Eric C. Wilder on Designing Everything That Hurt Us Becomes a Ghost
Eric C. Wilder is a freelance cover designer. He, along with designer Cherie Chapman, is co-founder of Chapman & Wilder, a studio specializing in book covers, interior layout, and marketing across all genres. Here he takes us through his process for designing the cover for Everything That Hurt Us Becomes a Ghost.
Everything That Hurt Us Becomes a Ghost is a poetry collection by deaf Indigenous author Sage Ravenwood, to be published this fall by Gallaudet University Press. For the cover the author wanted to incorporate images of ravens in some way. The brief stated “ravens represent the crossing of dead.” I could show elements, claws, feathers, anything that got the idea across. It was even suggested that I take a look at a bird that had passed on, which I found interesting.
One concept I came up with was the idea of having a “ghosted” or faded element on the cover. Not necessarily disappearing, but kind of haunting the image area. I took a look at projecting a silhouette of a bird onto a page using lighting and screens, and then photographed it.
I also wanted to see if I could get this same feeling using type. I set type on paper, and backlit it on a light table. If I set a sheet of paper over top of that and bent it, I could warp the text, having it lift on one side from the image area. Placing this with the ghosted silhouette would have been too much of one effect. I found this great image of a distressed feather I thought accented the title well. For a touch of color red fingerprints were added, a reference to MMIW (Missing Murdered Indigenous Women).
This was the direction that was selected by the author and client. I’m very pleased with how the cover came out. I’m grateful for the opportunity, and to Sage Ravenwood and Katie Lee for their guidance on this project!
Final cover
Editor, artworker and lifelong bibliophile.