Imagine Magazine Question for 9/15

[JeffsFort]

Something that I used to secretly do as a reader was to get an image in my head of what a character in a story actually looks like, then go find a picture of someone who looks similar to what i imagined. Years down the road, as an author I used to do the same thing but post those images to share what my view of some particular characters looked like. Sometimes people would totally agree with my pick, others would share their own to compare, and some would disagree with my effort to taint the image in their imagination. Who knew that would be a thing yet, here we are!

So our question this month is: Do you enjoy seeing representations of an authors character by the author posting a picture of a "Stand In"? Does it add to your own image of what the character looks like to you or does it ruin the mental picture you have created?

(Sorry, this should have been posted a week ago. Sooooooooo overloaded at the moment, LOL!)

[MrM]

Definitely! I loved to see Comsie’s interpretations of his characters! They helped me along in forming the image of them that he was thinking at the time of writing!

I often passed photos I’d find past him to see what he thought of my ideas. He usually loved my inspiration. He’d then offer one of his own and we’d discuss what we thought, as authors, what the character should look like and then submit that the most important interpretation of the character should always be the readers!

That said, Comsie always loved my vision of Brandon from The Secret Life Of Billy Chase! 
 

 

[SilentandBroken]

YES. Emphatically yes! I’ve posted them before but here is Justin from GFD

[SilentandBroken]

Incidentally, I shared this with Comsi once and he loved it

[MrM]

One time I colorized the book cover Comsie chose for Ryan’s Heart. The premium version on Amazon. You won’t find it on GA I don’t think. I used his description in ‘New Kid In School’ to get the colors right. I always liked Comsie’s choice of model for what he wanted Ryan to look like.

[SilentandBroken]

5 minutes ago, MrM said:

One time I colorized the book cover Comsie chose for Ryan’s Heart. The premium version on Amazon. You won’t find it on GA I don’t think. I used his description in ‘New Kid In School’ to get the colors right. I always liked Comsie’s choice of model for what he wanted Ryan to look like.

Oh my…. So hot.. wonderfully done 

[JeffsFort]

It's funny to me how strongly some people either support this idea or push back against it. Back in the early 2000s it was really common in forums all over the internet to have postings of what an author had in mind when creating their characters or from readers who imagine 'this' is what I think that character looks like. Personally. I love it when people post creative ways to show what it is they have no other way to show. If a character description for whatever reason makes you think of say Jacob Tremblay, then it's cool to learn why. Even cooler because lots of images of Jacob start to surface. LOL!

My problem when doing so as an author was finding ONE random image that is really close to what I imagine a character I created looks like. Then I drive myself nuts later on trying to find other pictures that are close but just seem to miss the mark. I actually have one character that has a before and after a very altering event in his plot line, mainly because I wanted to come up with an updated look but not let go of the original. Kinda neurotic when you think about it but to me it was fun because that effort tied into a story plot. The more twisted, the more I like it.

With Comsie's stuff, I loved his evolving images and how he would encourage others to share their own. That was the reason why his GFD: BloodBank site originally had the "Vampire Sightings" section (Now located at https://gfdbloodbank.com/chapters/sightings01/) and so much more that literally created a tangible world that we all could see instead of simply imagine. We need more of that still I think!

So yeah, I wanna see! (Stop laughing TurtleBoy!)