Download photos off the net that you think your characters would look like?

[purvis2]

I use photos off the net of what I "think" my characters would look like. It helps in writing. Has anyone done this in writing?

 

[CiaoSteve]

I do the same... helps keep me honest when I add extra detail to the characterisation in the story.

 

[Cfnmlover84]

Yes i do it all the time.

 

[JaxRhapsody]

I know what my characters look like, I just don't always tell my readers what they look like.

 

[SabrinaGLangton]

I do this all the time, I also like to find an outfit online too. I just wish the people I find online would dress up like the characters in my stories. It would make everything so much easier, ha.

 

[KelvinBlack]

Yes, exactly this. I also have had a photo trigger an idea for a completely different story, while looking for a character for another one.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

there are a couple i use.

here's one... https://thumb-p8.xhcdn.com/a/XKDyPkYxqvQIsz7Y1GeiFQ/000/430/212/538_450.jpg

 

[Defluer]

I do this all the time, I also like to find an outfit online too. I just wish the people I find online would dress up like the characters in my stories. It would make everything so much easier, ha.

I am guilty of this for sure! And believe me... This AI Art Revolution is going to make this so much easier for me. Or more distracting.

Yes, exactly this. I also have had a photo trigger an idea for a completely different story, while looking for a character for another one.

Yup. I actually have a collection that is sort of waiting in the wings. It can't just be an attractive person. The pose, expression, smile, location or something has to stir something up in my brain that I snip it for later.

 

[ElectricBlue]

All the time. And even though I rarely write a "description paragraph", my cumulative description is complete enough that when I've asked someone to send me a pic of someone they think my characters look like, it's been uncanny how close their pics are to mine.

 

[Rob_Royale]

I've four posted stories and until now I hadn't thought to do this, as I was pulling my female MC's from mature women I'd known throughout the years. However someone recently posted this woman in the BBW thread and she is just a perfect representation of the MILF in my most recent story MILF Cruise - Upgraded, if perhaps a few years too young. However, with less of an idea of what my next mature woman would look like in my current WIP, it prompted me to do a Google search for her and I found the second photo. I think I will be doing this pretty regularly for future storys.

 

[SimonDoom]

I couldn't do this without permission. I cannot recall having based any of my characters on a celebrity, but I have based them loosely (not in a way that would permit any reader to identify them) on women I've known personally or women I've seen on the Internet who are not "celebrities" and whose photos I would never post without permission.

 

[SyleusSnow]

My imagination and inner eye often fail so yeah, I collect all kinds of reference photos when working on a story: clothes, buildings, vehicles and, of course, people. It helps greatly when writing descriptions and keeping them consistent, especially when the character has specific characteristics (big or small boobs, dark, pale, very short, very tall, etc).

I've been working on a story involving "resting bitch face" (yes, it's a hateful term). But there are so many degrees and types, male and female. Should it be like Julia Stiles, or full Sandra Bernhard? Finding a reference model and sticking has helped.

Fuskator is useful for female reference models... lots of choice, and they tag many common characteristics. Then there are NSFW reddits for everything imaginable. Randomly browsing photo collections like Unsplash sometimes finds a face or setting that inspires when I don't have anything specific in mind.

 

[lovecraft68]

For what I call basic smut I often browse stock photo sites until something I see makes me say "Hey, that could be her" and a bonus if the pose is something I can easily work into a story. I have OCD with covers. If I see my female lead as a redhead, there needs to be one on the cover. If the cover I choose has her in lingerie or a sexy dress, she will be in that outfit at some point. I have seen people be the opposite, a blonde on the cover and brunette in the story as well as the woman a milf in the story and barely looking 21 on the cover.

For a more serious story I create the character completely in my mind's eye then hope to hell I can find an image close enough to make it work. I pay for a photo subscription so when I download them they're mine to use. These people running around the net stealing photos of women on facebook or off social media creeper accounts pisses me off.

Now sometimes I browse with nothing in mind, but an image will make me stop and something will explode into my mind. This is the most recent to do so.

 

[lovecraft68]

Describing a character can also be like those old toys where the person or monster was in three sections and you could swap them all out to create different looks.

