Intro
Looks like you have a good idea! It’s about time I got to know you.
It’s about time I got to know you.
Why do we need cover fx? Why can’t we just use the stock image? Why can’t we just use the default image in our app? What is the real value of cover fx at this stage of development?
But then again, why are we using cover fx at all? What is the real value of cover fx at this stage of development?
What do I mean by cover fx? Cover fx is an image which has been altered so that it matches a specific typeface (e.g. sans serif). It is a “cover” or “face” for your app.
Whatever else it does, it looks nice, it stands out and it helps convey your brand message more effectively than maybe any other visual design technique you might have heard of until now.
Cover fx has been used for decades and can be found on websites across the web, but its main purpose today is to make your apps look more professional and attractive. So why choose covers instead of just using stock images? Because they look better! That means they are more visually appealing, they convey your brand better than plain black text (even if those texts are super ugly!), they appear to be almost ready-made from scratch, and they help avoid common visual design faux pas like overlaying too many buttons onto an otherwise functional interface, or using too many gradients on an otherwise monochrome background.
What is Cover FX?
Cover FX has been around for a long time and have heard of them before, but never really understood what they do or why they exist. They’re just one example, albeit in the context of a very popular product. But I’d like to dig into some of their marketing to see if I can get a better handle on what Cover FX is all about.
Cover FX has been in business since 1999 and was founded by Greg Ginn, who was motivated to create something that would help him take his motorcycle photos to the next level. He wanted to produce an awesome camera accessory that could shoot instant DSLR quality snapshots from the saddle of his bike, as well as a rangefinder style one-handed camera — which he called the “Saddle Snap”. He felt that with his current setup he was limited by the fact that there were no dedicated mounts for his camera and he needed something more rugged than typical plastic parts for mounting it on his bike.
We can’t tell you exactly how much it cost to build this product because Greg never revealed this information and we don’t know if it still exists (he remains very quiet about many things). We can tell you what he said though: “I didn’t want to build a $200-300 camera accessory that would only appeal to telephoto users; I wanted something that would appeal to everyone who rides motorcycles. That meant providing an attachment that would work with all cameras — including DSLRs, compact cameras and mirrorless cameras — making this accessory available for anyone who owned at least one such device.”
The product itself is without question awesome: when it came out in 1999, it allowed Greg to immediately take photos from his bike with much better resolution than any previous camera mount or standard helmet lens mount ever had before (at the time). It gave him full control over exposure, shutter speed, ISO and focus but also gave him access to all of the same features as any other digital SLR or mirrorless camera — so there was no need for additional software or manual settings which are more complicated when you are shooting from your motorcycle (and often less convenient when you are not). This included everything from high ISO performance up through image processing options like RAW file format conversion (which was originally only available in JPEG format) and depth-of-field control via lens blur effects like bokeh (which turned out not overly popular on motorcycles). The company went public in
The Cover FX Brand
In the classic marketing literature, the cover is the first impression. It is what makes an item stand out in a crowded display of product.
The cover of a book, or even a magazine or newspaper, can make the reader pause and take a closer look. We do that with our covers too. That’s why I care so much about them (and why they are so important to us).
A cover actually exists only as a part of an entire story — that is, it is only as effective as its parts. And sometimes even those parts can be wildly misunderstood. The way we see it, the cover gives little insight into the entire story; rather, it signals what we want to say about our products:
1) It gives you a sense of how sophisticated and high-quality your product is
2) It tells you what you should expect from your user experience and how useful he/she will find it
3) It reminds you that your users are not just consumers, but also fellow members of independent creative communities (think photographers and creatives in particular)
4) It has a universal appeal so that it will appeal to anyone who has ever felt like they don’t fit in anywhere else
5) It helps get people to pay attention to you by reminding them of what they already know (the usefulness of your product), which may have been forgotten since they got away from their computer screens long ago (the beauty and utility of your product).
