Imagination

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This may sound crazy, but when I want to get my imagination working properly, I look at clouds and try to make shapes out of them. It’s one of the simplest and easiest things you can do, and it works very well for me because you need to have a lot of imagination to change the clouds.

If you honestly can’t get pictures from the clouds – or you don’t want to look like a crazy person – try to find a picture, either in a book or on Google, but make sure it’s a very complicated one, with lots of detail. Look at every little detail it has, think about how you can describe it, and then think how you can use it to describe your character.

The only thing about this step is that occasionally in my work I accidentally make references to clouds or paintings, because I’m thinking about them while I’m writing. As long as you’re careful to make sure you’re writing about the character without mentioning your inspiration, it should be okay – mentioning the source without meaning to can be very confusing for the reader.

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