Forgotten Futures XI cover

[ffutures]

Here's my first stab at the cover for Forgotten Futures XI - it's likely that this will be replaced by something else as I go, but I just wanted to have something in my mind to be going on with. After it was done I remembered that I'd originally planned to call the game Planets of Peril, not Perilous Planets. So which would you prefer? And do you like the cover anyway?



[Poll #1251444]

Comments

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

Is 1 the best rating, or the worst?

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Worst, I think.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

In that case I think I'll say 7. The basic design looks fairly neat, but the big cylinder at lower left seems obtrusive; I can't figure out if it's a part of the ship's structure (if so, it looks out of proportion) or a space station or something that it's flying past (if so, I think it's an unnecessary complication). It gives the whole design kind of an industrial modernist effect, where you show all the working parts with no attempt to make them elegant, whereas I tend to associate 1930s sf with more an art deco style.

[liliaeth]

I have to say that the text is too big, it obscures the picture too much. It would be better to either make the picture smaller so it's put next to the text, or to make the text smaller so it fits into the empty parts of the picture.

As it stands you can barely see the picture and it makes the text itself hard to read.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Eventually I'm aiming for a look more like a 1930s SF magazine, as I said this is more of a placeholder to give myself something to visualise than a serious attempt at a cover. But good point about the text covering the illustration, that's something I'll need to bear in mind for later efforts. Apart from anything else there's too much black in this version, anyone trying to print it on an inkjet will get poor results, I need to come up with something that will be OK in inkjet and laser, mono and colour.

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

I'd recommend outlining the text in white or light yellow. For an unobstructed view of the art, put it in a box on the back (in addition).

[doctor-toc.livejournal.com]

For a book called "Perilous Planets" or "Planets of Peril" (my choice), it seems odd that there isn't a planet on the cover.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Good point... maybe Lowell's Mars and a spaceship. I'll give it a shot.

[lawbag.livejournal.com]

Is the cover 3D computer artwork, or hand-drawn?

Considering the nature of the subject a hand-drawn sci-fi pulp cover would work better.

Planet of Peril sounds so much classier too.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

You haven't seen my hand drawing...

[lawbag.livejournal.com]

Im sure there must be someone on Livejournal who would be willing to create a cover for free, just to get their work in print.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I would be happy to go that route, but people who can match the 1930s style are few and far between. I'm hoping to fake something up, there may be public domain art around that can be adapted to my needs.