Cover art not as good as it used to be?

[Pariah32]

'a little cartoonish ( I'm looking at your Primogenitor); However the limited edition cover of David's new Warlord looks incredible!'

 

- ahem, are you sure? Fabius is a dark anime cover, warlord - teenager anime cover, lol

 

I am referring to the limited edition covers not the normal ones which for me are pretty standard affair stuff. The limited edition Warlord cover looks great the whole schematic of a Warlord head really does it for me. 

[HeritorA]

'a little cartoonish ( I'm looking at your Primogenitor); However the limited edition cover of David's new Warlord looks incredible!'

 

- ahem, are you sure? Fabius is a dark anime cover, warlord - teenager anime cover, lol

 

I am referring to the limited edition covers not the normal ones which for me are pretty standard affair stuff. The limited edition Warlord cover looks great the whole schematic of a Warlord head really does it for me.

Ahhh - you mean that one  http://www.blacklibrary.com/whats-coming-soon/april/fury-of-the-god-machine-ltd.html  - instead of that one http://www.blacklibrary.com/whats-coming-soon/april/fury-of-the-god-machine-hb.html

 

Yeap - LE are always done with love. In that case LE of Fabius is great too - W40K necronomicon in the making 

[R_F_D]

I know it is just a graphic but the one on the new e-Short, Ordo Sinister, looks excellent to me! Possibly the best one of the e-Shorts, in my opinion.

[Commissar Ibram Gaunt]

As someone who dabbles with a lot of digital painting which all the new stuff it is very easy to get carried away and make it too perfect and have no brush marks if that makes sense. Using masks and other cheats it is very easy to go too far and get what you would probably describe as the cartoon/comic look.

 

Go over and have a look on art station on digital 2d work and you can see what I mean. Their are a few real talented artists on there that manage to capture a real gritty and textured look of traditional techniques. For me they genrally hold far more mood and can build a real sense of tension. Keeping texture and grit in your image can be hard and they tend to lose their soul by been taken too far and the brush strokes been too precise and clean.

 

It could of course be that this is the particular style GW are after now for their books as we know they only now include actual art of the range they sell and no longer do the more abstract concepts we used to get. I know they have pretty brutal in the style of artist they higher so their is a type of look they are going for and this will be up to the judgement of the art director or person who commissions the work. I would beleive they would have a style guide they would use to keep what is a huge range consistent.

 

I feel the images are now also more colourful and upbeat than the darker grittier stuff we used to get. Which I think is for the worse. In many ways the black and white art we got in old codexes was far more characterful and set a real mood than what we have now.

 

We know Beasts Arises and HH both have their style to differentiate and keep them consistent ranges so there are a range of styles GW use to keep their lines distinct.

Edited March 8, 2017 by Commissar Ibram Gaunt

[Commissar Ibram Gaunt]

'a little cartoonish ( I'm looking at your Primogenitor); However the limited edition cover of David's new Warlord looks incredible!'

 

- ahem, are you sure? Fabius is a dark anime cover, warlord - teenager anime cover, lol

 

I am referring to the limited edition covers not the normal ones which for me are pretty standard affair stuff. The limited edition Warlord cover looks great the whole schematic of a Warlord head really does it for me.

Yeah the limited edition covers are great but funnily enough the art to do them is surprisingly simple and far easier than the other covers.

[HeritorA]

 

'a little cartoonish ( I'm looking at your Primogenitor); However the limited edition cover of David's new Warlord looks incredible!'

 

- ahem, are you sure? Fabius is a dark anime cover, warlord - teenager anime cover, lol

 

I am referring to the limited edition covers not the normal ones which for me are pretty standard affair stuff. The limited edition Warlord cover looks great the whole schematic of a Warlord head really does it for me.

Yeah the limited edition covers are great but funnily enough the art to do them is surprisingly simple and far easier than the other covers.

