes me the most anxious. Maybe it's because it's the way the book is going to be represented?

It's so weird, in my books I'm telling very personal things in my webcomics themselves but the cover is the thing that is making me anxious.

I mean this is gonna be what I show when I say to people, hey I created this book you should check it out!

Maybe I'm being silly I don't know?

Using other books as references for the cover

What I did to kind of help me with this is I would reference these old comic strip books that I have. I like the styles of these books and I collect them.

Collection of old comic strip paperback pocket books

I have shelves of them! I just like the way they look, I like having them around. I like to open them. I just think they're really cool.

I use these as a reference because I figure they knew what they were doing. They put a lot of these together for different comic strips so why not kind of just reference this and do what they did.

(BTW you can check out my vintage illustrated books collection in my eBay store here - https://ebay.us/p4XJXw)

Using the Amazon KDP cover template

I downloaded the cover template that they had on Amazon KDP and figure out the layout for the cover.

I used the Amazon print cover calculator tool to get the proper template I should download. Using this creates the right size for the spine based on the page count.

Using the Amazon print cover calculator tool

The cover template also has the things they put on it for print like the ISBN barcode (You can get an ISBN code free in KDP by the way), and where the bleed areas are for print.

Using the cover template I downloaded in GIMP

The book sizes I'm making these days are 8 by 5 inches.

My final book cover image

Here is the cover after I was done creating it in my image software program.

My finished book cover artwork

Also, KDP has a cover-making tool built into the upload process that I could use too. That cover-making tool tells me if there are any formatting issues. it's kind of really like a catch-all for mistakes.

Check out my video for more

I made a video talking more about this and the whole process of making my webcomic book. You can check that out on the site here! Making a Webcomic Book on Amazon - Part 2

Artwork for the original Candy Land game by Milton Bradley from 1955.

I have a vintage Candy Land game from 1955 by Milton Bradley and I was about to sell it so I thought I would add it to my personal art history course concept I've been doing . I'm going to try and see if I can find out how this game was created, designed and why? Here is what I found out about this game https://candy-land.fandom.com/wiki/Candy_Land_Wiki Candy Land is a board game about children exploring a world made out of candy and other sweets that originally came out in 1949. In every version of the game, there are a group of children that go through Candy Land. In the earliest versions of the game, it was a realistically drawn boy and girl. Drawing of the Candy Land kids I did on my phone ☝ https://board-games-galore.fandom.com/wiki/Candy_Land The game was designed in 1948 by Eleanor Abbott , while she was recovering from polio in San Diego, California. It's rumored that Eleanor also did the original artwork but I didn't find anything that

Some history about artist Alex Toth

So recently I decided I was going to try and learn something about each item in my toy collection and the artwork behind it . Kind of like my own impromptu art history class. Then I'm going to sell it so I can start collecting more! :) Moltar One of the first things I put up for sale was this Space Ghost Coast to Coast Moltar Action Figure from back in 2000. By the way, I learned a valuable lesson when shipping this item to the person who bought it. Never let the people at the post office touch your collectibles! The Space Ghost Coast to Coast show actually used the original artwork from the Hanna Barbera Space Ghost cartoon from the 1960s. Those characters were designed by Alex Toth . I knew his name but didn't really know anything else about him. Here is a sketch I did of Moltar on my phone. So I decided for my first art history lesson I would do a little bit of research on Alex Toth . he died at his drawing table on May 27, 2006, from a heart attac

Can I Buy And Resell Copies Of My Own Book From Amazon KDP?

There are two questions that I get asked about publishing my webcomic books on Amazon KDP . 1 - Can I Order A Print Copy Of My Own Book From Amazon KDP? When I started printing on Amazon KDP I also had that question. The reason I put the books together is I was just kind of doing it for myself. I could make a paperback version of my webcomic books and then I and my family could get a copy. It didn't even occur to me that I could actually start selling the book in public. I thought it was just print-on-demand and then maybe I could order one. But when I print a book on Amazon KDP I can also get up to 999 copies and sell it on my own! I was able to get my own copies from Amazon KDP sent to me. As the author, I can get them at printing cost . So they're at a discounted price. The option to order author copies is right in the KDP publishing setup. The button is next to the book in KDP. 👇 The other question I get about publishing my book on Amazon KDP... 2 - Can I Sell My A

Matty Sheets: Creating a music and art community - American Bandito Podcast S05E07

Up to this point I’ve only talked to people that are in or around where I am in Madison. Matty Sheets is a musician from Greensboro, North Carolina. In 2016 he was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and playing music started to become much tougher than they used to be. He wanted to keep doing things to artistically express himself so he decided to take up drawing. Listen to the episode: Available on: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify Visit Matty's website at https://mattysheets.com/

Tom Ray

Search This Blog