A book cover I've been messing around with...

[kreynolds]

Something I've been working on for a PDF. I'm not particularly fond of the text though. Haven't found a typeface I really like yet.

 

[Malessa]

Wow, looks great! I like the text, but what other text did you have in mind?

 

[Psychotic Dreamer]

It is a very excellent design. I think the typeface captures the feel of magical items, but I would be interested in seeing what other ideas you have.

 

[Kilmore]

Well, the biggest problem I have is that the whitish spine looks like it could be one of those plastic bindings you can find on college workbooks or something. Maybe it's too regular. And um, white.

Yeah, the typeface looks similar to what I've seen on other 3E books, and that might be an identity problem.

 

[kreynolds]

Well, the biggest problem I have is that the whitish spine looks like it could be one of those plastic bindings you can find on college workbooks or something.

Its deceiving at such a low res (the original is 300dpi). Its actually not white at all. Here's a zoom of the binding. Do you think I should darken it some more though?

 

[kreynolds]

Wow, looks great!

Thanks!

I like the text, but what other text did you have in mind?

I'm not sure. The text in the sample is the same typeface that WotC uses for their Forgotten Realms line. Basically, I just slapped it in there in the early design phase to see how much room I had to work worth in regards to script and block fonts. I've been scouring the net for free fonts. I've found huge collections of really nice fonts, but nothing's really jumped out at me. The only one so far that I really enjoyed was the Dark Crystal font (in both outline and solid), but there might be some legal ramifications with that.

Here's a sample of that font...

 

[Malessa]

Is there a way you can create your own, or alter what you've found?

 

[kreynolds]

The main problem I have with this cover is that the metal texture I'm using is only screen resolution. The entire image is perfectly scalable, meaning all the highlights and shadows recalculate them selves no matter the resolution, whether it be 72dpi or 1200dpi, but the texture always looks the same because its so low res. While the rest of the image goes up in detail, the texture doesn't. It stays really small. If anybody knows where I can find some nice high res metal textures, that would be great.

Also, here's a sample of the interior layout. I really liked the basic layout of the DMG, so I tried to duplicate that to an extent to give me a running start. Obviously, I want the final layout to be original, but I don't have any samples for the prototype layouts I've made yet.

 

[kreynolds]

Is there a way you can create your own, or alter what you've found?

You bring up a good point. While I don't know a thing about the editing or creation of fonts, I'm decently skilled with Illustrator. Converting the Dark Crystal font, or any font for that matter, into vector art allows me to play around with the shapes until I've got something original. Unfortunately, I haven't liked my results yet, so I'm kind of at a dead standstill when it comes to the cover title typeface. I'm still playing around with it though.

 

[kreynolds]

Also, just for fun, I was messing around with this a while back. I'm sure many of you will recognize the portrait.