Custom Cover Lite
Custom Cover Lite: Book Covers From Licensed Imagery
Plenty of books do not need a commissioned painting on the front. They need the right image, chosen and treated with care, and type that tells readers the genre at a glance. Custom Cover Lite is a cover designed for your book from licensed imagery, at a lower cost and on a shorter schedule than custom artwork.
- Designed by our in-house team, not a template
- Image licences sourced and recorded for you
- Ebook and print files available
- Revisions included until the brief is met
Who it is for
A professional cover without paying for original art
Browse the most popular new releases in thrillers, romance, self-help, business and memoir and you will see that many covers are built from photography and typography rather than illustration. A figure walking away down a wet street, a couple in soft focus, a clean object on a plain background, a bold title in a confident typeface. Done well, these covers are fast to read and squarely on genre.
Done badly, they are the covers that make self-published books easy to spot: a recognisable stock photo used unchanged, a default font, a title that disappears at thumbnail size. The image is not the problem. The design work around it is.
Custom Cover Lite puts that design work in: careful image selection, editing and colour treatment so the photo looks like it belongs to your book, and typography built for your title.
Lite or custom
How Lite differs from a fully custom cover
Imagery
Lite uses licensed stock photography or illustration, edited and combined for your cover. A custom cover uses original artwork created from scratch for your book.
Best suited to
Lite suits thrillers, romance, contemporary fiction, memoir, business and self-help. Custom suits fantasy, sci-fi and children's books, where the image often does not exist anywhere.
Approval stages
Lite goes from brief to concepts to refinement. Custom adds sketch and colour stages for the artwork before the cover is assembled.
Cost and schedule
Lite costs less and is usually quicker, because no illustration has to be drawn. Both are quoted before work starts.
Not sure which option fits?
Send us the brief. You will get a scope, a timeline and a fixed price within 24 hours — no obligation.
- A short review of current covers in your category to set the direction
- Image research and selection from licensed libraries, with the source of each image recorded
- Photo editing, compositing and colour grading so the image fits the book's tone
- Title and author typography designed for your cover and tested at thumbnail size
- Ebook front cover as a high-resolution file
- Full-wrap print cover with spine and back panel, available once your page count is final
How it works
The Lite cover process
1. Brief
Title, author name, genre, a short summary, the mood you want and a few covers you like. Trim size and platform if you know them.
2. Image search
We shortlist images that fit your genre and tone, avoiding photos that are already overused on covers in your category.
3. Concepts and refinement
Cover concepts built from the shortlisted images, then changes to image, colour and type until the brief is met.
4. Final files
Ebook cover first; the print wrap follows once the interior page count sets the spine width.
Honest limits
What a stock-based cover cannot do
Stock images are licensed to anyone who pays, so another book could use the same photograph. We reduce the chance of an obvious match by checking your category, and by cropping, combining and recolouring images so the result is your cover rather than the original photo. We cannot make a licensed image exclusive to you.
Stock libraries also cannot supply specific characters or invented worlds. If your cover needs your actual protagonist or a creature from your story, a custom illustrated cover is the better choice, and we will say so at the brief stage rather than force it.
Pricing
What Custom Cover Lite costs
Lite covers are quoted per project. The price depends on the formats you need (ebook only, or ebook and print), how much compositing the image needs and whether it is a single book or a series. Standard image licences are included in the quote. You know the full price before work begins.
Free proposal
Tell us the goal. We’ll send the plan.
Share your requirements and a strategist gets back to you within 24 hours with scope, timeline and a fixed price. No obligation, no sales pressure.
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Response within 24 hours
Usually much sooner during business hours.
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Talk to a strategist
Not a call centre — the person who scopes your work.
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Fixed pricing upfront
You approve the number before anything starts.
Prefer to talk?
[email protected]Questions
Questions about Custom Cover Lite
Still unsure about something? Talk to a specialist — no script, no sales pitch.
Yes, when it is designed properly. Many traditionally published books use licensed photography. What separates a professional cover is the choice of image, how it is edited and treated, and the typography. Those are the parts we design for your book.
It is possible, because stock images are licensed to anyone. We check covers in your category to avoid obvious overlaps and edit images heavily enough that the finished cover looks distinct. If total exclusivity matters to you, a custom illustrated cover is the safer route.
Standard image licences for your cover are included in the quote. We record where each image came from and the licence it was used under. Some uses, such as very large print runs or merchandise, can need an extended licence, and we will flag that if it applies.
Yes. Some authors launch with a Lite cover and commission custom art for a later edition or once a series takes shape. You can also upload a new cover to most platforms without changing the edition, as long as the trim size and page count stay the same.
Yes, for print editions. Once your interior is laid out and the page count is final, we build a full wrap with spine, back cover blurb, author bio and space for the barcode, on your platform's template.
Works well with
Pair it with the rest of the stack
Ready when you are
Ready to work with the pros?
Get a free proposal in 24 hours — scope, timeline and fixed price. No obligation, no lock-in contract.
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