@haneul
Thank you! I think my photos are safe for now, because they've given more bandwidth for free and I'm no longer above the limit. I don't think I have to worry about them deleting my stuff... But my biggest worry now is the whole website will go under eventually, since they've shot themselves in the foot. They've come a long way towards fixing the mistake though, but darn if it didn't ruin everything I'd been working on.
Anyway, yes! Their friendship was totally unplanned (most things in the story are, I just try to make stuff up to go along with what happens). You nailed it, Don was ALWAYS around. If Luke went somewhere on his own, Don would show up. I guess they were destined to be buddies He was very invested in the dynasty, haha.
On top of the sims you mentioned, there was also the pollinator who demanded a ton of time - to keep the town populated. Adding families from the gallery was forbidden. With no story progression (back then), the town would die out quick without someone making nooboos. But to be fair, I started having the best friend take the job, so it wasn't technically an "extra" sim, but I always had to spend a lot of time with him.
I’ve read stories with good characters and thin plot that I’ve enjoyed, but IMO no great plot is going to be a good story if the characters aren’t interesting.
This is exactly how I feel. If the characters get my attention, the plot can be very simple, totally cliche or even practically non-existent and I'll still enjoy the story. But if the characters don't interest me, it doesn't matter how good the plot is, it's hard for me to care what happens. And it's hard to say exactly what it is that will make me interested in specific characters or not. It seems inconsistent. It's not about them being "likable" necessarily. And it's not necessarily about them being "relatable" either. It's just a bond that forms between me and them... or not. My own mind is kind of a mystery to me.
So the way I'm actually planning the third story, is with a table, which is just one column with a bunch of boxes. It goes in order of:
- Initial ideas box (the very earliest planning bit )
- the chapter outlines, each box is for one chapter
- 'upcoming', ideas for scenes that will happen eventually but not too sure when they will.
- 'to remember' - bits I have to try and keep in mind because I will otherwise end up with a ton of plot holes (there are already one or two XC)
I end up moving around particular scenes quite often, changing orders of events within a chapter and even delaying certain scenes until a later chapter on occasion.
That sounds like an interesting method of story planning. I do most of my chapter planning with post-it notes on the living room wall. Luckily, I have an understanding spouse.
I used to always think 'improvement is always key you must be constantly trying to improve your creativity!!!' but now honestly it's just a case of whatever, just have fun with whatever you're doing. Who cares if it isn't the best thing on Earth? Have fun with it, do whatever it takes to get a sliver of serotonin from your hobby : P
This is really good advice. And it's the thing I always struggle to remember.
I go from screenshots to story whereas you seem to go from story to screenshots, which is the approach of several people here, but most don't go to the extent of having a comicbook style. So that's quite cool of you.
Actually, I have several sim stories that are more unplanned, just playing, taking screenshots, writing captions or notes. I even have one that I really developed into a written story in that manner, though I still have not finished it and haven't worked on it in a long time. Most of the gameplay driven stories, I don't really write much for, they're more in my head. I don't tend to refer to them as my SimLit stories in the same way I think of the more planned and crafted ones. I just share them in really brief explanation form in emails I send to a good friend of mine.
I've found though, that when I just play, I am too nice to my sims. I tend to just play "happy family", which makes for cute screenshots, but not a lot of drama. When something bad happens, I take care of it quickly, or even cheat it away, and get everyone happy again. So to actually have conflict, tension and drama in my stories, I have to plan for it. As an author, I can be tough on my characters when it's part of my planed story, apparently, but not as a sim-god. Sim-god me just wants my sims to be happy. The screenshot to story way is fun for me to play, but the story to screenshot way is more fun for me to write.
I think it's fun to share. I don't think this community is about critiquing one another's work so much as it is about sharing something we all enjoy and trying to be supportive. I find that people also get better at things by doing them, so whether improvement is a goal or not, it's easier to improve when in an environment where people are encouraged to continuing pursuing writing/storytelling as a hobby, vocation, or whatever. I've gotten a LOT of helpful feedback from people here.
Thank you for sharing this thought. Honestly, it's what I have observed as well. The SimLit writing community in general seems very supportive of each other. I just am always afraid I am the one person everyone else will, for unknown reasons, decide they don't like. Probably all that bullying way back in middle school messes with my head more than it should 35 years later. That, and the fact that other places on the internet sure remind me of middle school.
