Branching out

New year, new projects. Today I got a book cover assignment. It fell into my lap at a crazy busy time (three magazine issues simultaneously), but I am excited to design something new despite my schedule. It's my first book cover--well, first real, live, not-student-work cover--of my career, so of course I'm feeling a little pressure. In preparation, tonight I'm sitting down to research and come up with a few ideas. I'm fairly sure it's going to be typographic (tradition dictates, but I'm going to attempt to mix it up), and since it's a business book, it'll have to be fairly straightforward.

My challenge is keeping it fun and interesting while reinventing--yet staying true to--a 5-year-old, stale brand.

Let's look at some samples. I chose these covers in the first two minutes of searching. My requirements were simple: that the cover jump out at me. Now, granted, I am looking online without any of the distractions of the newsstand. But, I think they can all be called straightforward and simple, and not hugely surprising (a great contrast color), each cover uses red.

Off for more research. I'll check back in with my progress later! Here's a look at the covers I pulled (above).