In this paper, we show that the extended tanh method [Z.S. Lu, H.Q. Zhang, (2003) [37]] can be applied to construct exact breather-type solutions for nonlinear evolution equations, and those solutions might be used as rogue wave prototypes. As illustrative examples, we present exact solutions for the Boiti-Leon-Pempinelli equation and the (2 + 1)-dimensional breaking soliton equation respectively. The solution waves include rational rogue waves and non-rational rogue waves. (C) 2015 Published by Elsevier Ltd.