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[Bret Jordan]

Hey everybody. Travis and I have been working on the characters for Twilight to post on his website. He gave me the okay to begin posting them here as they get drawn. Soooooo.

Here's Courtney!

[Permuted Press]

Awesome!  You guys have been keeping secrets.   

[Stephen Blundell]

Very cool Bret! Looking forward to checking out more... and I am looking forward to grabbing a copy of "Twilight" sometime in the new year when I get some free time.  Sounds like a great novel Travis ... hats off to you, mate!

[Bret Jordan]

Thanks Jacob and Stephen!

I just finished another character for Twilight and sent it to Travis. As soon as I get the okay from him I will post it.

[Bret Jordan]

Here is another image that I have sent to Travis. I am going to go ahead and post this one since he saw and liked the rough draft, and there is very little difference except in quality. Soooooo....Heres the:

Armored Zombie

[Permuted Press]

Armored Zombie

That is awesome!

[Bret Jordan]

Thanks Jacob,

Here is another one that I worked on for Travis today. He just gave me the okay to post it.

Vaughn Winters, from After Twilight: Walking with the Dead

[Stephen Blundell]

I really love the two new images ... very very cool!

[Bret Jordan]

Thanks Stephen!

I have one more character to draw, then it's on to another project. When my new project is done (I am drawing some images for a young teen book (Hardy Boys type) - and hopefully doing the cover for it.  ) then I will have a few more characters to put together for Travis. 

I think the picture of Vaughn Winters is from the next book in the Twilight series, and everything that I have seen about the next book,Twilight: Walking with the Dead, sounds like it is going to be even better than the first one - and the first one was fantastic!

[Bret Jordan]

Here is the last character I'm going to be doing for a little bit.

Leon

[Travis Adkins]

Ahhhh.... Seeing an artist's interpretation of my characters is like going to writer's heaven...

[john_sunseri]

You're a lucky man.  I've rarely had my characters illustrated, though I've been dying to see how some of them look.  Before I met my wife, I dated an artist who did work for comic books (an inker, actually, for stuff like 'Preacher' and 'Wonder Woman'), and also drew...but she never wanted to draw the people in my stories.

No wonder it didn't last, huh?

Since then, I've had ten or fifteen stories of mine illustrated, but not many of them actually showed the characters!  I'm starting to think that my folks are offensive to artists...

That, or my habit of not physically describing anyone unless it's important.  Maybe that's got something to do with it.

Anyway, any of you artists want to take some time out of your busy lives, read stories by a guy you met online, and then draw pictures that match those stories - all for absolutely NO PAY - just get hold of me and I'll be happy to oblige!

[Travis Adkins]

That, or my habit of not physically describing anyone unless it's important.  Maybe that's got something to do with it.

I got in the habit a long time ago, in writing, to set my character's descriptions in stone. Maybe not all at once, but enough that a reader knows exactly what they look like.

It takes me out of a story if I don't know what a character looks like. For example, in reading Stephen King, he never gives the slightest hint what a character's appearance is. And to me, that makes them fodder. Perhaps that's a tool he prefers to use, but I don't dig it. If the writer can't visualize his own characters, then how can he expect his reader to?

I dunno. Maybe I'm completely off here. I only write part-time and I know I've still got a lot to learn, but I've just never understood those "Pro writer's tips" regarding not describing your characters. I can't remember who's essay I read, but he wrote to describe your characters' appearance with actions, not references, (or somesuch.) But I'm just not that kind of writer.

[john_sunseri]

No, Travis - I think I'M completely off.  Most of my favorite authors DO describe their characters (King being an exception, of course), and describe them well.  I'm thinking of Sam Spade with his ice-blue eyes and mouth like Satan, of Nero Wolfe with his seventh-of-a-ton-bulk and thin goldfish lips, of James Bond (who looks like a cruel Hoagy Carmichel), of Modesty Blaise and her jet-black hair and lithe figure...

It just doesn't seem to work out for me.  If a character's Chinese, or a bodybuilder, or anorexic, I'll describe those kinds of things - if he's got a limp or she's missing a breast due to mastectomy, if someone's excessively freckled or incredibly short, fine - but I don't spend any time on description of my narrators or most characters.  It's probably a flaw, and it's something I try to fix, but it's how I've done it up 'til now.  I would never blast a writer for making his characters easy to visualize, man!  You're doing it right!

[Travis Adkins]

Oh, I forgot to say this publicly: Bret Jordan is one hell of an artist.