The Slippery Soapbox

by **stardragon9** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 2:53 pm

Hey everyone, just having a moment and wanted to pose a question: was there ever a time when you put a lot of hard work into designing a cover, posting it and then noticed that no one had downloaded it (no matter how long ago you posted it)? Do you ever feel disappointed by this? Or am I just crazy for wondering this?

Secondary thought, is there anywhere I can put out an open request line? I just want to see if there are any specific movies people want me to make vhs style covers for. Thanks.

by **alienmem** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 4:29 pm

Never even thought about it. I don't know but I could almost swear that most of my covers have 0 to almost none downloads since I like stuff most people don't.

by **stardragon9** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 5:44 pm

Thanks for the reply alienmem. I'm sorry if I sound like a jerk. Today has just been one of those days both at work and in my home life. I should expect that there will be some covers that people just don't like (plus there are those covers that EVERYONE has made a custom for). Please excuse my small rant.

My second question still stands though.

by **chouette** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 5:50 pm

I blame CT, lol - Seriously, what you do is great work Star, but maybe like Alien, it might not be a popular demand. VHS style covers might be in that category, I don't know.

You can put out an open request line for cover designing in the Design Central (Design Discussions).

by **stardragon9** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 5:54 pm

chouette wrote:I blame CT, lol - Seriously, what you do is great work Star, but maybe like Alien, it might not be a popular demand. VHS style covers might be in that category, I don't know.

You can put out an open request line for cover designing in the Design Central (Design Discussions).

Thanks chouette!

by **chouette** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 8:18 pm

Not a problem my friend, and to answer your subject line... you are not crazy! lol

by **Wrench** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 8:34 pm

Crazy; we're all a bit crazy

by **tmscrapbook** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 10:05 pm

I don't worry about the number of downloads as 99.9% of my covers are created by request. If the person requesting them didn't download them, then I would be bummed!

by **ctaulbee** » Apr Sun 15, 2018 10:32 pm

The custom cover community is pretty varied in their tastes from what I've seen over the years, end of the day they like what they like and it's very hard to predict.

I've made covers that I thought were rather slick that nobody liked or if they did they sure did not download them.

At the same time I've done what I felt were very sad looking efforts, only to have them get rather good download numbers.

One thing that drives downloads is the movies themselves, if it's a popular new release then it will almost certainly get downloads, if it's a older film or a niche market film then the odds of it being very popular are not so good no matter how cool the cover.

I will say this some people actually collect covers based on the "art" aspect alone, meaning how cool was the design and not necessarily becasue they ever intend to buy the disc or print it out.

To cite you a different example in the opposite vain, I've seen some of my Disney covers pinned on Disney boards, probably not becasue they thought them cool but simply becasue they aligned with the theme of the graphics they were collecting.

Like Alien said most, myself included make covers to suit our own needs or whims, we then share those and if others like then fine, if not no harm done as everyone has their own tastes.

If you are doing this for download numbers (which is fine by the way) then I can tell you that you will have to give some serious thought to the titles you pick and the style you use for that to work out.

Chouette is correct as usual on where to put a open requests topic, understand though that requests are generally for one person, the requester, and again may have little to no appeal to anyone else as Pam so eloquently said.

At the end of the day most of us make covers simply becasue we love the hobby.

by **alienmem** » Apr Mon 16, 2018 7:31 am

Some nice answers. Very nice, I must add.
I do covers as a hobby but out of necessity as well since it's very rare that a film I love has already a cover(let alone covers) for me to just snatch it(them). I'm actually a very lazy cover designer(If I may call myself a designer at all. I don't think I'm worthy of that title yet, at least in terms of my output compared to other designers who clearly are more artistically inclined. I never was good at drawing. Never was good in art classes or hand crafts. I loved science much more)
So this whole cover thing, at least for me, started out of necessity, but as I grew to understand photoshop better(i rarely watch tutorials anymore), i started to like it more and more.
I'm still a very lazy guy. I can take from 10 hours or less(if it's a very simple thing) to a week, doing little things at a time. And I also like to look at a buch of covers and detect things that i like, so i'll maybe do the same kind of stills bar this design has and a codebar likt that cover and use the same font as another one...bla bla....i'll stop here because one of the things i like most in life is talking...lol

by **stardragon9** » Apr Mon 16, 2018 2:01 pm

Thanks for the responses everyone. I appreciate the kindness this forum affords to crazy people.

As for the downloads thing, I should know that there will be those covers which only a few people like. Heck, when I started creating covers I was just making them for myself. I need to get my mind back to that (although if people have constructive criticism about a cover I more than welcome them). Thanks again everyone!