Have You Ever Wondered What My Characters Look Like?

Seriously, have you?

I'm not a writer who normally goes around looking for pictures of my characters.  Like, ever.  Actually, I'm more like the person whose afraid to try and draw her characters for fear she won't do them justice, and who doesn't want to look for a picture that similar to them, because she thinks they are just way too unique for that.  If I could just snap a picture of my characters right out of my head to show you, I would.  Really, I would.  That's just how I am.

But the other day, I decided to actually go looking for pictures that made me think of what my characters are supposed to look like.  And (surprisingly enough) I actually FOUND SOME.  No, really! :)  Total surprise to me.  I just don't expect that sort of stuff.

So without further ado, here are (most of) the characters of SOTD.

(Disclaimer:  None of these pictures are actually mine... they are just pictures that I found on the internet that I'm using for character inspiration, and they belong to their respected owners.  That is all.)

Now, let's start with Curron, shall we?  I found three pictures for him.  :D

So this is what he looks like initially.  Just give him slightly longer hair, and WALLA!  And, interestingly enough, he's actually clean in this picture.  That's right folks... Curron doesn't always look this prim and proper.  Comes with working in the Stables a lot.  And with being a lower class servant. ^_^

NEXT!

 

There ya go.  That's more like it.  At least for the beginning of the book.  And I like this picture because I just can't decide on what his face is trying to express.  Which is fine with me: it means I can put that face in several different circumstances.  lol!

NEXT! ^_^ (I'm having fun doing that.)

This picture is fun because it's what I think Curron might look like grown up.  Not bad on the eyes, I'd say.  I like 'im. hehe!

Ok, that's all for Curron.  Now which character should I show?  Hmmm... how's about Olan?  I think I only have one picture of him...

Just make him a little bit heavier, and have him scowl at Curron a lot, and there ya go.  When Olan smiles, however, he looks pretty much like that.  Which is good to know.

Now for Caellahn:

This is probably what he looked like the night he first showed up at Fort Gallant.

 And this is a close up.  Actually, I picture his hair maybe the slightest bit shorter.  And he has blue eyes.  But still.  Good looking, no?

Here... have another. ^_^

Slightly different model for the last two pics, but you guys get the idea.  The mysterious, good-looking ranger type that the author just falls in love with as she's writing about him.  Yeah, that's Caellahn. :D  I suppose it should be that I love the MC the most.  Which I do.  But it's just so fun to think up the mystery around Caellahn... because, after all, he is a man of deep mystery.  *twinkly fingers*

Now For Allim.  You guys haven't met him yet, but he's an awesome character.  In SOTD, he and his son are the leaders of the outcast Believers.  They are Burri, which is a race I picture to look more Arabic than anything else.  They come from the deserts of Southland.  Here's a mix of pictures of what I think he (sort of) looks like... just so you guys can get an idea.  The top one resembles him the most.  (guy from lost... can't remember his name... <_<)

Yep... nothin' says that the burri can't look handsome too. :D  Allim is middle aged, but very in shape... thus that last picture.

And now for Allim's son, Drugan.  I found the perfect picture for him as well.  He's two years younger than Curron, but he looks more mature for his age and is quickly learning leadership from his father.  I have two pictures for him.  The top one is a slightly older looking version, and the bottom one looks closer to the right age but needs longer hair.

Last but not least, we have King Morven.  I'm sure you're all wondering about him.

I couldn't find anyone that looked EXACTLY like him... but I found a few things that I think are close.  Here ya go. :)

The guy would be the king, of course.  Just give him a goatee... and perhaps some sideburns.  IDK... I can't remember what color of eyes I gave him, but I think they were blue... so you'd have to change his eye color as well.

This would be Morven out hunting.  And he has longer hair.  The Morven in my story has shaggy hair, but it's not actually long.  I found a lot of the pictures of the men I looked for had long hair, but I never picture my male characters with actually shoulder length hair.  hmmm.... If you cut this guys hair shaggy up to about the bottom of his chin and taper it back around his neck, you might have it. :D

And that's all for now.  I'll leave you with one last picture...

GWALCH!  No really, that's the characters name.  He actually works in the palace, but you wouldn't know it by looking at this guy... however, if you cleaned him up a bit and made his hair whiter... maybe put him in some good clothes, you'd have him.  Gwalch really does look like this in my head.

And that's all.  Next time I'll have to do pictures of the characters from ELDREI.  See ya later. :D

Something Totally Unrelated to What We've Been Talkin' 'Bout...

Ok, so I know we've been talking about the Great Publishing Debate, and believe me... this theme WILL continue for a while.  But right now I'm at a bit of a "pausing" point.  I'm interviewing some people, but it's taking a while, so while we are waiting for that, I thought I'd share my latest digital painting, titled "Rejection".

"Rejection" was painted using Gimp and my wacom tablet.  It was created for The 100 Theme Challenge that I decided to take on www.deviantart.com.

