Stryker2011 wrote:I'm looking forward to your new photos. (Really excited for the Marrow shoot -- LOVE HER!) And the rest of the photos, as well.
I've also read that about King. A lot of other authors (classic and contemporaries) have been through much the same, claiming a measly hour a day of sleep, because they had real jobs before striking it famous; though most writers don't make a living solely as an author -- those fortunate few are just that -- FEW. I'm not that motivated any more, to tell you the truth.
I haven't written or drawn anything in quite some time (years, unfortunately). About 26 years ago, when my wife and I got engaged, I wrote a short novella for her as a wedding present (and illustrated it, as well). After we were married, since I wasn't all that enthusiastic about how that 98 page story turned out, I decided to expand on it. It took me about 4 1/2 years, and it turned into a massive tome a little over 1500 pages, which I started working on the illustrations for, but haven't completed. I really need to get that one done before I die. My plan is to have it professionally bound for her in leather (I like the look of pre-1900 books, many of which were over-sized -- as this will be; so it's quite the project). I think the last thing I did some writing and illustrating on was that last comic book (a humorous, slightly raunchy, sci-fi tale about an Intergalactic Marshal, and her partner, sent across the universe to retrieve several hundred escaped inmates. Some of the jokes/gags that I had come up with I actually saw on Tripping the Rift and Futurama years later -- like I said, "If you can think of it, so can someone else.")
I have started working on action figures to represent the main characters of the two ideas that I abandoned. Oh -- here's another one. I had been working on this Conan/Red Sonja type female barbarian comic-book character about 17 years ago. The way I drew her originally, was her race was a jungle culture that had mostly purple skin, with zebra-like black stripes all over. The artist I showed it to in order to gauge his interest in working on the project, thought it would be WAY too much work to do for a continuing character, and didn't think it would work. Imagine how pissed I was when James Cameron's Avatar came out with characters (though not human) had almost the same skin designs. I hate being so slow...
I think you'll only love Marrow more once I dig into her back story. I'm really proud of a lot of her background, if I do say so myself.
And I hear you, that motivation is hard to come by. Especially when, even if an idea is great, success is still so rare. It really does make sense to spend that time just doing something you really enjoy. I think if I end up writing it, it'll just be for the love of telling a story. If anything ever came of it, it's be pure bonus, but not the motivation to do it.
The Space Marshal story sounds like a blast, and reminds me of the sort of vibe you'd get from some of the old Heavy Metal magazine stuff. Now you've go me wanting to read it. And you owe it to yourself to finish that illustrated, leather-bound novella. That is such an awesome idea, and when you can hold that in your hands, every time you look at it, I can only imaging how satisfying it'll be.
If you ever do decide to take another crack at the figures from the barbarian comic, I bet you could do something amazing with Phicens. I have a friend who tried out Ephaine's pastel trick to color a body, and had amazing results.
See, there's a reason Saint Crow doesn't wear a shirt under that vest. He's not just flaunting his abs!
