Board 8 > Snake Ranks User-Nominated Cover Art *THE RANKINGS* (Part 2)

(+) Yeah! (+)

Sorry for letting it purge, but we're right back in business. Here are the last three write-ups, in case you missed them.

35. Finch
Nominated by: Gatarix (0/6 remaining)


This cover oozes with class and mystery, looking like a cross between hard-boiled detective noir and an Indiana Jones fantasy adventure. The rust-covered artwork looks appropriately wet and grungy, as if a long-lost relic, but what I really love here is the way everything is arranged and pictured in the pistol, granting a sense of all the different elements the story will be about. There's a deep sense of unease with the shadowed man, whilst parchment and brick walls exude danger and conspiracy. It's capped all off with an interesting flower design, either a bad omen for the scene or one that portrays hope.

34. Gammarauders
Nominated by: Raetsal_Lupin (0/4 remaining)
https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic4374.jpg

Not all covers need to be totally meaningful and serious. Sometimes a cover that's so out there and wild and weird can be just as effective in selling your product. Case in point, Gammarauders. "They're monsters! They're machines! They're here!" Well isn't that the foreboding statement. But If I'm able to make machine-monsters like a robo-t.rex with a heat lamp and a penguin with a turret and umbrella on its head and a life preserver for a lower body count me in! I actually quite like the detail put into this post-apocalyptic wasteland too, especially the skull motorcyclist and the design of the flying cars. Consider this cover a success in marketing.

33. Final Fantasy VI
Nominated by: Zyxyz0 (1/6 remaining)


Final Fantasy VI's cover captures the imagination of a generation, and is very well the best cover in the series. I love the image of an impossible city, drab and devoid of hope in its design, spread in front of a young girl bursting with color and dreams even whilst she uses the black technology for her own. Like the best of Final Fantasy's locations, Final Fantasy VI's cover combines fantastical steampunk with romance, idealism, and sci-fi concepts to create a unique vision and the feeling of adventure and discovery.

I will list what's left in the next post.
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Woooooo
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Here's a look at what's left:
Anagram (2/6)
Star Wars
http://posterwire.com/wp-content/uploads/star_wars_hildebrandt_art.jpg

Back to the Future
https://cdn.empireonline.com/jpg/70/0/0/1280/960/aspectfit/0/0/0/0/0/0/c/features/59e8d795405a5c6805947751/10%20Back%20to%20the%20Future.jpg

Scarletspeed7 (4/6)
Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. #1
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/marveldatabase/images/4/40/Nick_Fury%2C_Agent_of_S.H.I.E.L.D._Vol_1_1.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20070724115931

Animal Man #5
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/marvel_dc/images/a/a2/Animal_Man_5.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20070430203818

Starman #29
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/marvel_dc/images/c/c3/Starman_Vol_2_29.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20090110222548

We3 #3
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/marvel_dc/images/e/ec/We3_3.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20100509060324

Shonen_Bat (2/6)
The Nightmare Before Christmas
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/The_nightmare_before_christmas_poster.jpg

Dark Souls
https://gematsu.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Dark-Souls-PS3-Box-Art-JP.jpg

Bane_of_Despair (5/6)
Creeper - The Stranger
https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Music69/v4/e9/f5/22/e9f522fa-284c-27c8-6ea1-3cffa02dbeb2/825646941186.jpg/1200x630bb.jpg

Marilyn Manson - Holy Wood (In the Shadow of the Valley of Death)
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51grbapg5DL.jpg

Bring Me the Horizon - There Is a Hell Believe Me I've Seen It, There is a Heaven Let's Keep it a Secret
http://epitaph.com/media/releases/0045778706563.png.925x925_q90.jpg

Lorde - Melodrama
https://assets.vogue.com/photos/58b9984661298051ac278def/master/pass/00-holding-lorde-album-art.jpg

Norma Jean - Redeemer
http://images.genius.com/cb07fc4e71013e6460441ac7ca290724.600x600x1.jpg

NBIceman (4/6)
iamthemorning - Lighthouse
https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2967892724_10.jpg

Caligula's Horse - In Contact
http://www.metalinjection.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Caligulas-Horse-In-Contact.jpg

Gravity Rush
http://www.mobygames.com/images/covers/l/280937-gravity-rush-ps-vita-front-cover.jpg

Kansas - Point of Know Return
https://img.cdandlp.com/2012/07/imgL/115484003.jpg

Murphiroth (1/5)
Jinjer King of Everything


Pirateking2000 (2/5)
Doom
https://imgur.com/a/b1MiX

ICO
https://imgur.com/a/8P1MI

Johnbobb (4/6)
Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon


Hobo With a Shotgun


Hard Candy


Wish You Were Here


Dragon66116 (1/5)
Red Dead Redemption
https://gamefaqs.akamaized.net/box/2/0/9/109209_front.jpg

Simoun (2/6)
Brass: Lancashire
https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic3469216.jpg

The Grimm Forest
https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic3388680.jpg

BlueCrystalTear (4/6)
The Beatles - Abbey Road
https://timedotcom.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/abbey-road.jpg

Led Zeppelin - Houses of the Holy
https://target.scene7.com/is/image/Target/16671766?wid=520&hei=520&fmt=pjpeg

