Rewriting and Re-visualizing

I am a visual person. I can get inspired really quickly, but then I have to conceptualize my characters and world before I can move on.

For instance, I went to a Writer's Conference in May (Hoot Hoot!!!) and in one of my WIP's, I reworked the beginning chapter, and the character grew up three years. Suddenly, she wasn't thirteen. She was going on sixteen. Bugger. That meant all the characterization I'd done on her was changing. The new idea I had of her was different. She was older, she had a bit more pizzazz to her, and had a handicap she didn't have when she was thirteen. So, I've been working on changing her story, and I came up with a scene, probably near the end, that described her quite well:

(Forgive the off-centeredness - I took this picture with my awesome phone, but I was askew a bit when I clicked. Whoopsy!)

She looks young, sort of unsure about herself, but at the same time she seems confident that she'll be able to accomplish what she needs to do. Once I got this picture down, I suddenly had a plot twist that was going to make the story amazing. Plus, I knew more or less how my character was going to look, and what sort of style she'd be sporting. Both were super important to me.

I like to collect pictures that remind me of the stories I'm working on, as well. Things that my character might use, clothes she might wear, the way her town might look, I look for all that kind of stuff. I like to pin things to Pinterest (a fabulous way to "collect" ideas, by the way) but I also use the awesome FantaMorph to create photos of people. I like black and white illustrations (done by me, of course!), but I also like an actual photo. I posted about FantaMorph before, but I have recently used it to "update" my photo of my character.

On the left we have the main character's mum, alas deceased. (She might not be alive, but she's integral to the story, so I needed to visualize her.) On the right we have the new and improved MC, age sixteen, looking a bit uncertain of herself, yet glowing with promise. I like how they turned out similar, yet different.

FantaMorph is cool, because you can use more than one face to morph. For the main character and her mom, I used the same two people for the first, morph, then I used a different face for the final morph. A younger face for the main character, and an older one for her mum.

Do you need to visualize as you're writing? What sort of writing journal, or character journal do you keep? Any tricks you use to keep yourself excited about a project? I'd love to hear them!

Until next time, God bless.

Cat

New Program: FantaMorph!!

I love Monday Miribilia. I get to talk about the random things that inspire me.

Like this program I'm using, called FantaMorph.

It's the coolest program! You can take photos of two people - or just two things, the choice is up to you - and create ONE new person, or creature. How cool is that?

I created a prototype of the character I am now in the process of revising, and I just LOVE having a face to put the voice to. It's amazing how much easier it becomes. For instance, here's a face I came up with that is absolutely BEGGING for a voice and a story:

I'm not sure who she is, or what her story will be, but isn't she so CUTE? Don't you wish you knew someone like this?

As an exercise, try this. Come up with a name that you think fits this character, and give her a character trait, a personality, and maybe a little bit of a voice.

Here's my effort:

Here name was Vanessa Heather Raine, but everyone called her Ness. She always seemed to be smiling, even when she was nervous. Then, you could only see her uncertainty because of the way she'd reach up to play with her hair.


She was mostly easy-going, but there was a strong stubborn streak inside her that was the bane of her existence. "I'd wish that someone could get rid of that stubbornness for me," she'd say, twisting a bit of hair between her fingers before tucking it behind her ear, "except that no one would recognize me without it."


That was fun! Thanks for reading! God bless and see you next time.

Oh! Don't forget, we're heading into Week Two of the Writing Buddy contest. Head on over to Cat's Mathoms and let's see your submissions.