Share the story of where your work came from

[thedude3445]

For Hands Held in the Snow, I saw some cute images from a visual novel I have never played and then got an idea for a six-chapter miniseries set in a Venice-like fantasy city. My friend saw this story idea and became so enamored by it that they paid me to write it as a full novel... And so I did! A few drafts later and it became the web serial it is today.

Hands Held in the Snow | Tapas

[MaeRose]

Don't be embarassed!

The initial idea for my story came from GTA V! I don't think there's anything wrong with having ideas inspired by fanfics and video games etc, and then developing it into an original story of your own.

[arbiterswake]

I suppose so. Excited to finally release the first episode this week. Should have done this sooner!

[raeguardart]

Mine started while watching a damn isekai anime that prompted a late night text to our d&d dm: “Can liches breed?”
(He’s unfortunately used to me by this point)

After reassuring me that the undead can not in fact make babies I latched onto the idea of a disney-esque story of a child being adopted by an undead sorcerer. Whole nine yards little mermaid-but-with-skeletons. Then I slapped myself.

Since then the story evolved to focus more on the lich than the kid, and I started using him to examine my own feelings regarding loneliness and isolation? And now two years later I’m finally committing to drawing the dang thing.

[paracosmosfiction]

I can just imagine that conversation. Still, I'm glad that it helped you create something that's your own. For me, one idea led to another and then it snowballed from there.

[azzy-m]

All the characters in Celestials were originally Hetalia rip-off ocs - basically the "story" was meant to be like Hetalia but with personifications of planets instead. Except I got too lazy to research actual scientific facts because I was 12 and I didn't understand anything, made my own lore, and now it's being made into a 4-season fantasy comic about taking down a space tyranny.

[likhoradka]

Considering there's so much fanfic out there where people are just using the character tropes and the easy out for visual description, there's nothing to be ashamed of in using it as a jumping off point. Or just filing off the serial numbers. I may have a fic I'm planning on doing this with...

As for my current comic, Damngelic started as a fancomic that stemmed from some Halloween fanart. Then the plot started piling up, and I became more interested in the story and than the fanservice. Dropped it for a while, and since I was still interested in the story and wanted to change some of the opening elements and characters and character interaction, I started it over as its own thing.

[paracosmosfiction]

I'm just impressed you started writing that early. I'm pretty sure I was still spending most of my time gaming as opposed to doing anything actually productive or creative back then.

[paracosmosfiction]

Could I get a link to that? That actually sounds right up my alley.

[azzy-m]

To be fair, they were the type of ocs that just exist for me to mess around with. It's really only now, 4 years later, that I really thought of this as a "Story"

[domisotto]

I always feel weird in these threads, because peeps like have this one book they write, and I have eight... and counting.

My first novel was a love letter to an old video game that had its sequel canceled.

The rest of them came from just wanting to write about having adventures and fooling around in settings that go beyond standard Western Fantasy.

Really, I just want to write space operas for shank and giggles, but almost nobody comes to the Internet to read about space ships and aliens, so I switched to fantasy, like everyone else.

Honestly, I am tired and want to read adventures, and I vaguely remember a lot of obscure stuff from history, so I string it together in plots that sound like fun to me with characters like nobody else writes any more.

That’s all.

[arpeggiomax87]

My work came from multiple assets from my younger life. Where i screwed up lost people and thing and where i've wanted to kill myself on multiple occasions and such.

My original comic was going to be a character who's suicidal and would try to kill himself but never able to do so based on life's inconveniences. I felt that it was too loose and generic of an idea that's been done before time and time again and so I decided to do something much more effort driven as a whole.

Of coure my efforts proved to be in vain due to no one giving a shit about me and my creations whatsoever, so I have nothing to show that would be interesting at all and I just end up disappointing everyone and hide back into my shell of self-pity.

That's bipolar depression in a nutshell, and I know i'll never crawl out of it any time soon.

[CommanderMarty]

You got 22 subs, people do care about your series.

[CommanderMarty]

All my series came from a desire to make something.

I got the idea for Bounty Turn after watching Hunter X Hunter and I wanted to make a sci-fi series based on bounty hunters.

Uber Upgrades came from a custom game mode of the same name from Team Fortress 2 and other shounen series I enjoyed.

and Jervis T Booker is a continuation of a DND campaign I played in, Jervis was not my character in that but he had a backstory that I wanted to make a series about.

[paracosmosfiction]

For what it's worth, I personally love your work. And I understand wanting to do things beyond just what everyone else wants you to do. That's part of why I decided to leave the site I was originally on. It felt like the more and more I was writing, the further and further away I was getting from my original vision.

Also, you're not alone in the multiple writings department. I've lost count of how many projects I've started and "put in the freezer" so to speak.

[miss.monocle]

From one bipolar person to another, please take a step back from the internet. Do whatever you need to in terms of healthy self care. Relax as best you can. I understand the problems of equating your self worth to your work, but doing so is incredibly damaging, both to yourself and to your work. It sounds like you need to take some time to evaluate yourself and determine whether or not your artistic goals are really what you want to do in the moment. Stepping away from your art and comic is okay. The internet will always be there when you feel more positive.

I myself took a step back for years. During this time, I found happiness in my art again and felt far less constrained by lacking in numbers of followers. Because most of the time, that's all they are, numbers. Instead, focus on the followers themselves. The one's who support you. Reach out to them, have fun with them.

But right now, tearing down yourself and others is just going to burn bridges that you will regret later. Seek help however you can and focus on your artistic mindset.

[jgreene2433]

I've been working with my character and her universe for a little over 10 years now(man I'm old​) so my inspirations are kind if dated. I was reading Grant Morrison's X-Men run at the time and fell in love with his handling of the Emma Frost character at the same time I was heavily watching alot of the television show Supernatural(which was finishing up it's 2nd season) and I just loved the episodic nature of that show and the 2 characters always moving from town to town. I don't think I consciously set out to mash these 2 influences up, but kinda had fun being a thieving bastard any way,

[paracosmosfiction]

Player backstories are how I got started with writing. So that one holds a special place in my heart. World of Warcraft Roleplay was where I got my start however. And I've been obsessively adding stories to everything ever since.

[domisotto]

Heh, mine are all finished, edited a few times etc. I am not so much prolific as I am steadily persistent. I get into that book, and I can’t stop till I see the end scene. Then I am done and get obsessed about another setting, plotline and set of characters.

It probably comes from wanting to know what happens next and how it ends. Basically, one of the reasons why all my work save for one duology is standalone.

[paracosmosfiction]

One hundred percent agree. You gain nothing by tearing yourself down like that. Nothing. And I'll say this also. No one ever made something and then exploded the day after. It simply doesn't work that way. It took years just for me to get a steady fan base on my old site. And even then, I was nowhere near the top artists. Not by a long shot. I was still way way way down in the mid card.

Not only that, but I dealt with non-stop criticism, trolls, and people dogging my work simply because they didn't like what I was doing with the material. It's a process. It really is. And the fact that I'm now starting over from the very beginning scares the hell out of me, I'll readily admit that. Because that site represented years of work.

But it's like my Dad says. Nothing ever gets done if you let negativity and self-doubt rule your life.