My longest time, so far, was nine months. The nine-month chapter needed several cc items my husband made for me, and a ton of custom poses that I made. Finally got it done over this recent Thanksgiving break I took, and I was so happy!
I applaud such dedication! Wow!
Maybe I shouldn't admit this... but I'm actually downplaying it a bit. That chapter was actually years in the making. It was the reveal chapter for a character I had kept mysterious throughout the earlier part of the story, and I went through several iterations and dead-ends trying to make up my mind what exactly her deal actually was. The nine months is just counting from the point where I finally said "okay, this is what I'm going to do". And "this" unfortunately included a lot of necessary cc because I can never seem to keep things simple.
I'm also kind of anxious and shy about sharing my stories, but I also love sharing my work and seeing if people think anything about it. I also like the sense of community that reading someone else's story and them reading mine brings. It's just nice seeing what other people create and it's also nice if someone happens to like what I do. I feel like it's got easier with time and I'm less nervous about sharing my stories now than I was at the start.
It's comforting to know I am not the only one who feels anxious about sharing stories. I think the feeling of community you describe is really what I want, and by not sharing what I write with other SimLit writers I know I'm missing out on that. But it sure is hard to take that leap.
Actually, I have several sim stories that are more unplanned, just playing, taking screenshots, writing captions or notes. I even have one that I really developed into a written story in that manner, though I still have not finished it and haven't worked on it in a long time. Most of the gameplay driven stories, I don't really write much for, they're more in my head. I don't tend to refer to them as my SimLit stories in the same way I think of the more planned and crafted ones. I just share them in really brief explanation form in emails I send to a good friend of mine.
I've found though, that when I just play, I am too nice to my sims. I tend to just play "happy family", which makes for cute screenshots, but not a lot of drama. When something bad happens, I take care of it quickly, or even cheat it away, and get everyone happy again. So to actually have conflict, tension and drama in my stories, I have to plan for it. As an author, I can be tough on my characters when it's part of my planed story, apparently, but not as a sim-god. Sim-god me just wants my sims to be happy. The screenshot to story way is fun for me to play, but the story to screenshot way is more fun for me to write.
@GlacierSnow That makes a lot of sense. I think that's the way it is with a lot of gameplay-driven stories, but I put myself and my legacy in a gameplay box, so I'm going to stick with it and try to see what I can make of it. I'm a low-conflict, happy family kind of person (and probably more so if I'm planning because I don't want to plan bad things). BUT gameplay-wise I don't cheat and I don't think my Sims are particularly likeable or relatable so I don't have a picture-perfect family story, which hopefully adds some interest. Still, I agree that planning is probably the best way to go about having a good story, but…
For whatever reason (laziness? and because I want to play the game), I want my Sims to tell me their stories with them/the game AI making most of the big decisions. Now, I want to focus on words and not directing scenes. I've accepted that things might turn out less-than-ideal because of that, but that's also part of the fun and the challenge for me. My idea is to make my legacy look like a narrative with a plot that was fairly planned even though it wasn't, so I might have some shenanigans going on during post-processing, but not too much.
I also initially asked my questions because I like hearing everyone's perspectives, and because my low-conflict, slow-paced style is always in danger of being too boring.
Maybe I shouldn't admit this... but I'm actually downplaying it a bit. That chapter was actually years in the making. It was the reveal chapter for a character I had kept mysterious throughout the earlier part of the story, and I went through several iterations and dead-ends trying to make up my mind what exactly her deal actually was. The nine months is just counting from the point where I finally said "okay, this is what I'm going to do". And "this" unfortunately included a lot of necessary cc because I can never seem to keep things simple.
Nothing wrong with that, especially if it's a process you enjoyed.
It's comforting to know I am not the only one who feels anxious about sharing stories. I think the feeling of community you describe is really what I want, and by not sharing what I write with other SimLit writers I know I'm missing out on that. But it sure is hard to take that leap.
No need to rush. Feel free to share or not share as you feel ready.
@haneul Thanks for some great questions.
I've wanted to answer before, but I've been pretty busy.
How do you keep your stories interesting?
The most important thing is that I can keep myself interested in my characters.
