Next month Dark Horse will release a collected edition of Murder Book by writer Ed Brisson and a variety of artists -- Declan Shalvey, Simon Roy and Johnnie Christmas, among them -- with a new cover by Michael Walsh (based in part on one of his designs for a previously released volume of Murder Book stories).

Dark Horse's Associate Editor Jim Gibbons was kind enough to share with ROBOT 6 some of the cover process for the new Murder Book trade paperback, due out March 18.



Walsh began with a series of sketches for the wraparound cover, before settling on an approach.







As noted by Gibbons, next came the inks.





"Some minor tweaks later and we had our final cover art," Gibbons said.



Then Dark Horse designer Justin Couch created a number of options for the logo treatment.











"Brisson selected a favorite and we moved on to the first pass at the full front and back cover design, done by Dark Horse designer Rick DeLucco," Gibbons explained.



According to Gibbons, "after a few last tweaks and the inclusion of some more kind words from Greg Rucka and David Lapham on the cover, we had our final cover design."