# Ebook Cover Art



## Varin (May 12, 2009)

I just began to read The Hob's Bargain, by Patricia Briggs and wanted to take a look on the cover. But my computer was off and nowhere near by and then I remembered; hey, I can see the cover on my Kindle!

So I go to the menu and selected Cover.... only to find a picture that was less than an inch in size and pixelated as all get out. Darn. Those promo pictures of Kindles with the screen filled with a cover on the front page of this website is so misleading!

So I began to read another of Patricia Briggs' works, Dragon Bones, and dared to glance at the cover; this one, filled the whole Kindle screen and looked great!

I know it's a small thing, but why can't all books have a decent cover image for us Kindle users to see? I mean, some, like Dragon Bones are perfect, and I am not missing anything from the DTV of the book.

But others are cropped heavily with large margins, leaving much space on each side of  the kindle screen unused.

And there are many others in my library still that are like The Hob's Bargain, tiny, near illegible, with pictures far too small to make out.

That is of course, if the book even has a cover. Some books just have the Author's name and the title on it with some weird design on it, one that is NOT on the DTV of the book.

I hadn't realized I would miss something like the Cover Art so much until just now; I hope Amazon/Publishers/Whoever's in control of it, can do something about this in the future.


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## Jeff (Oct 28, 2008)

When the book is large, publishers sometimes omit cover art in order to keep the file size smaller.


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## Greg Banks (May 2, 2009)

Anarel said:


> I just began to read The Hob's Bargain, by Patricia Briggs and wanted to take a look on the cover. But my computer was off and nowhere near by and then I remembered; hey, I can see the cover on my Kindle!
> 
> So I go to the menu and selected Cover.... only to find a picture that was less than an inch in size and pixelated as all get out. Darn. Those promo pictures of Kindles with the screen filled with a cover on the front page of this website is so misleading!
> 
> ...


Actually, the images aren't cropped. They just used images much too small to fill the Kindle screen. All my books' covers were sized larger than the K1/K2 screen so that they could size it down to fit, and therefore look better. As it turns out, the sizes I used were perfect for the DX screen as well.


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## J. M. Strother (Jul 20, 2009)

Hi. Can anyone tell me if there is somewhere that gives the specs for what size the artwork should be? On-line guidelines? A good reference book you'd recommend? I am looking to publish for this format and am clueless as to how to size my cover art. Thanks.
~jon


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

One of these two books by our own Ed Patterson and Mike Hicks might have info on cover art:

Also, Greg Banks does cover art . . . .I'm sure he'll chime in with his thoughts. . .

Are You Still Submitting Your Work to a Traditional Publisher?

Publish Your Book On The Amazon Kindle: A Practical Guide


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## J. M. Strother (Jul 20, 2009)

Thanks, Ann. I'll check them out.
~jon


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## kevindorsey (Mar 4, 2009)

Jeff said:


> When the book is large, publishers sometimes omit cover art in order to keep the file size smaller.


that's what I noticed too.


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## Leslie (Apr 7, 2008)

J. M. Strother said:


> Hi. Can anyone tell me if there is somewhere that gives the specs for what size the artwork should be? On-line guidelines? A good reference book you'd recommend? I am looking to publish for this format and am clueless as to how to size my cover art. Thanks.
> ~jon


You'll need different sizes for different applications. For example, Mobipocket Creator wants a big file and if it is not big enough, you'll get a message to that effect. But uploading files on Mobipocket, they have size guidelines, which of course I am blanking on right now. 150 MB max file size, 350 x 500 pixels? Something like that. All Romance eBooks have a max of 200 x 300 pixels for the covers uploaded to their site.

I have gotten very adept at resizing covers in Photoshop.

L


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## J. M. Strother (Jul 20, 2009)

Thanks, Leslie. I'll do a Google search on Mobipocket Creator as well. I need to get my head wrapped around all this.
~jon


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## Robert Walker (Jul 21, 2009)

I have put my son the genius to work on my covers and he understands all the nuances of sizing, etc., and he's a genius with the images and lettering so that he has done all my fictionwise.com titles, 13 of them, and 8 of my 11 Kindle titles, and one DEAD ON was so good that the traditonal publisher, Five Star, has used it on the hardcover edition. This can be seen at Amazon or the Kindle store.
If you'd like to check out Stephen's work, his site is SRWalkerdesigns.com

Robert W. Walker, d'Author


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