 

exactly. I think the most prominent and inspiring arts are done for Horus Heresy in the last 8 years. That doesn't mean that all the HH covers are great. Some are indeed abyssmal

[R_F_D]

Is the image BL are using for the BL Weekender a new Adrian Smith one of Gaunt?  I don't think I've seen it on any of the previous covers.http://www.blacklibrary.com/Images/BL/product-pages/2017/09-06-BL-TicketLaunch-page_01.jpg

[HeritorA]

Yeap - that 'Warmaster' cover through simple and having only Gaunt face on it is much better then the previous zombie Gaunt cover.

https://www.google.com.ua/search?q=Warmaster+by+Dan+Abnett&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjyqY7R38LUAhXna5oKHZVGBM0Q_AUICigB&biw=1920&bih=960#imgrc=iwbx89yQ4VRGMM:

[Ascanius]

 

They are not so good, comparing to the old quality of Wayne England

 

I'm speaking somewhat ill of the dead, here, but it's funny to see Wayne England praised on a 40K forum when, as someone more familiar with his work illustrating Dungeons & Dragons books in the Third Edition era, I always thought of him as "that guy who always draws monsters full-face like they're posing for a passport photo" . . . or "the other Wayne" since Wayne A. Reynolds was a much more dominant force in Third Edition D&D art and the cover artist for the core handbooks in Fourth Edition, as well as a major artist for the Third Edition clone Pathfinder.

[veterannoob]

Yeap - that 'Warmaster' cover through simple and having only Gaunt face on it is much better then the previous zombie Gaunt cover.

https://www.google.com.ua/search?q=Warmaster+by+Dan+Abnett&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjyqY7R38LUAhXna5oKHZVGBM0Q_AUICigB&biw=1920&bih=960#imgrc=iwbx89yQ4VRGMM:

haha, don't even need to click the link to know what you're talking about.

[DarkChaplain]

Where is that knowledge of the new cover "simply showing is face" coming from? All the listings I've seen still show the old horribad art, and I have yet to see a full cover with the new art.

It seems far more likely that, like on so many occasions, they simply cropped a section of the cover to go with their marketing material.

 

I'll reserve judgement until I've seen the final cover with title and author on it. I certainly wouldn't mind if this one was in the style of the old omnibus volumes (which are getting reprinted this year).

[R_F_D]

The art for Warmaster on Amazon is in keeping with all the later Gaunt releases, which were created by Nik Vincent various people listed below.

Edited June 18, 2017 by R_F_D

[Knockagh]

The new GG is a difficult one for GW. It will obviously come with a spanking Limited ed in the new style, but that won't fit with people's existing collections. The last GG I bought was regular hardcover. Even though that feels like a lifetime ago I would still like future books to

match. It's highly unlikely they Will rerelease the series in Titanicus re release style. The box set hardcover still hasn't sold out.

 

I think it's the series is just too big to re release in anything other than omnibus.

[DarkChaplain]

Well... they tried to re-release them as trade paperbacks with new cover art. They got around halfway through I believe, and then stopped and Amazon started listing the omnibuses again.

This is one of the things that bother me a lot about Black Library: They are inconsistent as can be. I'm still salty about the format switch of Time of Legends, and now they've even dropped Legends of the Dark Millennium after a couple of books and re-release Genestealer Cults by Fehervari under one of the original titles, the Deathwatch novel by St. Martin is bundled in an omnibus and so on.

[Khyzer]

I noticed on Amazon in the Product Details portion, that Devastation of Baal is listed as Space Marine Battles (Book 1).  Does this mean a new format to the Space Marine Battles novels as well...  As if I don't have enough reasons for my book shelf OCD to flair up...

[DukeLeto69]

The art for Warmaster on Amazon is in keeping with all the later Gaunt releases, which were created by Nik Vincent.

Err as in Nik Vincent aka Mrs Dan Abnett... The writer (not cover artist)?

[R_F_D]

So from the editions I have the artists have been as follows
 
First And Only - Kenson Low
Ghostmaker - Martin Hanford
Necropolis - Martin Hanford
Honour Guard - Martin McKenna
The Guns of Tanith - Adrian Smith 
Straight Silver - Adrian Smith
Sabbat Martyr - Adrian Smith
Traitor General - Adrian Smith
His Last Command - Alex Boyd
The Armour Of Contempt - Cos Koniotis
Only in Death - Clint Langely
Blood Pact - David Palumbo
Salvation's Reach - Stefan Kopinski
Sabbat Worlds - Stefan Kopinski
Sabbat Crusade (LE) - Raymond Swanland
 
@DukeLeto69 my apologies, I cited the author photo listing.
 
