We present our Fantasy Book Cover Cliches Gallery 2. What turns a fantasy book cover into a cliche? Colors? Composition? Typefaces? The hundreds of copy-cat covers thrown onto the band-wagon?
We present a few more familiar cover classics.
Soft focus like a shampoo commercial
Bigger dragon, smaller girl.
Monumental architecture
A girl, a sword, a sunset.
Big author, small title. More swords & sunsets
Runes, cut-outs and a big Sans-Serif font
These are brilliant. You’re a comedy writer?
Thank you. I have written sketch comedy and sitcom.
So many gags in the Dragon Breath cover. How long do these take you to mock up?
Far too long. I pretend I’m being creative when really I’m procrastinating.
You got me with the Sanderson parody. I thought it was the real thing.
This is what gets me about the language of book covers. Fonts, tropes, backgrounds. You can knock off a decent ‘me-too’ cover with not much effort.
Swords Against Sunsets. I’d read that.
I’m tempted to write it. Somewhere between Eragon and Watchtower. If only I had time.