Cover Frustrations - A Better Way to Design a Free Cover

All of my covers except one were made from Canva templates. A few of them are fine, even more than fine in a few cases. But then there are the ugly ones.

A couple of them I've hated forever, but finding something good from among Canva's offerings is nearly impossible, so I've stuck with them. Because eight of my books are novellas, and because no one wants novellas (did I mention that?), I wasn't going to invest money in having a professional cover designed for them. Especially since I'm advertising these books for $1.99, even if I managed to sell ten copies (which I haven't), that wouldn't even finance a $35.00 GetCovers investment.

I already pay for a Canva subscription, and Canva works well for social media posts and what-not--it created a five-second video for me that I use on my author site--so Canva has always been my fallback for covers, too.

What I find, though, with Canva's templates is that they're so dull--visually. I suppose the correct description is "matte finish", which equals dull. They don't stand out, especially when compared to a bright, glossy cover. People browsing for books would probably think, dull cover = dull story.

As I'm in the midst of readying Book 2 of my anthology, I focused in on two of my novellas; re-read them, fixed the spots in the manuscripts that needed improvement, and re-uploaded the new versions to KDP. Then I got to thinking about their covers. I hate them. So, I went searching through Canva's templates once again. I even chose a couple and used them, only to find that I hate the new covers even more.

What's a penniless author to do? Apparently, there are one or two free design sites, but from reading about them, they each have a steep learning curve, and I refuse to go there. Plus, one has to supply her own images, so that would put me back at square one.

Then I thought about Pixabay. Both Pixabay and Pexels offer royalty-free images, and they're very similar to one another. They may even carry many of the same images. I chose Pixabay because I've used it many times in the past for various projects.

One might think, well, yay! Problem solved! Not exactly. Not being inclined to scroll through thousands of images, I needed to narrow my search down by a keyword or two. Okay, but which keyword? Let's say I choose "shadow" for my psychological thriller. Pixabay has 2,537 shadow images that are vertical in orientation. That's "only" 26 screens to scroll through. (I did it--found one possible but unlikely choice.) Next keyword--same drill. And really, how do I even know what I want? I could well be missing something that would be awesome because I chose the wrong search term.

And there's much more to consider than just the "right" image. How would it look as a cover? Do its colors signify the right genre? The right mood? Is there even room to add a title and author name that would be legible? 

What Pixabay and Pexels both have that beats Canva's covers to hell are their standout images. They're bright, sharp-focused. Eye-catching. To me, Canva's templates look like a copy of a copy. I know they're not, but were their artists instructed to only create covers that fade into the woodwork? Lifeless ones?

My current search term is "dark blue". That's right; I decided to search by color instead of mood or environment. As someone who was once an avid photographer, I know that the best photos are the surprising ones. Who knows what "dark blue" might deliver? If I get the first photo and move on to the second book, I'll do the same, only a different color.  

A great image, however, won't solve the font issue. That's where Canva actually can be helpful. A template's image can be replaced with a better one, while maintaining the original font. So, the next time I scroll through the templates, I'll be looking for an appropriate font and ignoring the rest.

All of this is conjecture right now, of course. I'm still on the hunt for images. But I do feel better knowing I have options. I don't like settling, which is what I've done with some of my book covers. Sometimes you just want to get on with it, so you go with "okay, I guess this is my best choice".

Why even bother, you're probably asking. Lifetime, I've sold 8 copies of Find My Way Home and 2 (count 'em) copies of Whispers in the Dark. I'm bothering because it matters to me. Nowadays, that's why I do anything publishing-related. I need my books to look good on my website; appealing. I need them to look good on Amazon, even though I'm the only one looking. 

When the age-old question pops up, who do you write for--yourself or readers--there you go. I have no readers. But my work matters to me, for my self-respect. If one person out of a million saw one of my books on Amazon, I don't want them to brush me off as someone who did "just enough" to get by. Whether anyone buys my books or not, I cared enough to present my best.