I’m in search of book cover design services for my new fantasy novel, but I’m feeling overwhelmed by the number of choices out there. How do you find a designer who truly understands your genre and can capture the essence of your story? Should I opt for a specialized service or an independent freelance designer? Cost is a factor too, but I don’t want to compromise on quality. What should I look for in a designer’s portfolio? If you’ve had success (or challenges) with a particular service, please share your insights. Any tips or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!
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Do you have an idea of what you want in terms of style? Do you know what your budget is? I can recommend some people. Two of which I’ve worked with.
Independent or specialized, you’d probably have to keep a look out for AI and even specify that you don’t want that 
You’d probably also want to see if that person is comfortable doing the style you’re looking for.
When I was looking for a cover artist before, I knew I wanted a bipedal feline on the cover, so I looked through their portfolio to see if they might have done a bipedal animal in the past. If they did, that means they might be willing to take on my idea.
This part is half their responsibility and half your responsibility. Of course they need to be knowledgeable, but you’ll need to be able to tell them what you want on the cover, too. It’ll probably be helpful to you if you go look at fantasy books which are in the same sub-genre as yours and see what kind of things they put on the cover.
I went and looked for covers that I liked and put them all together in one file so I could look at them all at once. I pulled out what I liked about those covers. Did they all have flowers in them? Since for one of my books, roses are big part of the story, I thought I would like some roses on the cover.
I also liked covers that had silhouette illustrations of creatures or things that appear in the story. So, I thought about the important elements in my story. I have a rabbit in a hat, ominous fangs or claws, a strange building, forests…
For me, I didn’t want too much realism on the cover, so when I went to search for artists, I did specifically look for people who did vector art or minimalist illustrations.
When it came to actually contacting, I did contact a few at the same time asking availability and price for my idea. They might say one thing on their website but once you contact them, it might be different. Depending on the design, might cost more or less.
For me, I had a pretty clear idea of what I wanted. If you don’t know, it probably doesn’t hurt to ask the artist what they would recommend that you do. They’d probably ask you what the book is about, I would guess. Then you’d probably go from there figuring out what works and doesn’t.