Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Get your next album cover for less than $25. Five creative Graphic Artists on Fiverr.com

If you're reading this blog, you are probably a musician like me, that knows exactly how to spend hundreds of dollars on studio gear, instruments and software, but when it comes to marketing, even the expenses under $100 seem to hurt. Have you ever asked yourself any of the following questions or statements?
  1. I wish I could find a graphic artist for my new album cover that costs less than $300 and will actually give me something I want.
  2. I am broke and I need an album cover, but I don't know anyone.
  3. A lot of album covers that I've seen these days look cheap and simple, why is that?
  4. I just need a simple album cover for a cheap price, I am broke.
  5. I don't know what I want on my album cover, that's why I'm calling you.
  6. Why do graphic artists take my deposit for an album cover and then disappear for two weeks?
  7. I know I explained to this graphic artist, exactly what I wanted for my album cover, and they made something totally different and now they want to charge me to make changes.
  8. I heard that there are people overseas that are graphic artists that will work for cheap, unlike the spoiled local college brats that are over charging me.
  9. Hello Facebook friends, can anyone recommend a graphic artist for me?
  10. OK, five bucks, I think I can pay $5 to get a cover for my next single, I just need something basic.
Well, I think you've come to the right blog post? Fiverr is an amazing place, where people across the world offer services starting at $5. You can find graphic artists, translators, musicians, SEO web specialists, graphic designers and more. So why did the title of my blog post say “... less than $25?” Because the truth is, at fiverr, the prices for gigs start at $5, but you probably need a few “extra gigs” to get exactly what you need. But before you start comparing fiverr sellers, there are a few things that I recommend you get, no matter who you hire to design your album cover.
  • Get a square version of your album cover that is 3000 x 3000, 300 dpi, .jpg less than 15mb.
  • Make sure that you either have the ability to resize your own image, or you pay your graphic artist to output different sizes, based on the table above.
  • Make sure to get the source file (photoshop, illustrator, or whatever program they used) 
Getting your source files important, because, you may want some small change later on, two years from now and you can't expect your graphic artist to have archived this file. Save yourself from a huge headache later. The following is a list of some of the artwork dimensions that you need for some of the main distributors. You would think that this is an industry standard, but it seems like every distributor wants something a little different.

Distributor Dimensions File Types Accepted
Band Camp 700 x 700 minimum .jpg, .gif, .png
cdbaby 1400 x 1400 .jpg
Distro Kid Not Published / Public Not Published / Public
Loudr.fm 3000 x 3000 .jpg, .jpeg, .png
Mondo Tunes Not Published / Public Not Published / Public
Reverb Nation 1000 x 1000 .jpg or .png
Symphonic Distribution 2000 x 2000 .jpg, .jpeg, .png
Topspin Media 600 x 600 min - 1200 x1200 max .jpg
Tunecore 1600 x 1600 min - 3000 x 3000 max .jpg, .png, .gif

You'll notice, that on fiverr, some graphic artists charge a little extra for each of the three rules stated above, which is why the $5 simple album cover is rarely a viable option. $25 is more reasonable, and depending on the seller, it may cost you up to $50, but keep in mind … most retail graphic artists are charging anywhere from $200-$500 for album covers. Keep your options open.

Here are five great sellers on fiverr that I have found:

Hatimbahia Team from Morrocco














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