Black Opium - I like this one because it uses the title in a more free, loose way than I normally do, and I think it fits well with the image and the story's subject matter. It annoys me that it and Shot in the Dark (see below) use almost exactly the same color scheme, but what are you gonna do? That thought only occurred to me when I put them next to each other on this page.

Confessions of a Park Avenue Playgirl - Probably my favorite design, this has a real happy, sexy feel. This is the kind of book that wouldn't shy away from it's sexual content, but winks at you the whole time, taking none of it too seriously.

Dead Man's Eyes - There's a new line of paperback mystery/crime novels called Hard Case Crime, which uses a mixture of old and new material by old and new writers. Part of the motif of these books are their covers--classic, old-timey looking paintings--to go with the hard-bitten contents. While it's odd to buy a book just for its cover, I've found I really enjoy these books and already read about nine or ten of them.

Anyway, some of the people they use are the best in the business, people like illustration legend Robert McGinnis. Obviously, I would love to do work for HCC, but I knew my style wouldn't really match what they've traditionally been using. But I knew I wanted to try anyway. I was mulling it over for a few days, until late one Sunday night when, for whatever reason, I couldn't fall asleep (this was pre-dog; now I grab every second of sleep available to me). While I lay there, I got an image in my head of what my sample book cover would be. It just popped in there, like the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.

So I sat down and tried to pull this thing together while it was still fresh in my head. Instead of using pre-fab titles and taglines from old paperback books, I wrote it all myself to match the image I had created. I messed around with the colors, as I usually do, so after a couple of hours I had this pretty much finished. Trying to get it look more old-timey, I did "hand draw" the city outline, to give it that loose, jazzy feel--a kind of Naked City sort of thing.

The Girl From Midnight - Chronologically, this was my first of the smutty paperback book covers, where I took an established title, author, and tagline, but composed my own illustration and design to match.

It got started when my friend Sean Tiffany told me that the most popular pieces on his ispot page were of sexy girls. I wanted to test this on my own ispot page, so I decided to purposely illustrate a very alluring woman, but incorporate some sort of design. I don't remember how I got the idea to do a paperback cover, other than I've always been a fan of them, and have lots of books on paperback art, so the whole thing was in my blood, I guess.

I worked on it late at night and really enjoyed the process--one I had the illustration part down, messing around the with design was pure bliss. While all the subsequent paperback designs I've done I think are better and more complex, this does have a basic cleanness that I still think holds up.

A Hell of a Woman - This is so different than the way I would normally think to design a cover that I'm a little amazed I didn't rework it to death. The title felt to me like it was about a very confident, assured woman--a hell of a woman.

So I liked putting the title on big, bigger than I normally would think to, and in a strong, assured font. The woman in question is staring right at you, in a very relaxed, confident position. Using the hell-ish colors was a no-brainer, and once I had those in place I got the idea to wipe away some of the lettering as if the heat was burning its way through the title.

Hot Rod - I hadn't done a paperback book cover in a while, so when I had a hole in my schedule I worked this up, and I think its one of my best designs. It's a little busier and kitchy-ier than I normally do, but I dig it and it was a real joy to work on.

And no, I have no idea what those numbers mean; I just thought they looked cool and fit the whole hot rod/dragstrip feel of the cover.

Vroom! Vroom!

Island Girl - As much as I like the main portrait I came up with for this, it was the color scheme of blue and green that I really liked. Once I dropped that green in, I really didn't bother experimenting further.

Like I've done with the other covers, I go and search for an existing genuine period paperback title and tagline. Once I saw a book called Island Girl I knew I had the right title for my image. The font I thought fit perfectly, as well--a retro and relaxed kind of look, with the semi-threatening image and tagline (The spell of the tropics was in her look...and love was her favorite game!) working against that, which I thought made for some nice tension. One of my most simple paperback covers, but I think one of most effective.

I wanted more of a mystery thriller cover instead of the lurid nudie look, so no sex here at all--you've got a tough-looking dame holding a gat, looking over her shoulder, either ready to kill or be killed.

I think my favorite part is the blood spatter on the "goodbye." I thought the cover needed one extra little something, and then I remembered I had this graphic in my files from when I used it on a poster. I dropped it in, and it was exactly what I wanted. I never throw anything away.

The title I saw in my head going with this image doesn't belong to any actual sleazy paperback that I'm aware of, so I broke my normal guideline for doing these and just appropriated an author and tagline from a vintage book. I thought the title--while definitely sleazy--had just enough lightness and humor to it that it wouldn't make the cover look too extreme.

Same with the image--it's clearly meant to tittilate, but I thought with the coloring and the little sunbursts that the whole thing gives off the vibe of trashy fun, the kind of book you buy at a newsstand while waiting for a bus, and you keep face down on your lap so no one else can see what you're reading...

Negative of a Nude - Negative of a Nude uses a neat color scheme, and I like the checkerboard pattern a lot (it looks very period to me), but now that I look at it again, I think maybe the subject is too dark and grim looking. I do like the sketchy lines, though.

No Time For Sleep - Probably my all-time favorite paperback cover, I think this is the perfect synthesis of illustration and design, if I do say so myself. You can pretty much figure out what "no time for sleep" means, and if you don't, the scantily-clad woman looking right at you oughta close the deal.

The all-hearts background works to me as both a sort of realistic wallpaper look (like something you might see in an old-time bordello), or just a pure design element. The title combined with the tagline looks like a smiling face to me, which is a nice bonus. I also like the semi-bifarcated look, with all the color at the top and just black at the bottom.

Pure Sweet Hell - I wanted to do a little more of a realistic scene for this one, so even though the subject is looking into the camera, you do get some sense of a scene here. Maybe the woman is looking into a mirror at the guy behind her...hey, that works!

I do like the bright yellows contrasting against all the dark of the room, too. You know that this story is about her.

I told him the book had the feel to me of an old paperback-y type story, and I wanted to come up with that kind of cover for it. Dan, too shy to say "I didn't ask" agreed to let me try and come up with something. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, this proved to be probably the single-hardest piece I ever worked on. I came up with half a dozen different ideas, none of which pleased me. I would get so frustrated I would move onto other work and hope lightining would strike at some point.

Part of my problem was, since I knew this was for a friend, I was second-guessing myself too much, and after a talk with Dan on the phone (he lives in Hawaii, the S.O.B.) I decided to just work on it as if it was one of my paperback exercises and put the "end client" out of my mind.

Once I did that, the piece came together remarkably quickly. I didn't worry too much about it matching the book's contents too closely, since those old-timey paperbacks never did, either. I messed around with some colors, Dan made some suggestions (which I had planned to ignore, but, as Paul Simon said "got to keep the customer satisfied") and pretty soon I had something we both liked. Finally.

(Btw, the book can be puchased here!)

Shot in the Dark - Shot in the Dark has quickly become one of my favorites--I like the multi-tiered images, and it has a playfulness that I think is sometimes missing in my work. I dunno, I'd buy a book with this cover.