Why a script to make cover art?

If you’re a book designer and constantly have to create covers for soft or hard cover books, you’ll understand that creating a new file in InDesign to set up the page guides and prepress marks can be tedious. It isn’t just preparing the front and back panels and the spine – case bound covers also have additional areas for where the printed laminated cover wraps around onto the case to be covered up by the endpaper… not to mention if a dust jacket is also required.

Enter Hurry Cover 3

This is the latest version of Marc Autret’s cover-creation script from Indiscripts that has been recently released. The third in the series, this script makes creating a book cover a simple task. The script lets users choose from one of four cover options:

• Soft cover
• Soft cover with flaps (left, right or both)
• Hard Cover
• Case Jacket

Other panels in the dialog box also contain enough customisation that allows the program to be flexible without being unwieldy.

A novel feature (pardon the pun) of the dialog is also the dummy book that appears in the bottom left hand corner of the window – I found this quite useful for letting me know how the entered dimensions would alter the book’s appearance, albeit exaggerated. It’s a clever feature.

Another clever feature is found when clicking the plug icon to the right of the word Margins – this shows the “Load a specification” panel that allows users to take known real-world specifications from two popular print on demand providers, KDP and books on demand.

The next feature I like is that once the script has been run and the artwork has been set, running the script again will allow users to tweak the measurements in case dimensions were off and have the cover update by clicking update; or to prepare epub-ready covers by pressing the export button and then using portions of the artwork that has just been set.

The script is a one-off purchase for €49 (less if you are upgrading from HurryCover2) from the Indiscripts site. Also here is the trial version, as well as the instructions on how to use the script.

If I have to find fault

The script is very clean in appearance and easy to follow. One addition that I hope is made concerns pressing the close button after making changes – currently this will keep all of the currently entered values in place for next time. Having an additional cancel button would be great if I don’t want to retain those values, or even better, the ability to store previously created values.

Another consideration could also be the creation of Endpapers when creating a case bound cover, as these elements always go together.

If I could dream…

When creating covers for my employer, I use a script that I’ve created that – while not as powerful as Hurry Cover 3, has two features that Hurry Cover 3 does not, namely:

• Soft cover art can be two spreads in size (for outside artwork and inside artwork); and
• My work’s script will determine the size of the spine when prompted for paper thicknesses and page counts.

Soft cover artwork can be double sided, but Hurry Cover 3 will produce artwork for one side only. Yes, the page can be duplicated, but it is important to note that the spine – and the hinge areas to the left and right of the spine – are to be left ink-free, so extra dimensions now have to be set outside of the script.

In fairness, Hurry Cover 3 can determine the size of the spine using the “load a specification” feature. If this isn’t used though, the spine has to be worked out prior to running Hurry Cover 3.

Lastly, I note that in the Hurry Cover 3 instructions is the following phrase: This guide is far from complete. Other features will be documented very soon. That said, if there are any other value-adds such as a specification set for the Blurb POD service, or items mentioned above, I can only speculate.

My takeaway

With such a low barrier to entry, creating cover artwork for soft and hard cover titles hasn’t been this simple in a long time. Head here to try, buy, or read more about Hurry Cover 3.

Declaration

Marc Autret and I have known each other for years as users of Adobe InDesign and contributors within Adobe’s own InDesign forum. While we’ve never met face to face, he is a scripter and InDesign user whom I have great respect for. I’ve been a beta tester on this script and earlier scripts of his; and have also purchased several of Indiscript’s pro scripts in the past. That said, no money has changed hands as a result of this article, and everything written here is my opinion without outside influence.