I often get very involved with the Sims I write about and they often start living their own lives (on screen or in my head). I describe them with positive qualities as well as flaws. The more complex they are, the more they interest me.
When I start a new story, I like to start with a special problem or a few rules / restrictions.
My style is somewhere between the plot driven and the game driven story. I love to be inspired by the coincidences that arise in the game. I think I will be bored if everything is carefully planned in advance. The coincidences in the game feed my imagination and give me inspiration to exploit them in the story.
I can hardly guess what catches my readers, but here it obviously helps if I get comments. That Rasmus has been given so much space in my current story is only due to the comments he has received that and he happened to meet Alice / Blue.
The community of SimLit writers is definitely one of the things that keeps me going
How long does it take you to prepare each chapter and what is the most difficult part about it?
I spend a really long time preparing a chapter. At least one week per. chapter. Luckily, I no longer work, so I see this as a kind of self-developing job. If you ask my husband he will say I spend too much time I learn a lot while writing, like communicating in a foreign language and about using imagery. It can be a challenge but also exciting.
I really take a lot of pictures, to be able to choose between them. Maybe several hundred for a chapter.
Although my texts are very short, it may take a few days before I have found the wording that appeals to me the most. It is a style I also used when I wrote stories in Danish. Short texts and many pictures. I have always loved comics and I love pictures that have a story.
Some chapters I build up to over a long period of time. It can take several months. These are the more plot-driven chapters.
What's something you really like about your own writing (for example, a favorite character, scene, or story arc)?
I especially like to describe development stories.
I still like Finn a lot from 'A turtles journey' due to his development from injured boy to grown man. The bad boys from the orphanage Jeff and Tom also hit something in me. They deserved their own development.
My current main characters also have their demons they must overcome. This probably applies especially to Tusnelda and Rasmus. Martin is in many ways mr. perfect guy ... but that does not mean that everything succeeds for him.
I loved writing the whole drama around Rasmus and Blue and I love that Tusnelda is so full of mistakes.
Now I want to spend some time reading all the many answers. Maybe get some new inspiration.
@MonaSolstraale Way behind on your story and no idea when I'll catch up, but I do like the way you write your story, especially the bond between human and animal and how you've breathed life into little Trix.
@SnowBnuuy Thank you
I also really have a hard time getting time to read what I want to read
i got behind too. then after i got glasses i was catching up
now i can't read again cause masks are more important than glasses. i have to wear a mask at work now that work changed my hours its dark when i get back.
Since a lot of people have asked me how I achieve various effects I've made my own little guide to screenshot editing. Thought I may as well post it here as well as the WL.
@SnowBnuuy Yay, thank you! I really like the lighting and glowy effects on your magic screenshots and have been thinking of trying something similar, so this is great!
This one has been asked before but for the newer people in the thread, how much do you edit your screenshots? Do you leave them as-is, change a little bit (like brightness or colours), do you edit heavily, use ReShade/some other program?
I edit mine heavily but I don't use ReShade (primarily because I never did manage to figure out how to use it properly, haha). It's a mix of the long-dead Adobe Fireworks and pixlr for lighting/colour contrast.
Hosting D&D sessions on the side. Interested in playing through some fantasy-themed shenanigans? Send me a message 😘
Since a lot of people have asked me how I achieve various effects I've made my own little guide to screenshot editing. Thought I may as well post it here as well as the WL.
@SnowBnuuy This is actually amazing. I haven't had time to read it properly yet, but 100% will soon. I love seeing people's processes like this.
This one has been asked before but for the newer people in the thread, how much do you edit your screenshots? Do you leave them as-is, change a little bit (like brightness or colours), do you edit heavily, use ReShade/some other program?
I edit mine heavily but I don't use ReShade (primarily because I never did manage to figure out how to use it properly, haha). It's a mix of the long-dead Adobe Fireworks and pixlr for lighting/colour contrast.
@_sims_Yimi Sometimes, I edit them a lot... It doesn't show so much in the part of my legacy that I've posted until now, but even with those screenshots that are up, I sometimes take some shady liberties. As a gameplay-driven person, I try not to do too much, but on the rare occasion, I will edit a Sim's expression to better convey the atmosphere of what's going on. Now, I start with Reshade and make further changes in Lightroom and Photoshop. It's so unnecessary, but I can't resist.
