Old Dog, New Trick cover process

Old Dog, New Trick by R/L Monroe is out! This one's for the big hairy bear lovers, the leather likers, the transmasc tops, and the fags. It's really good and sweet and all about falling in love with your own body again. You can check out the first three pages and a list of what it features on its shop page, and it's only $3!

but this means it's time once again for a process poooost~ you can read about how we designed the cover below!

THUMBNAILS!

this one might have been the most straightforward yet. lee essentially told me 'dad bod in a chest harness' and that is what he got. the two on the bottom left were me thinking he hadn't Literally meant that, somehow, and trying other things. even rereading the chat log i'm not sure how i came to that conclusion because he very clearly asked for a dad bod in a harness. (i also had not read the story yet, so i didn't have an impression of charlie. do not be fooled by my slinky little twink in the bottom middle. he is a big boy too)

the bottom right is when i was like 'no wait he definitely just said dad bod with harness' and had the thought of putting the author and title on the harness itself. we went with that one!

color passes, had to involve the rainbow somehow for pride. dom painting himself seemed the obvious choice for me, very dad at a football game. but lee was like "wait. put it in the background." and it Is the obvious choice. and then

what did he mean by this

honestly there wasn't much more to it from there, just workshopping where the 18+ should be on his body and how much space it should take up. this is probably the most straightforwardly representative cover i've done for him so far! oh my god there's lineart.

also please appreciate the itchio thumbnail. making the itchio thumbnails is actually the most fun part. you should look at lee's shop page and see how nice and clean those look all together. i wish i'd kept a consistent style guide when i started out with my own books ; ;

tits