Gas Up Your CD Covers

The best option for terrific CD covers
May be right down the street

I am always amazed how many folks make things a lot more complicated than they need to be.

Like having preconceived ideas on what they THINK they will have to do to create an audio product.

One of the biggest obstacles seems to be creating covers or other graphics for their CDs. It’s the old “I’m not an artist / I don’t have money to hire one” conundrum.

However, I've got a solution for you. And it may be as close as your neighborhood gas station.

First take a look at this simple CD cover I created just for this blog post. (Note: its longer than it is tall because I use DVD cases to package my CDs). I realize you won’t see it in an art museum, but its more than adequate to feature on CDs sold on my website or at the back of the room.

So Rob, you may be asking, where did you get that beautiful flower photo on the front cover? Did you pay a photographer? Did you search for hours on a stock photo site? And when you did find it, I’m sure it cost you a pretty penny.

You’d be wrong on all three counts.

Because now I’d like you to take a look at the next photo. The one of the gas station. In front of the gas station is a flower bed. Yep, it’s the same flower bed featured on the front of my CD.


Here’s the exhausting, monumental process I went through to capture it:

1. Waited until I needed a break from my usual tasks.
   
   
2. Took a walk down to the gas station, a full 2 minutes from where I live.
   
   
3. Pulled out my digital camera and snapped a few pics.
   
   
4. Walked the whole 2 minutes back home. (Man this is exhausting!).
   
   
5. Transferred the photo to my computer, resized the photo, and added some text.

Now if you’re creating a CD on managing large companies, you’re probably not going to want to use flowers on your cover. But chances are, with a bit of thought, there’s something very close to where you live or work that IS appropriate you can capture without much trouble.

So, the next time you’re making excuses on why you can’t create audio products --- consider one less roadblock in your way.