Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion
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New Pic and Masterhead pic
Just my opinion, but I'm not sure that picture gives a professional look as Connor is suggesting...just my thoughts, but I could be totally wrong (have been often)
Kodai wrote: "Apparantly Gearsonline doesn't allow hotlinks.Here's the page the image is on:
http://www.gearsonline.net/series/fiv..."
Alright, thank you. It does look a little more animated than what I was thinking, but it could work. I'll wait for some more suggestions before I do anything though. I want to combine suggestions and find what the majority likes best. I do like that idea of combining sci-fi and fantasy into one. That's a really good idea if they're all in the same pic.
Thank you. :)
Byron wrote: "Just my opinion, but I'm not sure that picture gives a professional look as Connor is suggesting...just my thoughts, but I could be totally wrong (have been often)"Alright. I probably should have rephrased: appeal. Are you talking about just that picture, or the whole idea?
I'm not volunteering to sift through the vast selection (because I'd need days!) but the #1 best place to find royalty-free original art by SF/F fans of SF/F concepts is deviantart.com. There's actually a search category called Science Fiction under Digital Art and one called Fantasy and sub-categories for space, robots, strange worlds, aliens, skylines, all kinds of stuff. Just type "Science Fiction and Fantasy" into the search box to get all of it. There's one "deviation" (what they call the pictures there) that I saw of a little girl sitting in a chair with a book on her lap and all kinds of "creatures" flying out of it swirling around her head. Pretty kewel visualization of imagination at work!
Ooooh, an even better one of a girl on a window sill reading with a totally UNEARTHLY background outside the window :) Let's see if I can link to it:
Click to see the pic - it won't let me copy/paste the link on my iPad
Another one I really like is titled "The Day the Earth Died" and has a fantasy feel to it like a Michael Whelan painting but it's totally done digitally, probably with one of the "worlds" software generators. It has a POV from a person standing on the planet looking up / out into space where worlds are being destroyed. That might be too much SciFi and not enough Fantasy though. Needs a fire-breathing dragon killing one of those planets and it'd be PERFECT.
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
I'm not sure about copyrights, so you might have to look into that, but the cover of the book fits the categories of both science-fiction and fantasy. It would need some photoshopping to remove the book title and author's name, but it definitely would attract visitors to the group.
Like I said earlier, though, I'm not sure about copyrights.
I second Marjorie's suggestion if there's no copyright issue:)
Yes I like the idea of the image as you're saying. I think two sci-fi related images not to do necessarily with any one book but to do with the genre in general? Like for instance a picture of a weird planet or a futuristic cityscape?
Marjorie wrote: "I'm not volunteering to sift through the vast selection (because I'd need days!) but the #1 best place to find royalty-free original art by SF/F fans of SF/F concepts is deviantart.com. There's act..."Is it legal to just take people's art from there though?
Kodai wrote: "Here is another suggestion.I'm sure you could probably find an image that better suits your needs on Deviant Art, but be mindful that most of the artwork there is under copyright, so you may have ..."
I do like that a lot. It might have to be a group pic rather than the master head because I'd have to crop it to be the master head.
Jonathan wrote: "Yes I like the idea of the image as you're saying. I think two sci-fi related images not to do necessarily with any one book but to do with the genre in general? Like for instance a picture of a we..."That is actually what I was thinking. I was looking at specific books thought with cool things like that, but maybe I'll just look up planets and stars or futuristic city landscapes or something.
Alright. Yeah, I'll let you know if I want it reworked. I think I'm going to leave this topic opened for the month and I'll take the best ideas and vote. If you can recreate a nice masterhead and pic, that could be a set to vote on. I may edit photos with gimp and present that too.
Alright thanks for the suggestions. :)
Connor wrote: "Alright. Yeah, I'll let you know if I want it reworked. I think I'm going to leave this topic opened for the month and I'll take the best ideas and vote. If you can recreate a nice masterhead and p..."Connor, I have to agree,I don't see what the rush could possibly be :) so if you're going to leave the topic open a month (or can you wait 6 weeks?) you might want to create an account on DeviantArt and post a contest for people to voluntarily design and offer art concepts. Only those who are actually interested -- and willing to donate a free, non-copyrighted image -- would enter. You can state up front there's no money involved, just the "fame" :) For some artists, that's totally enough. For ideas/inspiration, just give them the list of books the group has already read--since that IS the reality of what the group is interested in reading/thinking about, right?
ETA: I'm "pushing" DeviantArt because (a) it's been around a long time; a lot longer than Goodreads! and (b) DeviantArt is to digital artistry what Goodreads is to books and reading. I'm not at all associated with the site and althoguh I have an account under another username (my other pen name actually) I rarely sign in or use the site. I go there for fun and inspiration, not to create or share (or sell) art. Some people DO sell their art there. Most of the SF/F artists just like to share it the same way most readers here just like to talk books/genre. Enjoyment in sharing interest applies to all areas of art.
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
Connor wrote: "Byron wrote: "Just my opinion, but I'm not sure that picture gives a professional look as Connor is suggesting...just my thoughts, but I could be totally wrong (have been often)"Alright. I probab..."
