Miriam's Art Corner

I felt inspired and randomly started to sketch a scene from my own story, A Rising Star. It's still pretty work in progress, but I guess I couldn't help but wonder if people would even appreciate it in any form.



I'm probably going to finish this drawing for story cover art either way, but it made me contemplate drawing out some more scenes and adding them to the story as well. I'm thinking they could support the writing by providing a more visual picture about what is happening in a particular chapter, and I'm hoping people might appreciate them too.

... Except I feel kind of conflicted. So far I've always avoided describing the main character, and left the name fully customizable. This is because I want readers to be able to fill out the details about her exact appearance with their own imagination.

By drawing the main character in any shape or form it feels like I'm intruding on the imagination of the reader, by pre-defining what she would look like.

Well, I suppose I could always add a toggle variable and make the pictures optional...

Thoughts?

 

There are two kinds of people in this world.

People who demand that they be given features on characters, or else they're just a bunch of talking lips (and maybe eyeballs).

And people who need visual aid to fully flesh out the character in their brains, because for reasons unknown, their brain can't imagine scenes.

I will agree that, by how your story sounds like, drawing the character in the flesh does remove the "independence" of the customizable variables. And it does seem like you have a good idea in making the pictures optional, and with that, I don't suppose you could make a "dead-end" chapter before, or after, the proceeding chapter with the title of something around the lines of "Visual aids for this chapter (optional)" where people can have a look of what you intend the scenes to look like, but only if they're interested in them.

 

Both the kinds of people you describe wouldn't enjoy the way my story is laid out right now (no pictures and no detailed feature descriptions for the main character).
Perhaps I will have to leave less to the imagination. Sometimes I wonder if 2nd person is even the right format for the kind of story I'm trying to tell.

Anyway, I realized I can just make two chapters at the start of the story called 'Disable Pictures' and 'Enable Pictures' (and even hide either depending on which is active). Whichever chapter was clicked last decides the value of the variable 'Pictures', which determines if they are displayed in the rest of the story: {If pictures=1}DisplayPicture.png{else}No picture displayed here!{endif}

I tested it and it worked fine, so I'll probably implement that! Only downside is that people who are up to date with the story may have to restart it in order to get it working properly.

Either way, thanks for your thoughts!

 

Today I felt like drawing again, so here's another scene from my story in which the heroine agrees to BDSM with her aging landlord (in exchange for rent), but gets pinned under him after he seemingly suffers a heart-attack (spoilers: he's fine).



Here is the corresponding chapter for this drawing.

 

I'm not sure if I'm suddenly on a personal quest to make a drawing for every chapter or what, but here are three more for the opening chapters of the story:

 

Damn, those are nice!
Miriam, is that you?

 

How long does it take you to produce each of these?

 

You mean the character in the drawings? It's not me, but I do take heavy inspiration from my own looks and belongings, yes.

About two to three hours for each drawing, depending on amount of detail and the length of my limited attention span.

 

These are nice.

If you make a weekly comic, something like you'd see on newspaper, I'd read them.

 

Thanks! That's a huge compliment, since I've always wanted to make an (online) comic.
I just never know what it'd be about. I guess I can simply turn my CHYOA story into one at this rate.

 

And f̶i̶n̶i̶s̶h̶e̶d̶ botched another one. Featuring the main character her first threesome.

What can I say about this one? Augh. Too many limbs and I rushed it slightly after I couldn't get the proportions right.
I can probably do better than this. But it's way too hot today and time for bed.

Edit: I redid this one with a little more sincere effort. See below.

 

Yes, I see that.

Blondie's... index(?) finger seems too long, while his pinkie is too bent. Trying it now, both my middle and ring finger bends with the pinkie, but I have to force the tiny finger to bend in order to achieve that.

Miriam's face doesn't seem appropriate I think. She seems more at peace rather than lusty or euphoric.

And does Hairy really need to grab arm and shoulder for Miriam to continue the handjob?

 

All great feedback, thanks! I suppose I'll try and fix those areas up somewhat tomorrow. I fully admit I can't draw hands to save my life.

He really doesn't. I'll find him something else to do with that weird looking arm of his.

Oh, and the pictured MC's name (by default) is 'Marlow', Miriam is my own moniker; just clearing it up now before anyone gets the wrong idea about me.

 

That's a very stiff looking arm.

It'll dislocate for sure.

 

So I ended up redoing just about everything multiple times. It's still not perfect and will never be, but my eyes are square and my neck hurts from being hunched over a tablet for too long so I'm probably done with this one. I might still clean it up slightly or beautify the background a little, but I'm not redrawing all the characters again.

I redrew some lines so many times that at one point it became hard to tell whether I was even improving it or just making it worse overall. It didn't help that I wasn't using any references, and I'm not used to drawing complex scenes with multiple overlapping and interacting characters like this. But it was good practice either way, and we all know I could use some more experience with drawing hands and feet.

Anyway, I hope it's at least somewhat of an improvement:



Here is the corresponding chapter for this drawing.

 

Corresponding chapter can be found here.

 

Just a quick one today before bed. The main character stripping for her very first audition as 'actress'.


Corresponding chapter can be found here.

 

I'm pretty sure the actual set has a painting.

I don't think that's important, I just thought you could've added some sort of inside joke or shitpost on the wall.

Spoiler

 

Ha, the couch itself was the inside joke already, and it seems like you got the reference just fine.

I actually did consider adding the painting as well, but that felt like overdoing it. It's not meant to literally be the casting couch set either. Just a small nod towards it.

 

Quick one today. Two secondary characters (Sarah and Candy) arguing about who the MC is going to do a porn scene with. Who would you choose?



Okay, one more. The MC learning why they call her 'Candy':


Corresponding chapter(s) can be found here.