Drawing Characters

[cherrystark]

Is it weird to ask other people to draw your characters? I like art and can draw, I'm just not good with people. I kind of want to see what the characters from my series look like as a picture. I know them. I know basic traits about them and can tell you all about their personalities but I can't picture them in my head? Has any other writer had that problem before?

[DasIstWunderblyat]

It is not weird and very natural of any writer, although I do not have such problem because I can draw to a degree.

However, if you are going to approach an artist for request (free) make sure they are open to it first because it is considered rude to ask for free things especially if you don't know them. If you are willing to spend money, you can comission an artist; many of them are willing to draw from description and even offer character designing services. The rule of thumb is always follow their term of service, consider what they can/cannot do, and be cooperative.

If you feel bad about your social skill or just want a rough placeholder, you can use avatar makers online. Particularly for anime style, the avatar maker compilation site Picrew gives you a range of choices and style. Be sure to read and follow the guidelines and terms of service of each avatar maker.

If you prefer to draw imagination from real people, you can use images of various models and celebrities as an idea of how your characters look like (to be safe, only as an idea, not actually use it). There are many Tumblr blogs and tags dedicated to faceclaims, you can look it up on Google too.

In the case of your character contains specific features of two or more different people, you can use Photoshop to edit them for easier visualizing. You can also combine faces of celebrities and use it as an inspiration.

Picrew｜つくってあそべる画像メーカー

Tumblr

http://www.morphthing.com/

[miss.monocle]

I've had this happen to with a novel project of mine. I could always draw the characters in my comic and picture them easily, but for novel characters, it just never looks right. It might be a medium thing? For my comic characters, they were always designed to be visual with the writing coming after. If you're having trouble drawing novel characters, it might be because they were intended to only be described in words, not so much with drawings.

[DeleteThisAccountFag]

Not at all, I've commissioned plenty of times for drawings of my characters. Though for reference, I am not speaking on behalf of a novel but for a game I am making since I am hiring artists for that game.

Though if you are going to search for an artist, make sure you check out their artwork and see if their style fits your vision. When I was searching for an artist for my game, I ended up having a lot of artist commissioned and they all brought me different results. Every single one of them.

Just as an example, here is the first character drawn by an acquaintance of mine to be used as reference for the potential artist;

And here are some of the submissions from 4 different potentials:

And the art style I decided upon:

As you can see, what I started with had different interpretations from different artist. That is why it's important to see their art first before you request your characters to be drawn in their style.

Just wanted to give you a heads up on that.

[cherrystark]

Thanks for the resources. Before I would make such a request, I would definitely provide more information and do my research

[cherrystark]

Some of my readers have asked for more "detailed" descriptions of my characters because they can't picture them visually. While I can see where they are coming from, I can't really "fix" it. One character, for example, I envisioned one of two actresses playing her but one woman is black and the other white. They are also physically very different so I omitted the character's race and general body type because it was not critical to the story.

I know part of my issue is describing them enough with words to make me happy instead of the readers, but it still makes me curious what they'd actually look like visually

[cherrystark]

Good to know. I will keep that in mind when I officially decide to commission a piece

[surenlicious]

Actually, the medium doesn't matter but the order in presenting the art vs writing tends to help. I am an artist writing a novel, so I made sure to burn my characters on people's retina's first before I began the writing part. XD

[magnavarra]

it's strange that readers can't imagine characters - to me reading is most fun cause I can imagine any charcter or even myself when I read. even if t\the character has another hair color or whatever.

[cherrystark]

Right??? I like to imagine how the characters look in my head. I focus more on the important things about the characters like their personalities or maybe a key trait them such as unique hair but everything else is up to the reader.

[Maps]

As mentioned above, you can commission. But it'll likely come at a cost - which is only fair.
I've only had this issue by reading other books, but not of my own characters. I realized that sometimes when I read books, I end up imagining actors or actresses (even musicians) with similar descriptions. But if the description is good enough I can create my own image of a person who doesn't exist.
I can see how you might have trouble imagining your own character, but maybe you should start thinking about all the little details. It's kind of good to have your own idea of what the person you write about looks like. You can also always use references.
Sometimes features seem to "fit" a personality. I mean, I can literally imagine a yakuza manga member in my head right now with how generalized that appearance has become. Maybe start with a cliche base-idea of a character and work from there.
What color is their hair? What shape is their face, their eyes? Do they have thick eyebrows? Long eyelashes? What skin tone do they have? What kind of haircut would they have? Are they toned or curvy? Birth marks? Moles? Scars?
Breaking down each little detail can kind of help your mind begin to form something mentally "tangible".

[pilot-obvious]

I've had a lot of writers in the past commission me with only a written description of their character! It's totally normal and if the artist is comfortable working from a description, it's absolutely worth it! Don't be afraid to ask if the artist says they're open to requests... and feel free to inquire if an artist will work from a written description if they have paid commissions open!

It also helps to have any kind of visual reference such as stock photos, mood boards, outfit ideas, etc. Every little bit helps, even written scribbles/notes on those references.