Fleetwood Mac - Rumours
https://exclaim.ca//images/fleetwood3.jpg

Meat Loaf - Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell
https://tinyurl.com/yb37rpa4

Zyxyz

Damn, it purged.
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32. Brass: Lancashire
Nominated by: Simoun (1/6 remaining)
https://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic3469216.jpg

I feel like we've had a lot of steampunk and industrial-type covers in this project, some of the fantastical nature, some more abstract, but I think Brass: Lancashire is a quintessential example of how do this setting pitch-perfectly. It's obviously a very grounded cover, rooted in history and realism, and gives off a variety of emotions. Dozens of smokestacks pump out fumes into the atmosphere, casting this city in what looks like a perpetual state of hazy darkness, the cost of an ever-advancing society. Way down in the background, you even get a sense of life here, as people work and walk by the waterside, a constant stream of busyness and activity that hardly gives time for rest. Finally, we get to our main centerpiece, a clearly rich oil tycoon lost in thought, thinking ahead towards progress but maybe even lamenting the current state of society for a brief moment. Some kind of heat source illuminates the lower right corner of the cover, which creates a warmness and maybe a sense everything will turn out okay. It's quite a fantastic cover, every piece of it meticulously painted with great detailed coloring that make it as effective at is.
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Tag
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Tag.
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retag

4 entries in the top 30 is way better than I typically do on rankings
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up
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31. Lorde - Melodrama
Nominated by: Bane_Of_Despair (4/6 remaining)
https://assets.vogue.com/photos/58b9984661298051ac278def/master/pass/00-holding-lorde-album-art.jpg

Would a Louvre reference be too on the nose here? The cover art of Lorde's pop opus Melodrama communicates so much in such a simple scene. Themes such as longing for love in your late teens, a dash of sexual promiscuity, and the transition to adulthood are all portrayed through subtle touches like the color choice, falling of shadows, and Lorde's body language. It's a scene that feels like an all-too-personal window into a small moment of time, as a half-shadow on Lorde's face shows change and progress whilst Lorde's gaze suggests restless thought and untapped potential ready to be unleashed. The hazy overtones and deep coloring nail that sense of confusing and complicated "coming-of-age" moments that Melodrama the album is largely about. It's an incredible mood-setter and I could not see this album without this cover.
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A Louvre reference would be perfect as she has a song on the album called The Louvre!

grumble grumbleShould have won Album of the Year at the Grammys, that or Kendrickgrumble grumble
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that kind of color usage always fascinates me. most of the skin tone is blue-purple, red, and dark red. if I tried doing that kind of thing, it would look like a hot mess, or maybe an alien; but somehow the artist makes it look natural.

also, about my own noms - most of the books I haven't actually read and I just picked cool-looking covers. but the two books I have read (Finch, Crooked Kingdom) and like a lot ended up being my top two, which is pretty neat
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30. Back to the Future
Nominated by: Anagram (1/6 remaining)
https://cdn.empireonline.com/jpg/70/0/0/1280/960/aspectfit/0/0/0/0/0/0/c/features/59e8d795405a5c6805947751/10%20Back%20to%20the%20Future.jpg

This poster tells you all you need to know about this movie, containing all the elements of a successful movie poster whilst still maintaining a now iconic scene and original idea. The DeLorean time machine, the way Marty looks shockingly at his watch, the burning hot fire streaks created from time travelling, these are all key ideas in the movie and subtly presents the concept of time-travelling to the audience. Marty's period hip fashion targets right at the teen demographic of the time and is also another point of the time travelling concept, as the people in the 1950s era point out Marty's wardrobe as weird and out-of-place as if Marty was a navyman wearing a life preserver. One of my favorite things about the poster is the way light beams out of the DeLorean, appearing like a literal portal into a world that's similar yet extremely different. It's a poster that remains ironically timeless and still one of those posters that sticks with you always.
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I mean, was Marty's live preserver ever in fashion?
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Marty made it cool!
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Anagram posted...

I mean, was Marty's live preserver ever in fashion?

KUSHIDA wears it now.


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Also, I just realized that it makes no sense for Marty to look at his watch in surprise. The watch won't tell him what year it is.
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I missed the first topic entirely (IDK why!) but am tagging this one now so I can see how well the iconic stuff I nominated does. I'll go look on the Lost Old Games Site...
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bump
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29. Norma Jean - Redeemer
Nominated by: Bane_Of_Despair (3/6 remaining)
http://images.genius.com/cb07fc4e71013e6460441ac7ca290724.600x600x1.jpg

Looking like a scene out of a bird horror movie, Redeemer is a cover that is painful, scary, unwelcoming, and shockingly unexpected. It does a great job of setting the mood for the album, letting you know that it's not for the faint of heart. The use of deep watercolors puts the scene in the realm of fantasy but with a disturbing sense of realism too, with the girl's cries of anguish rendered in all of its silent high screams of pain which you can feel emanating from the cover. The bird's uncaring eye and expression are pure malice, an agent of chaos fighting against childlike innocence. It's a cover that will warn many a person away, but for the rest, it's also a cover that fits the album and what it's going for perfectly.
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Ha, yep another one that I just love how off putting it is. And the fact that it's a painting really adds to it, if this was a photograph instead I think it would come off way cheesier.

Fun fact and timing: I'm seeing them tomorrow night! For that album! They're playing it in its entirety.
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