Writing Wednesday: Tuesday's Catch Up

Hey Guys,

This is the part of the week where I update you on the work I have been creating for the week and what stage everything is up to.

It will also include the area that I have been focusing on the most and how helpful it has been to me.

So as you have probably noticed, I did not post a Talk Tuesday post yesterday, instead I used all my time on Monday and Tuesday to work through, and catch up, on some of my writing.

This week i have been focusing on the more intense chapters of Mysery. I have also placed the book on Goodreads for all to see, at present it is just the tittle and an estimated release date of early next year but it's a step forward.

I also have a front cover update for Mysery. Please tell me what you think of it.

Old Cover:

New Cover:

There are only small changes:

• Blue background - added grey to make London scene look more polluted
• London Eye - Slightest change in colour, slight hint darker
• Mysery text - Different font, larger, different blend
• Name text - Different blend, darker.
• Size difference
• added birds

Not only have I been writing more of Mysery and editing the front cover to suit the book,, I have also been editing a new short film called The Duckling. It's only a small piece I made when my sister came round a few weeks ago and I've been meaning to piece it together.

This piece is mainly focusing on Cinematography and Location. It is about a girl who is trying to escape from her daily life in a park and she tries to find comfort in her surroundings. I will place in the link for you to check it out. 

What's more, on my Monday and Tuesday, instead of writing a blog, I've been working on a brand new idea for a book. This has some very magical essences to it and is inspired by such books as The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins, 2008.

The title of the series is Tournaments and lately I have been working on the ideas for the first book, Ernest Island. I will place more information about this book in a later Writing Wednesday post.

So now you know. Instead of writing a Talk Tuesday blog I decided to spend two whole days to my writing and Photoshop editing. I have had so much fun writing all this new stuff also as most of it is the scenes I have been dying to write for quite some time.

If you have Goodreads and want to add Mysery to your 'To-Read' list, here is the link:

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15835115-mysery

If you would like to check out my new short film The Duckling, he is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXFNy4ZhP24&feature=youtu.be

Please let me know your views on my new cover in the comments below.

If you have any handy writing tips, then leave a comment below and let me know

Stay safe,

Matt

 | Follow | Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | Scribd | GoodReads |

Writing Update Wednesday: Mysery and Photoshop, Book Cover

Hey Guys,

So you've been wondering how my writing is going? You want to know what I’m getting up to on my stories or what’s going to happen next? Well, let me update you on everything so far.

This week I have been playing around with Photoshop and been trying to create a few front covers, now I don’t want to be showing them all off at once and give the game away before it’s even started but I want to talk about how it may help your story progress more and maybe even give you a few more Ideas.

Now recently I’ve been paying most of my attention towards Mysery, (A story about a girl who ends up in a large city that she has never been to before; she has no clue how she got there and knows she does not belong. It is a story of adventure and love.) Now even though I know exactly how I want the story to go and what I want to happen to the girl, Mysery, there are still little bits that are still to be discovered as it is a story of discovering and adventure. I’ve been working on it for quite some time so it tends to change shape quite often.

So I have been sat here pondering over what to do with the character and where to take the character and it has been slightly more testing than normal, but I found that playing around on Photoshop and trying to create something that explains how the character feels has helped me dramatically. Not only do I now have two drafts for my front cover but I have two more chapters and two more added ideas to place into the story.

This hasn’t just helped with the one story either. It has helped me with a few others and made me think about trying to write a series of books. Now that I have the cover, which has made me think ‘The character is this kind of person’, I feel like the stories are just going to flow afterwards.

The reason I have two drafts for Mysery is because I made my first draft, and had a perfect idea of how I wanted it to be set out, but unfortunately I was using images off Google to edit and was told about copy-write, and didn’t want to risk it, so decided to start again and try and create the look and style myself, which has been rather testing.

So here for you are my first two drafts of my book covers for Mysery:

This was my original idea, using images. I really liked this idea as she is a girl from 1920 who has somehow ended up in the modern day. I thought this showed that idea perfectly, but unfortunately the only way I could have truly created this with my own images was to go to London myself and, from where I am, it’s rather far and rather expensive just for one photo.

So my second Idea was as follows:

I tried to stick with the original idea of the girl in black with the long grass, whilst having a coloured background, but I wanted the colour to stand out more so decided to have contrasting colours put together.

As I said before I have created other covers for other books, but seeing as some of them have only got a tittle and a basic layout, I’m not as willing to start handing out all the information for them.

These are just first Drafts and I may change them or play around with them a little.

So overall I believe that playing around with Photoshop and editing, Even if it’s just to create a basis or just an idea. You don’t have to be a Photoshop wizard, but I believe that it will help you with your writing and make you think of ideas you never had before.


Stay safe,


Matt