Operation Navajo Book Blog Tour and #Giveaway #LoneStarLit

Operation Navajo–Book Trailer #2 by Award Winning Author Anita Dickason from Anita Dickason on Vimeo.

Designing Covers: My Interest in Graphic Design

Guest Post by Anita Dickason

I’m not sure which I enjoy more, writing or designing graphics. My interest in graphic design started after I wrote my first book, JFK Assassination Eyewitness: Rush to Conspiracy: The Real Facts of Lee Bowers’ Death. The book was published by Archway Publishing. I soon learned I had no control over the book. Nada! None! I don’t own the distribution rights or even the copyright to the cover.

I decided if I planned to continue writing, I wanted full control over what happened to my books. I created my own company, Mystic Circle Books & Designs, LLC. As a result, in retirement, it was back to school, taking online courses on writing, publishing, and graphic design. The design phase started with book covers but soon expanded into bookmarks, bookplates, social media banners, a column about writing and publishing titled On the Hunt, and then into videos. Yes, videos, I have a new addiction. To date, I’ve done about 35 on everything ranging from book trailers to Mother’s Day and even toilet paper missing in the stores. What fun.

For many of my designs, I deconstruct an image, then reassemble elements into a new image.  In Sentinels of the Night, the key issue was the owl’s eyes. Owls have a special place in mythology. To die is crossing over the owl’s bridge. I enhanced that mystique into the cover. They are the Messengers of Death.

In Going Gone!, the plot starts with the escape of a kidnapped six-year-old boy who is the son of a U.S. Senator. My heroine, a private investigator, inadvertently rescues the child on a foggy backroad in East Texas. I should mention I like strong female characters, and my heroines kick ass. I deconstructed three images to create the final cover.

The truck emerging from a bomb blast was an image for the book trailer for A u 7 9. I had to remove the motorcycle and helicopters from the background. I extracted an 18-wheeler from another photo. I also added a bit of special effects to the truck. I did the same for the SWAT team. I added a larger helicopter and enhanced the smoke and flames, pulling them around the truck.

NOT DEAD was complicated. The cover was created using elements from six images. The main character, the doll, needed a lot of work. This is the doll portrayed in the book. After extracting the doll from the original image, I enhanced the damage to her face, added an eye, deepened the grey in the hair, and added highlights around her throat and front of the dress. When I enlarged the image, I didn’t like the appearance of the hand against her dress. I removed the original one and built a new hand.

Operation Navajo was interesting. The plot deals with cybercrime. When I reversed the image, the mouse was on the wrong side of the keyboard. I had to move it to the other side. I also built a new pyramid from the back of a dollar bill, and accented the glow behind the pyramid, then dropped it onto the computer screen on the desk and added a 3D effect to the final image.

My designs can be viewed on Pinterest and my videos on my website.