For example for a female

Eye color-only so many
Hair-only so many, although these days blue, pink, streaked hair, gives more options.
Tall or short
Petite, busty, athletic
Skin tone, she fair, she tanned, olive tint, dark skin?
Tattoo, no tattoo ( this doesn't occur to everyone, I like throwing a couple of tats on my females)
Piercings, same as above.
Breasts( I don't like stats so...) smallish, ample, full, 'more than a mouthful" "a good handful"

Just go down the line and mix and match. It works unless you're someone who really gives the full menu list of a person's attributes.

 

[oggbashan]

I don't use photos at all and I tend not to give much detail so that the reader can people my stories with whoever he/she wants.

I have a general idea when writing the story but I know the reader might have a very different one. I use my imagination - they use theirs.

 

[lovecraft68]

I don't use photos at all and I tend not to give much detail so that the reader can people my stories with whoever he/she wants.

I have a general idea when writing the story but I know the reader might have a very different one. I use my imagination - they use theirs.

I wonder if this approach becomes less popular as time goes on. These days everyone needs everything shown and explained to them. You tube has a ton of channels who produce content explaining the ending of a show or movie.

If you need it explained, either the director didn't do a good job, or you're a dipshit that can't come to their own conclusions.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

I have massive archives for the Alexaverse in this regard. It does indeed help. I knew what all my characters looked like already, no question, but the pics help in terms of inspiration and description. I'm a control freak about my characters, so I rarely leave things up to the reader's imagination. Lots of them get it wrong or make up their own looks for my characters, so whatevs.

 

[Priscilla_June]

Yes, I strayed away from it since starting on Lit, but I used to utilize pics from the internet when I did ERPs on other sites. Those sites though you could link the image in your post to give everyone an idea of what YC looked like. But not so much here.

I think I need to just throw it in the doc I am using and reference it from time to time so I have a picture in my head.

 

[Lifestyle66]

I tried to describe the wife's hair and I used an Internet search to find the right color. Then I used DAZ3D software and some models to create a few scenes, to keep the characters and models consistent.

So, some of my characters and even the props are based on what I could find for my DAZ3D scenes. The MC's first car is a Mustang convertible, mainly because that was the closest prop in DAZ I had available for the visual I tried to create.

 

[Djmac1031]

I've done this several times to help with descriptions of both women and their outfits.

Although early on I had a lovely reversal of that when a reader sent me his fan art of a character I'd created strictly in my head and absolutely nailed her appearance. It was uncanny.

 

[oggbashan]

I wonder if this approach becomes less popular as time goes on. These days everyone needs everything shown and explained to them. You tube has a ton of channels who produce content explaining the ending of a show or movie.

If you need it explained, either the director didn't do a good job, or you're a dipshit that can't come to their own conclusions.

It mighgt be less popular, as are some of the words and constructions I use in my stories written in British English.

I write for readers, not those with short attention spans who need pictures. Readers might be a dying breed, but so am I.

 

[Duleigh]

I use photos off the net of what I "think" my characters would look like. It helps in writing. Has anyone done this in writing?

Yep, it helps focus the thinking

On larger works I'll set up a table with the characters, their interactions with other characters, and the major players will have a link to a photograph of someone I think looks like them.

 

[KeithD]

I use photos off the net of what I "think" my characters would look like. It helps in writing. Has anyone done this in writing?

I've done this, yes. I use international locales a lot, and it helps to find that a character I have in mind could be grounded in the place they are from in my story.

 

[lovecraft68]

It mighgt be less popular, as are some of the words and constructions I use in my stories written in British English.

I write for readers, not those with short attention spans who need pictures. Readers might be a dying breed, but so am I.

I don't know that reading is dying, but physical mediums are. Newpapers, magazine, books, comic books, they're all becoming a thing of the past. Sad to see

 

[oggbashan]

I don't know that reading is dying, but physical mediums are. Newpapers, magazine, books, comic books, they're all becoming a thing of the past. Sad to see

We buy two daily newspapers every day of the week, and three editions of the local paper on Thursdays, together with some monthly magazines.

Our monthly paper bill is at least 30% higher than anyone else supplied by that newsagent.

If I compare the number of news items on the main evening TV news with just one newspaper - the TV news has at most 15 items. The newspaper has over 100. Between the two newspapers that rises to over 150, without the editorials.