Just the picture - love the idea
Marjorie wrote: "I'm not volunteering to sift through the vast selection (because I'd need days!) but the #1 best place to find royalty-free original art by SF/F fans of SF/F concepts is deviantart.com. There's act..."Ooh, the Day the Earth Died is nice...the other one is also =)
Yeah, I like The Day the Earth Died. The only problem is, It won't work to well as a masterhead. The masterhead has to be 970x245 pixels. That's like a narrow landscape and it's a little tall. That's the problem. I would like something like that for a masterhead more than the actual group picture.
So I have a few minutes this evening while I munch my dessert :) and am taking another look at DeviantArt (actually logged in from my laptop this time!) Turns out, The Day the Earth Died was actually created by a pair of artists (sanosoke and 19-10) Check out 19-10's gallery of stuff (OMG! Now we know who had the planet-making software :-)))http://19-10.deviantart.com/
19-10's "Memento" forex (click on this to get the large size; the details are worth seeing)
It's super easy to change the size/shape of an image and in fact, if you check the page sanosoke made for The Day the Earth Died, these 2 actually HAD it in "landscape" orientation and "flipped" it on purpose hahahaha, the irony abounds!
We could distort the image making it "fit" the landscape orientation. Here, I'll make it small so it loads onto the page but it can be made bigger by changing the IMG tag settings. This is at 1/2 size (486x122) using the source image at Deviant art and just altering the IMG tag parameters to make it display "wide."
It really screws it up, definitely, and I like the Memento one a lot better. There are a lot of other options at 19-10's gallery, though. I think it's worth contacting the artists and asking them to donate an image to the group--they might even enjoy creating something CUSTOM!
Really, I kid you not. You never know how alluring "fame" and "exposure" can be to an artist. As an Author, I can tell you, being featured somewhere my target audience would see my work would totally appeal to my desire to become "known." It's even more poignant for a visual artiste.
I think you guys might be getting too stuck on only using what's there, what you see. Think outside the box. Think interactive. Get the visual SciFi / Heroic Fantasy fans involved. Trust me, these artists are as into the genre as you are! Maybe more so!! :-) Check out 19-10's comments/description of "Midnight City"
They're actually offering this one up as wallpaper AND offering to make you a custom size. Don't be afraid. Ask for a custom header graphic that is JUST what the group wants :)
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
(again, I am NOT volunteering to be liason but it's not hard to contact someone at DeviantArt; just create a free account and message them)
I like those. Even the second one, if you like, blur it or something on photoshop, it might make it look cool as a masterhead. It might be too squished though, who knows. I really like the 1st one. That could make a good masterhead and works with either sci-fi or fantasy.
Oh, I almost forgot. On my on profile, I'd favorited a really kewel artist named Orikon who does "worlds" like 19-10 and sanosoke. Check out Orikon's
Deus Ex Machina
(sized half-size at 486x122, which is not its original orientation - click through to see the original)
This one works really well. I love how everything is lit up and glowing. But then, I have thing with glowing (haha)
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
That last one is epic! that's probably my favorite so far!
yeah, I favorited Orikon for a reason :) check out the rest of his gallery. It's more Tron-y motorcycles now but they are way kewel images :)
Yeah, he has some pretty cool stuff. :)
I bet, if asked, Orikon would CUSTOM design an image for this group's masthead just to get the exposure (having a little text credit for the art at the bottom corner of an image is great for him and does no harm to the image for us)One of the mods should ask him (hint hint Connor hint ;-))
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
Visual art, written art and musical art definitely all converge in an amazing way sometimes, more often in the SF/F genre than any other. Those "literary genre" types just don't know what they're missing :)
I just joined the group, but I found this discussion to be very interesting and did some searching on my own. As others, not sure about copyright and such, but I thought this would make an awesome banner: 
and the link: http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs46/i/200...
ooooh...ahhhhh...but that's NOT a valid DeviantArt address / link. Do you have the ORIGINAL artist's link on the REAL DeviantArt site? The one you gave is a bogus site not just a bogus link.If we have the real link to the real artist's DeviantArt profile, we can ask. Looks like they spent a lot of time on that and it'd be truly nasty to just steal it without even asking. My 2 cents anyway.
Again, I assert most DeviantArt users are thrilled and would be totally open to getting approached with opportunities like a masthead for a SciFi/Fantasy group on a busy site like Goodreads. No one likes to have their stuff stolen though and copyrights on visual art are infringed even more than on my kind of art (written words) Given that Creative Commons licensing makes it so easy to just use it and give credit, I'm not sure why so many people steal instead.
Let's find / contact this artist. This would, indeed, make a great masthead (and I was also wondering recently if this idea had died or were going somewhere, Stefan so thanks for starting it up again)
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
Stefan wrote: "I'll see what I can find."If it's in the next 6 days (while I still have a place to live with internet access etc.) I'll volunteer to contact the Deviant/artist on behalf of the group but we still need a Mod to step up to be the official contact and email the artist directly for whatever deets need to be placed in exchange for usage.