My latest screenshots (without poses) below the cut and some of which I've shared in other threads. They were taken a bit out of time (not in sync with my gameplay) so I don't know if they'll be incorporated into the actual story of my legacy.
Sorry for the double post, but my editing post function seems a bit wonky at the moment and I wanted to add that one of the things that I've started paying more attention to is the lighting in game. Rooms in my builds all tend to have overhead lights because I like brightness, want to see what's going on in my game clearly, and don't mind blowing out the highlights in my screencaps (IRL I used to have a habit of underexposing photos and I may also be overcompensating for that), but I pay a little bit more attention to the lights I use and turn all lights in a room on/off one-by-one-ish until I get what I want and to convey a certain mood. I make a lot of mistakes because I'm still finding my style and there are a lot of moving parts to pay attention to, especially in the midst of gameplay. Most of the time, I let the mistakes go and post the screenshots anyway (like I did above).
If my Sims are taking portraits and I'm using poses, I always! try to use the photography lights that came with Moschino or Get Famous to light my subjects because it often makes a big difference and reduces the need for post-processing. I can adjust the brightness of the lights in game to make sure they're not too bright/dim. For example, compare the below (and again, I tend go a little bright, so most would probably not end up quite as bright as me).
Forgot to put down the lights
Placed them and probably upped the exposure just a little bit more in post-processing.
[I got my edit post to work and changed this photo to make the difference clearer. I love those lights.]
@haneul Your screenshots are *chef’s kiss*
You’re right about lighting, mine is always dead simple because the insides of the houses always seem dark so I just use the flat ceiling lights everywhere so I need to experiment more with lighting, especially lighting colours.
@haneul Your screenshots are *chef’s kiss*
You’re right about lighting, mine is always dead simple because the insides of the houses always seem dark so I just use the flat ceiling lights everywhere so I need to experiment more with lighting, especially lighting colours.
@friendsfan367 That’s too simple for the effects that I want and lighting intensity isn’t really an issue for me. That’s why if I need to change the lighting I just edit it in an art processor most of the time. And most of the time I have headline effects turned off, which affects adjusting intensity and colour of lights in the room. If HeadlineEffects is off it won’t let me change it (IDK why) and I’m too lazy to keep turning it off and on!
Since a lot of people have asked me how I achieve various effects I've made my own little guide to screenshot editing. Thought I may as well post it here as well as the WL.
I am really impressed with the work you put into your photos. It may not surprise me because I consider you to be an artist once I have followed your photos.
Thanks for the amazing tutorial
how much do you edit your screenshots?
Personally, I edit my photos to a lesser extent, with some simpler tools. I mostly use Paint 3D for cropping and texting and Windows photo editing for various color effects.
In my latest chapter, I have experimented with Gimp.
@haneul Your screenshots look gorgeous! I love how warm everything feels, as well as the lighting effects and the depth focus. I’ve been trying to improve on lighting a little in my own game as well – it’s always been the overhead lights here too because that is the easiest way to illuminate pictures, but the lighting is almost never flattering as a result. The photography lights make such a big difference!
@SnowBnuuy I used to use the flat ceiling lights for inside too. It was the easiest option. Not the prettiest thought, which I’ve only realized later.
What do you guys do when you have a scene outside, in the middle of the night? When it’s clear skies it looks somewhat okay still, but whenever it’s overcast, my pictures always end up being either A) a blue-and-black blob or B ) unnatural lighting from the overhead lights that I placed and way-too-dark surroundings. It’s rather frustrating 🤣
@MonaSolstraale I remember the drunken effects and the text messages from your story! They looked really nice 😁
Hosting D&D sessions on the side. Interested in playing through some fantasy-themed shenanigans? Send me a message 😘
If my Sims are taking portraits and I'm using poses, I always! try to use the photography lights that came with Moschino or Get Famous to light my subjects because it often makes a big difference and reduces the need for post-processing. I can adjust the brightness of the lights in game to make sure they're not too bright/dim. For example, compare the below (and again, I tend go a little bright, so most would probably not end up quite as bright as me).
Forgot to put down the lights
Placed them and probably upped the exposure just a little bit more in post-processing.
[I got my edit post to work and changed this photo to make the difference clearer. I love those lights.]
Your photos are amazing
I love the Mochino package, especially due to the camera and tripod, the many positions and the ability to photograph smaller groups that come with the package.