I've been working on skin tone and coloring a lot lately, as well as highlighting and shadow, and trying to make my subjects appear more "solid".  I've been getting much better with that: working with human forms has helped, of course.  The thing I've recently been playing with are the different colors that skin tone consists of.  If you'll notice, there's some green, blue, purple, and a little gold in his coloring.  Plus the ice blue highlighting.  I like the effect.  This painting was done using a reference, not something I use a lot when I'm painting digitally as it is, essentially, a pain to my eyes.  When I using graphite I use references all the time, but it's different when you have to split your computer screen up so that you can see both images, and my computer screen isn't all that big.

Well, that's all I have to say for now about this.  Let me know what you think in the comments.

As a warning, Deviant Art is a website dedicated to the visual and literary arts of people everywhere, and as such can present some immoral content if one is not very careful where and how one searches the site.

It is Finally Finished

At the beginning of the fall semester last year, as I was just finishing Song of the Daystar and getting close to test time, I suddenly discovered the wonders of Adobe Photoshop.  Now, I know that Photoshop is ideal for editing and fixing photographs, but in the art world, it is also a major step towards digital painting.  I have recently been experimenting with digital painting.  It's not nearly as easy as most artists make it look.  But after a while I got the hang of it and started working on a project called "The 100 Theme Challenge".  (No, this was not my original idea.  I found it on Deviantart.)  The challenge is to create 100 pictures in any media that you want, in any order that you want to create them, based on the themes given to you.  Since I had been wanting to explore the world of digital painting, I decided to try and do most of my pictures in the computer.

Unfortunately, about half way through painting the picture, my computer did a nose dive and I had to replace it.  When I went to install Adobe to finish the painting, for some strange reason the software wouldn't install.

But this didn't deter me.  I had been hearing some good things about a freeware art program called "GIMP" that could be downloaded straight off the Internet.  I ran it through my school's security software before installing it on my computer.  To my great and ecstatic surprise, GIMP is actually a decent art program.  The majority of the picture was done in GIMP.

The first theme I decided to do was #92, "All I Have".  I apologize now that the colors seem a bit light.  After I finished the picture, I went to print it off at Wal-Mart and discovered that my new computer's Gamma must not be set correctly.  I'll have to go back in, re-set the gamma, and eventually adjust the color.  But until then, here it is.  If you click the image below, a bigger version will appear, and if you double click that version, an even bigger version will appear.  I strongly suggest looking at the biggest version.  I put a lot of work into this painting, but it's hard to see when the picture is so small.

Tagged! A day in the life of my room and Other Ramblings

Well, I had meant for this post to be a good one so I will try to be as posotive as I can be.  That said, today has turned out to be a real let down... and it's only 12:00 pm!

Why, do you ask, am I feeling so down in the dumps?  The answer is quite simple: I was fired this morning.

Yep, the ever dreaded "F" word of the Work Force woke me up this morning with a phone call, dragged me into work, and dropped that horrible, awful, hateful bomb.

FIRED.

But this was not supposed to be a post filled with melancholy and woe, and I can only hope that loosing this job means that God is opening another door for me... preferably one in a business that deals with publishing, books, and the wonderful world of the written word.

So, to comfort myself (and for your visual amusement) I have decided to post pictures of my bedroom.  Thankfully my room was clean (for once) when Jake tagged his followers to post candid pictures of their rooms.  I guess I was one of the lucky ones. :D

This first one is my bed, and the entrance to my bedroom.  Yes, that is a curtain over the door: my room is actually a converted attic and though the pictures make it look bigger, it is really, very small because the ceiling slants all the way down to the floor.  You might also be interested to know that I seem to have a love for Lions and Dragons.  The big stuffed lion was a gift for my birthday several years back: he was deemed "Aslan" soon after.  The little lion sitting next to him is "Little Aslan".  :)    The pillow on the floor is for my cat: he likes to come up and sleep on it.  I usually put the book I just finished reading on that pillow: this time it was "Auralia's Colors".  Oh, and that paper bag by the head of the bed in the first picture?  Books. :D

There's "Little Aslan" again.  And a Picture.  I have three pictures like this placed randomly throughout my bedroom.  This one says "Love" and the other two say "Peace" and "Faith".  My mom says she has another one that says "Hope" somewhere, but she would have to find it before I could use it in my decor.  And yes, those things around the pictures are just pillows.  I had no where else to put them because my bed is rather small.

This is my doll corner.  My mom collects China Dolls and my love of them stems from hers.  Some of the dolls were hers at one time, but she knew that I loved them so she gave them to me.  Others are dolls I fell in love with but didn't have money to buy and that people later bequeathed me as gifts.  I'm too old to play with them, but I love to display them.

There you are, the first real look at my room as a whole.  Now you can see what I mean when I say it is small.  As you can see, I love books.  Those too random wall piles are actually two book shelves filled to bursting.  There are also three more piles of books under my bed hidden under the comforter.  The big black thing in the front of the picture is my guitar case: my guitar isn't in it at the moment.  The other stringed instrument is an alpine dulcimer.  I can play it a little, but I prefer my guitar.  My desk was a Goodwill Find.  We call it my "Waltons' Desk" because in the old TV series, John boy had a desk like that.  (John boy was an aspiring author looking for publication too! :) ) 

Here's another look at it, only this time from the floor.  You can see yet another random pile of books in the lower right had corner.  You probably can't tell by now, but I LOVE to read!