@Connor I think that's you since you started this thread, right? If I get permission from the artist, you willing to take the action?
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
@Marjorie I believe that this is the DeviantArt page for the artist. I can't find the exact picture in question, but a lot of his art looks like this.http://danillovesfood.deviantart.com/
POST EDITED:
Never mind. Found it!
http://danillovesfood.deviantart.com/...
It's such a freakin challenge to decipher DeviantArt paths, isn't it? I just had to go dig for a source on an image I want to use. I'll email the artist from my Deviant Art Account but I think it'll need to be turned over to a Moderator to actually move forward.Thanks for digging, Stefan :)
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
No problem. I was just stoked to find something that seemed like it fit the group. I didn't mind doing the extra legwork.
I already messaged him so we shall see.
Let us moderators know what's going on Marjorie that way we can upload the image if we can use it. That's such a great picture choice I think!
Jonathan wrote: "Let us moderators know what's going on Marjorie that way we can upload the image if we can use it. That's such a great picture choice I think!"Jonathan, I was actually kind of hoping Connor would follow up since he started the thread ;-) but I'm trying to "liase" and get an email address you or someone else can write to when it comes time to complete the process. I am NOT going to take responsibility for receipt of any images or make any promises on behalf of the group.
I wrote from my DeviantArt ID and laid out the situation (no money but we can offer a credit, right? that was my understanding from Connor at the beginning of the thread so that's what I told the guy) and asked him to tell me how one of YOU can contact him outside the DeviantArt messaging system.
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
That's why I was asking you to let one of us know. I was talking to Connor recently and he is a little busy but I will let him know that you are working on contacting someone to get an email address for a picture usage. If he can't follow up then I'll see what he wants the rest of us mods to do. And yeah no money but we can say that he created the image yup.
Stefan wrote: "@Marjorie I believe that this is the DeviantArt page for the artist. I can't find the exact picture in question, but a lot of his art looks like this.http://danillovesfood.deviantart.com/
POST E..."
That is an amazing picture! That's the one we will use if we can get it. Since this is my group, I'll be willing to buy it if I need to.
It's perfect! Now we just have to find a good group pic that can sorta match it, but not be the same... If that makes sense.
Here are a couple that I like:
I like them too, but I don't know if they'd go well with the masterhead.... Especially the second one, lol.
I threw that in as a joke. I couldn't resist. I actually think that the pic in post 7 from Marjorie might look good with it or I could see if there's something from the same artist that would work.
Or how about this? I cropped it a bit to make it work better. 
http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&...
I don't feel grabbed by any of the avatar options, esp to go with the nice masthead img. I think the thing I'm wanting is color and delicacy to balance the grey and heavy metal. the girl in the window if cropped tight would work but i think the current avi pic would be okay overlaid on the grey battle masthead. do you really need more Connor? and I'll let you know as soon as / if I hear back from the guy at DeviantArt-Friday
actually i would say use one of Orikon's glowy blue "moons" as the avi, cropped tight but I know he sells his stuff
oh yeah, there's one more place I know to check. A designer who creates glowy fairytale images for paranormal and fantasy genre ebooks -Regina at mae i design. i'll have to get her web site gallery thru her facebook and I'm abt 2 hrs past bedtime here so it'll have to be tomorrow (friday on friday haha)
Okay, she's actually got more stuff on her Facebook (profile and Page have different stuff too) than she does on her web site. What do you think of this one for the small avatar?
This chick definitely looks more Celtic wood nymph than pixie but ... since you're willing to pay, Connor, you could definitely commission her to do a specific pose--like a fairy pixie reading a book in the forest--and she can probably do it for as little as $30-$50 if she has some stock art on hand. She has a lot of stock photos on hand.
She also does photography and often uses her two little girls (one just around toddler or pre-toddler stage and the other is just pre-school age) because they turn into such good little pixies. You have to check out what I mean. When this person takes a photo and "pixies" it into fairytale land, it definitely does not look human anymore ;-)
Regina Wamba at Mae I Design Photography on Facebook or see her other albums on Facebook
You'll have to browse through to see if you feel inspired. She has a LOT of stock photos from which to choose and does "fake" photos all the time if she can't get a model to pose in the exact setup she wants. Sitting on a log reading in the forest forex :) I just envision her little magic, multi-colored swirls of light flying out of the book, like that one on DeviantArt with the girl reading in the window sill - only better :) There's this one she did for a custom blog design:
She can make almost any "common" pose look fantasy-magical with a little sparkling color. She does seriously creepy Paranormal dark Urban Fantasy stuff too but I think to balance the heaviness of the grey header graphic Stefan found, you need some kind of colorful twinkly going on. Plus pixies = fantasyland in most people's minds.
I gotta go find a place to live so I'll check back later. Regina is on Facebook ALL THE TIME so just ping her there to open a discussion. She's VERY open to barter and negotiation but money is always a good expedient :)
-Friday
@phoenicianbooks
Anyway, if you have any ideas, feel free to post them here. Our group seems to be more lenient on science fiction so you might want to pitch those ideas in more unless you have a great idea with a fantasy pic.
Thank you!