Several lamps came with the package. Is there anyone you prefer and how do you place them in relation to your motif?
This is a great question. I've seen some gorgeous screenshots in some SimLit stories and have been utterly blown away. I know a lot of work goes into a great shot, both before and after the picture is taken, and I'm always impressed.
My edits are somewhat rudimentary. Partly by choice and partly because I'm still learning digital image editing stuff. I try to get the best shot I can in-game with lighting, camera angle and so forth, because no amount of editing will fix a bad shot. But I definitely do some post-processing and effects stuff.
I usually adjust brightness and contrast, to get consistency, so that as a reader is scrolling through the story, all the pictures look good within the same range of dark and light (trying to prevent there being any pictures where details are hard to see due to being much too bright or dark compared to the others).
In addition, because I have many characters with very different skin tones, I sometimes find I need to adjust brightness and contrast on them individually using cut-out and masking tools. Especially when this lady in the pink jacket (a detective in the story) is in the same screenshot with my main vampire character (in the gray jacket):
If I adjust the whole screenshot to make the detective look good, the vampire gets so washed out that he practically looks shiny, and if I adjust it to make him look good, then the detective becomes so dark that all detail in her face is lost and you can't see her expressions well. I want all my characters to look their best, so I will cut out one of them (whichever is easier) and adjust them each independently.
I occasionally use layering to create scenes that can't happen in the Sims game. For example to get this train car scene on the San Myshuno bridge, I look the bridge shot independently (making use of the wider roaming range of the camera in TAB mode) and then layered it under the interior train car image with the windows cut out:
And I have also used layering to get this sort of transparent effect for a "ghost-like" background image of something being thought about or talked about:
Because I'm doing comic book style, I also add speech balloons and some sound effects or snarky narrator commentary to images as well.
But that's about it. I haven't needed to learn anything fancy for what I'm doing so far. I enjoy image editing though (reminds me of my old dark-room days, but without the chemical smells ) and will probably learn more as I go just because it's fun for me.
What do you guys do when you have a scene outside, in the middle of the night? When it’s clear skies it looks somewhat okay still, but whenever it’s overcast, my pictures always end up being either A) a blue-and-black blob or B ) unnatural lighting from the overhead lights that I placed and way-too-dark surroundings. It’s rather frustrating 🤣
I love taking outdoor night shots (which is good, because I have so many vampire characters ). I tend to go for an intentional high contrast look. My favorite art styles are the super dramatic paintings of the European Baroque and Rococo periods. A really good example is the painter Artemisia Gentileschi from Italy in the late 1500s early 1600s. I love her work. (Be aware though, if you go looking her up, some of her paintings are really gory and grisly. Just a warning.)
I have always loved high contrast and bright colors against dark backgrounds for dramatic effect, and doing nighttime scenes in my SimLit gives me a great excuse to play with that. They're actually my favorite scenes to shoot. I usually get the contrast as dramatic as I can in-game, and then punch it up a few notches in image editing. I also will turn up the intensity of certain colors to draw attention to specific details and get that dramatic color effect like the paintings I love.
So, I'd say my approach is to lean into the "unnatural" lighting of bright lights in the dark, and really use it instead of trying to minimize it.
Hardly at all. For me the screenshots are about capturing the moment so I watch the action and then pause at the point when I think something interesting is happening. Then I go into free camera mode to line up the shot just as I want it. I've only used after effects twice in Sim 66...once when John Action had a Vietnam flashback, I desaturated the colours in the screenshot (and I sneakily created a character that looked like Action in an entirely different video game but which had a Vietnam War setting and screenshotted that) to look like it came from his memory.
Another time I made a series of screenshots black and white and added grain so they resembled black and white photographs. With every enlargement of the images, I added more grain. The final photograph; an enlargement at maximum magnification, was actually a still from the movie "Blow Up".
What do you guys do when you have a scene outside, in the middle of the night? When it’s clear skies it looks somewhat okay still, but whenever it’s overcast, my pictures always end up being either A) a blue-and-black blob or B ) unnatural lighting from the overhead lights that I placed and way-too-dark surroundings. It’s rather frustrating 🤣
@_sims_Yimi I would change it in Lightroom/Photoshop.