There's my desk top.  The book in the lower right corner is "No Plot, No Problem".  I found it to be a major help.  Can you see my two daggers?  Maybe not.  They're kind of hard to pick out.  One is laying in front of the picture, the other is just above the leaf mat.  The picture has a saying on it that says "She watched a leaf fall from the sky and slowly felt her life falling into place... at last."  It touched me so I put it above my desk to continue inspiring me.  I think my aunt gave it to me.  She gave me the mug in the corner too: it was a souvenir from a renessance faire.

These two pictures are the tops of my bookshelf.  As you have probably noticed, I like the colors Red and Gold, and I also like leaves.  The picture behind the giant leaf bowl on my Bookshelf says "Reach for the Stars" and it has that saying also written in Chinese.  Leaning up against one of my lamps is a book that shows how to write Chinese words, and a bamboo paintbrush.  I made the runner.  You might not be able to tell, but it is Crazy Patch and it was made out of purple, crimson, black, and gold velvet.  It was no easy task to piece it together straight, let me tell you!

My smaller bookshelf.  As you can see, it's so full that the shelves are starting to bend.  I really need to fix that, but I'm not sure how. 

Another picture of my big bookshelf and my desk.

My bed buddies: a red bear that my mom found at a second hand shop, and my stuffed dragon named Torch.  As you can see, I'm reading Cynder's Midnight by Jeffery Overstreet.  I've read Auralia's colors too and will be posting a review on it soon.  The pillow is a Crazy Patch piece I was working on for my mom.  It's not quite done as I hadn't finished the beaded fringe around the edges, which explains the white string draping across the pillow.  lol*  I didn't see the string when I was taking the picture.  The folded blanket has more leaves on it.  :)

That's the wall hanging that hangs above my bed, yet another Crazy Patch piece that I worked on.  The "N's" stand for Nichole.  My Grandma taught me and my siblings how to make them.  Her own Crazy Patch works are just absolutely amazing!  And, of course, her stitching is much neater than mine.  I love my Grandma so much!!!

Another Lion.  When I saw this plaque, I was reminded of the scene in  "The Voyage on the Dawn Treader" where Caspian is telling Lucy and Edmund how the Lion Plaque above his door came to life and spoke with him.  That's why I hung it above my bed.

 My night stand, with my alarm clock, my reading lamp, and my three guardian angels standing in the background. 

Yet another pile of random books.

There's my Guitar.  I had it out of its case and on my bed because I was working on a song when I decided to drop everything and take these pictures.  :D

And last but not least, a final look at my room.  It's small, but I do love it.

And now I'm glad I decided to post these pictures.  It has made me feel much better about the nasty morning I had.  I hope the rest of the day goes well. 

I'll be posting a review on "Auralia's Colors" soon, so keep checking in.  In the meantime, I'm going to follow Jake's example and Tag all of my followers!  This should be interesting... very interesting indeed!

The Artist and the Writer

This is a subject that doesn’t get addressed often enough, I think. I mean, give me a show of hands, how many of you writers out there believe you have some talent in visual arts? Visual being the key word in this instance, not literal.  Maybe some of you do, and that's great!  *thumbs up*

From what I’ve heard tell, though, there are a lot of writers out there who believe they are also amazing artists. Don’t get me wrong! They are artists in the craft of words… but sometimes – sometimes they’re not so great with a pencil and a sketchpad.

On the other hand, there are artists out there who think they are also writers. (Believe me, I know a few). They are so sure they can capture with words what they capture with paint when, more than half of the time, it just isn’t so.

And yet once more, there are those few people who really are talented in both areas. They’re very rare, it would seem… and yet they're not quite as rare as many think. In fact, if anyone reading this has a Deviant Art account, or would just like to browse the site, they might find several talented artists who are also talented writers and vise versa.

I guess it all depends on who you think you really are. If you really believe you are both, then what’s stopping you from being both? So you struggle with the visual aspect of art: take a few art classes, learn some stuff, keep practicing. You’ll get it. So you have trouble fitting words, sentences, and paragraphs together in a smooth flow; take some writing classes, go on line, read, study… it’s not like rocket science. Really anyone can learn to do these things! And when I say anyone, I mean anyone.  It just takes practice, as every action or talant does.

And of course there are those writers/artists who can do miracles with photo editing! (I’m still a baby in that area.)


Me though? I actually fall into the category of both. Yes, I’m a writer and an artist. And also a musician. Those are my three strengths. Some people are like that too (especially if they’ve been playing an instrument since they were young – which I actually haven’t had the pleasure of doing... just since I was 14.)


What? Don’t believe me? Here, I’ll give you a few examples of my artwork:

These are just a few of my favorite pieces (I have more faves, but I thought this post might get too long, so I decided not to post them yet.)
 
So what are your tallants?  Share them with me!  It be awesome to hear about them.  :)