Best Not to Visualize

Whilst waiting and waiting for my notes to arrive on the new book, I took to 3D modeling the cast of characters. Big mistake.

You’re a writer – you know how it goes. You work so hard at creating a mental image of your characters, you always wonder what it would be like to actually see them.

I’ve got this goofy software that lets you create 3D models. Actually, it creates the model, starting with a base figure, and lets you customize the physical attributes.

Whilst a’waitin’ for mah notes, I thought I might just sorta mock up a book cover that has the whole cast in it. Ehhhh. Bad choice.

In the mind’s eye, the big guy is a giant – he’s huge, like a bear. When you go to cast a person like that, however… that’s a different story. He’s the guy on the right.

One of my characters is perpetually drunk – it’s not his fault. He is having a rough night in the tavern. Having drunk too much ale and run out of money, he gambles away a grimoire, a book of magic spells. Throughout the rest of the story, whenever anyone opens the book, it calls this poor fellow straight from his table at the tavern to wherever the book is in space and time. Worse, when the book’s done with him, he get put back, right there in the tavern, until the it’s opened again.

The other characters have this big adventure with the grimoire, but for him, it’s just one long, inebriated night. He’s the guy on the left. He looks like a little kid!

The old wizard, Shelburne, looks like a Martian in this image.

And let us not discuss the pants on Penrose, my main character, there in the center. I chose them because they’re knickers, and seem vaguely Elizabethan. But they’re meant to fit a huntress, and simply look… go ahead and say it… stupid with two o’s.

The kid and the girl came out all right, and the fellow in front of the giant is supposed to be a 10th Century prince – he looks okay. The girl is from that same time, but looks more like you’d meet her at the mall.

Emminy-way… you know who loses the argument, right? The first one to say “anyway…”

Anyway, I rendered these super quickly – so quickly that you can see the green-screen around the prince and princess. eh.

When the book is published, oh, this shall be a lovely cover, for certain.

For now? Best not to visualize…