Adrian Smith, remains my favourite.
 

Where is that knowledge of the new cover "simply showing is face" coming from? All the listings I've seen still show the old horribad art, and I have yet to see a full cover with the new art.
It seems far more likely that, like on so many occasions, they simply cropped a section of the cover to go with their marketing material.
 
I'll reserve judgement until I've seen the final cover with title and author on it. I certainly wouldn't mind if this one was in the style of the old omnibus volumes (which are getting reprinted this year).

 
BL's Warmaster page remains the old art
 

http://www.blacklibrary.com/Images/BL/product-pages/2017/08-02-GG_Warmaster_Landing.jpg

Edited July 19, 2017 by R_F_D

[DarkChaplain]

I noticed on Amazon in the Product Details portion, that Devastation of Baal is listed as Space Marine Battles (Book 1).  Does this mean a new format to the Space Marine Battles novels as well...  As if I don't have enough reasons for my book shelf OCD to flair up...

 

SMB is getting a relaunch, yeah. Whether it'll be Space Marine Battles or Space Marine Conquests is up in the air though, going by Amazon listings (Baal is SMB #1, Ashes of Prospero SMC #2).

I feel your pain though. Especially with how mediocre/uninspiring the cover art has been for SMB the past years, ever since they got rid of Jon Sullivan's art. Shield of Baal and Blades of Damocles especially were piss-poor. The placeholder cover art for SoB especially was much superior to the nondescript Blood Angels that are barely in focus now.

And don't even get me started on Crusaders of Dorn lacking The Eternal Crusader and being a tiny 240 page book with a slim spine, tiny Space Marine logo thing and not lining up spine-wise with the rest...

Edited June 18, 2017 by DarkChaplain

[HeritorA]

Khyzer

Sadly SMB get's a relaunch. With the 8th release it's obvious they wanted to advertise it a different (new) way.  It could be very strange for a lot of readers.

 

R_F_D

Adrian Smith indeed for the win. Also I do like Martin Hanford covers.

Sadly if Warmaster will have an old art - it's a bit of a disapoointment. Cause the cover is to put it mildly - not good.

[R_F_D]

So going on the image on the BL Weekender page, it looks like the cover art for Warmaster may have changed.  Although the Warmaster page still shows the old one.

[HeritorA]

So going on the image on the BL Weekender page, it looks like the cover art for Warmaster may have changed.  Although the Warmaster page still shows the old one.

Cause they usually changed it after several months of a new one being shown. In that particular case they are sometimes really slow.

[R_F_D]

So on here and in the specific book threads the Primarch series have taken a bit of a beating for their cover art and, to be honest, I agreed until I saw the Lorgar cover.  This worked for me so I looked the artist up Mikhail Savier  and his work is great, in my opinion.  The black and white cover for Leman Russ, for example, looks great so I'm thinking the issue I have is more with the colouring - especially the eyes (although Lorgar's suited him for me).  So I'm wondering, does someone else do the colouring?/Did BL make a decision to request such a uniform approach?

Edited October 9, 2017 by R_F_D

[Lord Marshal]

I was a bit taken aback by the new Warmaster cover. Gaunt looks, ironically, more like Richard Sharpe than any other depiction of him. He just seems a bit too... handsome? Like they saw how much of a zombie the old Warmaster cover made him look (another extreme) and dialled it back in the opposite direction.

[Phoebus]

My problem with the Leman Russ cover had nothing to do with coloration; I simply didn't think there was nothing to distinguish it from the cover of a comic book. That having been said, I love the sequential arts and comparing something to them shouldn't be taken as an insult by default. In this case, however, it's of a style and quality that is hardly noteworthy even within that industry. You'd be hard-pressed to distinguish it from any number of artists who have been doing very similar work since the 1990s. Put that cover next to the one from Prospero Burns, and you've effectively summed up the issue driving this topic. The latter is by no means perfect (Russ's proportions seem off from the waist down; his wolves look more comical than monstrous), but it's positively visceral. You're not going to confuse that Leman Russ with any number of blonde "savage" super heroes from any number of titles out there.