Cover FX was founded on these values — this is why we are always trying to come up with new ways of showing them off: because we think covering our products allows us to stand out among other companies who are doing things similar but differently. We want people to look at our covers and think: “Wow! This looks very different than everything else I’ve seen!” And yet at the same time — and more importantly — “I don’t think I would be able to do this if this was just another company doing something similar…” And so on …
Choosing the Right Product Line for Your Skin Type
Going into skin type should be a fairly straightforward exercise. If you want to protect your customers’ skin, you need to provide both protection as well as a way to customize how they look.
A while back I wrote a few posts on the topic of skin types, such as:
• If you want your product line to be unique and different, it needs to cover all skin types.
• If you want your product line to be beautiful, it needs to take into account people with different skin types.
I think the above are quite valid points, and they have already been covered in depth elsewhere. I will briefly summarize them here as well (there is an excellent guide for this that I reference in my copywriting course):
• You need to know what kind of person your customers are — even before you develop a product for them. This is important because it means that once you have developed a product for one group of people (say women), if you are going to develop another group of people (say men), then the design and development process has already focused on what will work best for them (their anatomy).
• Different products require different approaches. In general terms, there are three main approaches:
1) Skin type-specific: This is how manufacturers typically approach their products — they focus on one skin type only (like “skinny”), and often use very light colors on their products so that they don’t distract from their target audience (like “normal”). This typically leaves the consumer with no choice but to live with their appearance since there isn’t anything else that can help her look more attractive or normal. It therefore makes no sense from an aesthetic perspective since beauty and attractiveness are subjectively defined by people who buy these products; thus these products don’t make any sense in terms of aesthetics versus non-beautiful people – like dieters or overweight people! The advantage here is that if someone doesn’t like what she sees on Salejo & Co., she won’t buy it either…but she probably won’t care much anyway since she’s not really buying into it anyway! Also note that this kind of customization requires extra work when compared with totally user-friendly software like Photoshop which allow users do things like make faces or change colors without having to try any special effects themselves!
2) Skin type-specific customization: This approach is more common than skin
The Different Products in the Cover FX Line
If you’re looking to buy a new bag of makeup or a cheap perfume, you’ve come to the right place. We have all sorts of products to choose from.
After all, there are so many different kinds of makeup out there: from the “everyday” kind like your old mascara (which will be your go-to for years) to the more dramatic kind like dramatic eyes and eyeliner. But no matter what kind of skin color you have, you’re going to need a good foundation and an eye shadow that doesn’t look weird in it.
We try very hard to never make major changes in our products and I think that is one reason why we are still around after almost 20 years: each year we keep improving our products, which makes us maintainable as long as they stay useful and useful people keep buying them (even though they might not be the best bang for their buck).
Application Tips and Tricks from a Cover Fx Makeup Artist
Cover Fx is a new startup, in the sense that they are a relatively small company with fewer than 20 employees and they took less than a year to get to this stage. They are, however, one of the most famous makeup artists in the industry. Their approach is quite different from some others: they have no client list and no referral system which means that all their contacts know each other. What sets them apart from most other makeup artists is their use of 2D (not 3D) vector illustrations in their online marketing materials, rather than traditional illustrations. This means that all their product images can be easily created by anyone who knows how to use Photoshop (and not just those professionals who spend thousands of dollars on designing them).
The advantage here lies in their ability to make product images look more real vs realistic stills or videos — which can often look fake when you have such high resolution video footage. This makes it possible for someone who has never worked in fashion to create something beautiful using the technology at hand (even if it’s not always pretty).
Conclusion
The first two topics I’ve left out were more technical and involved more code than you’d want to read in one sitting, so I’ll conclude by talking about them briefly.
The first of these, covering backdrops and fades, is an example of something that can be really hard to do well, especially if you don’t know what you are doing. If a fade is not done properly (or if it is done badly), the user experience will be significantly degraded. The other two topics are easier to do poorly but have a larger impact on your product so I thought I should give them some time in the spotlight.