Creating Your Book Cover

By Ron Miller, award-winning artist and author

http://www.lulu.com/content/brochure/creating-your-book-cover/237627

A brief introduction to the basics of good cover design. It describes what makes a good cover, how to handle typography and artwork and how to obtain art for your book (including a list of sources for free artwork). Illustrated in color with many examples.

To find out more about Ron Miller, check out his Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Miller_%28artist_and_author%29

Creating your book with Microsoft Word - a Tutorial

By Ken Anderson, Author

http://www.lulu.com/content/965104

A tutorial designed for those using the most popular versions of Microsoft Word but excluding Word 2007.

A free template is available with this tutorial.

The tutorial emphasises the use of Styles, the use of Page and Section Breaks, correct Page Numbering, the creation of a list of Contents as well as an Index for a book.

Whilst the tutorial shows how to create a 6” x 9” size book it can be applied to any size book with probably only an initial adjustment to the size of the margins necessary.

Copyright

Australia: http://www.copyright.org.au/information/cit020/wp0019

United States: http://www.copyright.gov or http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf

Canada: http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/cipointernet-internetopic.nsf/eng/wr00039.html

UK: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/types/copy.htm

 

ISBNs

Australia: http://www.thorpe.com.au/isbn/index.htm

Thorpe-Bowker has an English language version of the ISBN User's manual, an invaluable resource on the background of the ISBN and how they should be used, available on its website: http://www.thorpe.com.au/forms/files/ISBNUsersManual.pdf

United States: http://myidentifiers.com

Canada: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/isn/041011-1000-e.html

United Kingdom: http://www.isbn.nielsenbook.co.uk

 

PROFESSIONAL SOFTWARE

Professional Book Design Software

The industry-standard software for book interior design is Adobe InDesign. At the time of writing, the latest version is Adobe InDesign CS4. For covers, use Adobe Photoshop and/or Adobe Illustrator. For production of print-ready PDFs, use Adobe Acrobat Professional version.

Templates for Professional Software

A book interior template is available that demonstrates the use of paragraph styles and master pages in Adobe InDesign software:

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/exchange/index.cfm?event=extensionDetail&extid=1764524

Cover creation for books printed using the print on demand services of Lulu.com (using Photoshop CS3 and above): www.lonesomemoose.com/lulu/

FREE SOFTWARE

There are free alternatives to most of the professional software. The free programs do not have the same quality of functionality, documentation, and support as the high-end programs, and they are often clunky.

• Photoshop: Gimp www.gimp.org
• Illustrator: Inkscape www.inkscape.org
• InDesign: Scribus www.scribus.net
• Word/Office: OpenOffice www.openoffice.org
• DreamWeaver: Nvu www.net2.com

• Acrobat: Primopdf www.primopdf.com pdf995 www.pdf995.com dopdf www.dopdf.com

WRITING SOFTWARE

These are programs to assist with organizing your ideas while writing.

• Writer's Cafe - http://www.writerscafe.co.uk
• New Novelist - http://www.newnovelist.com
• Storybase - http://www.ashleywilde.com
• Scrivener (Mac only) - http://www.literatureandlatte.com

 

Book printing companies (including digital printers and print on demand service providers)

Lulu.com: www.lulu.com

Lightning Source (a part of the Ingram Group): www.lightningsource.com

Ligare: www.ligare.com.au

Griffin Press: www.griffinpress.com.au/digital/digital.asp

Digital Print Australia: www.digitalprintaustralia.com

CreateSpace (an Amazon.com company): www.createspace.com

Baker & Taylor: www.btol.com

Wordclay: www.wordclay.com

 

Ebook distributors/providers:

Lulu.com: www.lulu.com

Smashwords: www.smashwords.com

Kindle (Amazon.com): https://dtp.amazon.com/mn/signin