Art is Powerful
I’m not exactly breaking new ground when I say art is powerful.
Sight is the king of the senses in humans (er, “us humans” I mean), usually riding roughshod over weaklings like touch and hearing — we don’t have both eyes on the front of our head for nothing. Unlike text, which requires an intermediate “translation” before it gets turned into a picture in our head, pictures go straight to the source. Which is why we say things like a word is only worth 1/1000th of a picture. This whole post is only worth about half a picture.
Now I’m not an artist, I’m a writer. Well actually I’m a GM, which isn’t even the same thing because a GM uses the written word as a launching point for what is basically performance improv, the final product being the game not the page… but I digress.
Since I’m not an artist, when I make material for publication I have to hire artists to turn my words into pictures. If the artists I hire are any good (and I try to ensure they are) this can be a very dangerous process — dangerous because if an artist produces something that looks great but doesn’t match what I had in mind, I have to resist that change and stay true to my original concept.
Once something is drawn (and drawn well), that image becomes very compelling. It can be very tempting to let an image I see replace the idea I have in my mind. Holding true to the original concept, resisting the power of art, can be very difficult.
Perfect Preconceptions
Usually a character has existed in my mind long, long before I see an artist’s interpretation. A character could be in play for years before it is put into a draft for publication and an art spec is sent out — Dreadnaut was first used in-game three and half years before the description was sent to an artist.
That’s a blessing and a curse. On the plus side, you have a strong mental image of the character, so you have a little more strength to resist a “wrong” image.
On the downside, you have a strong mental image of the character, which can lead to excessive perfectionism (“but it doesn’t look like I imagined! Wah!”).
Accidental Details
Sometimes there are details that are critical to me because they imply something that will actually make a difference in play. An early sketch of Scorpio showed barbs/harpoon tips at the end of her whips. It looked good, but to me it was critical they were removed. Why? Because even if the text says nothing about it, players and GMs looking at that picture will think “ah, we can ruin her whips if we cut off the ends” which went entirely against the concept of her powers: she is supposed to be able to reel out as much cable as she wants, and even leave behind severed sections to tie people up.
These unintentional implications can easily overwhelm the text. Draw a sad person, and it doesn’t matter if the text says he’s happy. The memorable impression will be that he’s sad, and that’s how he’ll be played and reacted to in the game.
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I also like art; I’m lucky enough to be a little of an artist, though not a very good one; it does mean I can producy my own maps and handouts, which is double the fun! Illustrations are much harder!
Ian
“Just out of curiosity, where do you usually dig up the artists that illustrate the books you publish?”
Mostly from seeing their work in other releases, sometimes by just calling for open submissions. My recent releases have been superhero, but even then different projects require different styles (more mechanical, more 4-color, etc).
_Really_ nice work by the way:
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/44220762/
I agree that sometimes a good drawing can ruin a concept with unnecessary details, although sometimes I’ve seen unwritten details really enhance an idea. I don’t know if I’m supposed to talk about official D&D supplements directly here, but in one of the D&D books dealing with undead, there’s a painting of a “weeping undead” concept. Now, in the picture, this thing is really gruesome… metal stakes coming out of the eyes and screaming mouths where the palms of the hands should be. I combed the description and found that neither of these details were mentioned, but they sure made the monster a lot more compelling to look at and increased the chances I’d run it in a campaign. And I’m pretty sure those details were not only harmless, they could actually improve the GM’s description of the action. The rules don’t cover exploitations for iron eye socket protrusions, but since this creature is undead and feels no (or perhaps constant) pain, it only enhances the action to have one of the PC’s hits have a particularly horrific reaction with the metal stake. And the teeth in the hands can be factored into the description of the monster’s claw attack when played out on the table. Anyways, the point I was trying to make is, sometimes the art can make positive suggestions to the GM. The trick is, of course, that the artist and the art director have an open dialog going about what is and what isn’t proper to add.
Just out of curiosity, where do you usually dig up the artists that illustrate the books you publish?