You may recall that I'm fond of a show called Doctor Who? Well, I'm not the only one, it's a rather popular show. One of the other fans out there is a guy called Philip Sandifer, and he likes it so much that he's decided to watch every (existing) episode and write a blog about them. Then, he compiles the blog, cleans it up, updates it and publishes it as a book. It's a very in-depth blog, I rather like it.
Anyway, when it came to the book he needed a cover and asked for people who would be interested in doing it. I contacted him and he said "Hey, that's cool, but you couldn't do anything that could get me into legal trouble, like a portrait of William Hartnell" (the subject of the first book). So I decided I'd do a spec cover to show I can do more than just portraits - but I was in the UK at the time, so I did it when I got back to the States.
Which I thought was pretty spiff, as did Philip when he saw it. Unfortunately while I'd been away someone else had done a cover for him, so mine didn't get used. He requested I not show my version publicly until after he'd published the book though. I had no issue with that, so since the book is now available (with the other artists cover) I can show you this and talk about it.
My first thought when told I couldn't use a likeness was to go very graphic with it. My second thought was to do something in the style of a book published at the time Hartnell played the Doctor (1963-66). Since I couldn't use his face I thought I could perhaps use the costume (which is perhaps even more distinctive on a per doctor basis). But since I didn't want the new book to look old I though I would do the cover as a picture of an old book on the white background of new cover (oh the post-modernism!). After that it was just a case of doing it.
There, that really didn't take long. I didn't polish it all that much since it was just a spec (which is also the reason the finished piece isn't print resolution - if he'd wanted it I would have to do it a second time, but better). After getting my graphic looking cover it was time to age it and wear it, which is not something I'm a stranger to.
I think the wear was around 15 layers of grime, creasing, chipping and so on. Probably half were created using photographs, the other half were done by hand. This resulted in the final "aged" cover that I would then add into the white background of the actual cover. The shadow of the book was a combination of Photoshop's layer effects and hand painting. I think it turned out rather well - although I prefer the aged version (not on the white) to the final spec cover.
As a consolation Philip said he'd let me know when his next book was in production if I wanted to do the cover to that. It won't be about Doctor Who apparently, but I think the subject matter might be even more fun to work with...
TARDIS Eruditorum is available in digital and print from Amazon.
No comments:
Post a Comment