Jason Platt Drawing Demo

Watch as Jason Platt goes through his process of drawing his main character from his graphic novel, Middle School Misadventures: Dance Disaster!

Creating the cover for Dance Disaster

There are a certain number of challenges when creating the cover for a book. When you’re both the author and illustrator for a graphic novel you also have the luxury of being able to make the cover exactly as you’d like it. With the exception of comic book covers, usually the same artist that does the interior art will also do the cover art as well.

Prose novelists don’t usually have this luxury. They might have an idea that they’d like to see for the cover, and their ideas will certainly be heard, but ultimately the cover design will be determined by the editor, designer, and publisher.

Covers for Middle School Misadventures and Middle School Misadventures: Operation Hat Heist!

With my first two books, Middle School Misadventures, and Middle School Misadventures: Operation: Hat Heist!, Newell was alone on the cover. And while I wanted to replicate having Newell be the focus (he is the hero of our story after all) I wanted to incorporate his friends in the cover too. While we follow Newell throughout each story, his friends who make up the ensemble, are just as important. So I made sure that they were seen too.

Early pencils for the Middle School Misadventures: Dance Disaster cover

The working title for Dance Disaster was Wallflower Jinx. But it wasn’t a solid title, as Newell—at first—is super excited about going to Garfield’s school dance. So it wasn’t like he was on the sidelines of the dance or anything.

But design wise, you can see right off, that we are near the target of what the final design will be. Even now, I still like image of Newell’s back turned to us as he watches his friends cut a rug on the dance floor. But we decided to go with the pencil sketch on the right.

So next was the next phase: Inking and coloring.

Dance Disaster cover art, version 1

This first version wasn’t entirely a train wreck or anything. But even as I was working on this first attempt I knew it was far from what we were all looking for. Even though Newell’s posture works with the emotional struggle he goes through in the story, it was lacking a certain amount of energy that it was needing. And while I was overall happy with the color palette, the values had a dullness about them. I knew I needed to give them a little more life.

There were also three different levels of depth that I was working with, and all three needed to hold their own independently. 1) The background: This was a school dance, so I wanted to be sure I showed other kids having fun too. While I wanted to incorporate them I also needed to make sure they weren’t competing with the stars of the show. And I needed to make sure that they disappeared into the background. 2) The middle: Right smack-dab in the middle of it all are Newell’s friends. With the exception of Skyler, who is lumped in with the first group (foreshadowing maybe??), I wanted to be sure that they were in clearer focus from the crowd, but not pulling the focus from Newell. 3) The Front: Front and center stands our main character, Newell. I knew that by looking at this version he wasn’t dynamic enough here. Even though his hierarchy was front and center, his friends were more fun to look at.

I had some changes to do.

But you got to start somewhere right? You can’t solve a problem until you know there’s a problem to solve. So even though this was a setback, it was a setback leading in the right direction. I could see what was working, and what wasn’t.

So I took what my editor and I liked about this version and moved forward.

Dance Disaster cover art, version 2

You can tell right away that things are moving in the right direction here in this 2nd version. Along with beefing Newell up, I also added more contrast with the colors. I also pushed Newell’s friends back just a touch giving Newell all that more focus.

Even though I was pleased in the direction version 2 was headed, I knew it wasn’t the be all end all. It was time to move on to version 3.

Dance Disaster cover art, version 3

With version 3 you can see how incredibly close we are to the fished cover art. In Dance Disaster, Newell is originally excited to go to the dance because he’s able to reprise his famous dance move, The Shake and Slide. And we thought we’d incorporate it into the cover and it was exactly the right amount of energy we were looking for.

The only thing we weren’t sure about were the glasses or not. The concern I had with having them on was that they made Newell look older. Which I guess was successful since that is what Newell’s after in the story (esp. since he’s wearing a tie too). So we went back and forth on whether to have the glasses on or not.

Eventually, we decided to have them off. But, as you can see by the final art, we ended up having them flying off of him mid-dance.

The only thing that I haven’t mentioned is that whenever I adjusted the position of Newell’s body (or even the size of it), I also had to adjust the crowd in the background. One of the reasons why Newell’s left arm (in the cast) is angled up a touch is so we have a clear view of Lilly, Max, and Skyler dancing in the background. There were many times I just wish I could have called out to them and said, “Okay, Lilly, Max, Skyler? Yeah, you three—can you all just move slightly to the right? That’s perfect. And now Collin and Clara? Can you inch a touch to the left? Great! And Newell, just angle your arms just a little bit—stop!—that’s perfect! Okay… hold still everybody and… * shutter click * got it!”

Dance Disaster, final cover art

And here is the final art for the cover for Dance Disaster!

They say that you should never judge a book by its cover. While that’s true, there is so much beyond throwing an image onto a book and slapping the title on it. There are so many things to think about when designing a cover like this. Between the front and back cover of a book is the whole story. But the cover is the first thing the audience sees. It’s where their first spark of interest comes from. It’s something that you want to be proud of.

And I’m so proud of it.

-- Middle School Misadventures: Dance Disaster is available for pre-order right now and comes out April 5th to your favorite bookstore!