Wraparound Cover Help

[K.R.]

I make my own covers, which has never been challenging. I downloaded the template from Createspace for the wraparound cover, inserted it into Microsoft Word and made it how I wanted it. However, when I submitted it to Createspace, they emailed and said that the cover needed a bleed area. I don't understand how to do that. Can anyone help? My cover is 5x8.

[Christina]

Word isn't a graphic design program, so it's not going to keep the template's true proportions, nor are you going to be able to make sure your images are at the right size, and as far as I know, you would have no way of layering. My recommendation is to download Gimp, which is a free image manipulator that is similar to Photoshop. There are tutorials as to how to use it online. Otherwise, you might consider looking at hiring a formatter.

[K.R.]

Thanks for the feedback! I'll download Gimp and try it out.

[K.R.]

Hi again, one more question about Gimp. Do I just put my cover overtop the template? It doesn't have to be bigger than the template, does it?

[Rohvannyn]

You can do that, but you want to make sure you always work in layers. Gimp lets you do that and it's really nice because then you can do the cover layer on top of the template, then flip the template on top to make sure it still looks good. You can also toggle layer visibility, so you can make the template invisible once you know everything's right. Ideally, the cover should be the exact same size as the template because it includes trim space.

[Clair]

I had confusion with that too. The pink lines are for the bleed your picture is supposed to go to the outside of the pink lines not the inside otherwise you'll end up with white rim :)
Also...please...please make sure to turn off the guidelines before you send it in. I'm guessing you don't want your book to be a create space advertisement.

[K.R.]

Thank you!