But, ideally, if I were to do it now I would first mess around in game with ReShade and if I were doing SimLit, I would try to find the proper lighting or construct the proper lighting. By construct it, I'd use the Moschino lights (probably the stage soft box light because that's my favorite) or get some random wall lights from the base game and make them float in front of the subject but not so that they show up in the picture.
I actually just went in my game and had Adelise dance outside at night in the cold Windenburg rain in her Winterfest dress (after changing clothes twice to create a more interesting feel)…
I was able to get some dramatic shots by leaning into where the limited light was shining, and adjusting the exposure, temperature, and then sharpness (technically clarity/texture) in Lightroom afterwards. I'm fortunate in that I can use Adobe products, which are extremely powerful but pricey, but ReShade is incredibly powerful on its own. I just began using ReShade regularly a few months ago and still have around 2,000 non-ReShade screen captures to go through and upload to my legacy blog… I wish I had started using it earlier.
I don't think there's really a way other than creatively using lights in game, using ReShade, or doing a lot of editing afterwards. The first picture of Adelise in the rain is a bit too horror film-like for my personal style, but it looks interesting and she caught the light well there.
@haneul Your screenshots look gorgeous! I love how warm everything feels, as well as the lighting effects and the depth focus.
Thank you! I'm in a really warm mood these days when it comes to pictures.
I love the Mochino package, especially due to the camera and tripod, the many positions and the ability to photograph smaller groups that come with the package.
Several lamps came with the package. Is there anyone you prefer and how do you place them in relation to your motif?
@MonaSolstraale Thank you! I think any of the standing Moschino lights will do, but I always find myself using the stage soft box light. I put it right in front of my Sims, but not so close that it would get in the picture.
@haneul Thanks for sharing your lighting tips. I actually have both Get Famous and Moschino Stuff, but I hadn't used the lights much. After reading what you said earlier, I played around with them last night and I think they'll come in handy. It's nice to have something that gives a soft but bright directional light. I have trouble with indoor lighting sometimes, so I'll try using those lights now.
Your screenshots are spectacular, by the way! They have a very cinematic feel.
@Kellogg_J_Kellogg That's a cool idea, to use a different game for the flashback scene!
I didn't do a whole lot of editing screenshots. About the only time I did was to indicate a flashback, or a memory. And even then, it was usually just putting a tinted color over it.
For, say, dreams, I just fashioned up a completely black room and went accordingly with what I had planned.
I have a couple new questions that I'll answer later: Does music affect your writing? For example, do you listen to anything while you write, find any songs inspiring or have any writing playlists? I know that @Kellogg_J_Kellogg often features songs in Sim 66, which I think adds another dimension to those chapters, so I'm curious if anyone else does something similar. Most of the time I find it distracting to listen to music while reading, but I'd still like to know if writers think there are certain songs that capture the vibes of their stories or a particular chapter or something similar.
Comments
Thank you! I think my photos are safe for now, because they've given more bandwidth for free and I'm no longer above the limit. I don't think I have to worry about them deleting my stuff... But my biggest worry now is the whole website will go under eventually, since they've shot themselves in the foot. They've come a long way towards fixing the mistake though, but darn if it didn't ruin everything I'd been working on.
Anyway, yes! Their friendship was totally unplanned (most things in the story are, I just try to make stuff up to go along with what happens). You nailed it, Don was ALWAYS around. If Luke went somewhere on his own, Don would show up. I guess they were destined to be buddies
On top of the sims you mentioned, there was also the pollinator who demanded a ton of time - to keep the town populated. Adding families from the gallery was forbidden. With no story progression (back then), the town would die out quick without someone making nooboos. But to be fair, I started having the best friend take the job, so it wasn't technically an "extra" sim, but I always had to spend a lot of time with him.
Maice Sims
@SnowBnuuy
This is exactly how I feel. If the characters get my attention, the plot can be very simple, totally cliche or even practically non-existent and I'll still enjoy the story. But if the characters don't interest me, it doesn't matter how good the plot is, it's hard for me to care what happens. And it's hard to say exactly what it is that will make me interested in specific characters or not. It seems inconsistent. It's not about them being "likable" necessarily. And it's not necessarily about them being "relatable" either. It's just a bond that forms between me and them... or not. My own mind is kind of a mystery to me.
That sounds like an interesting method of story planning. I do most of my chapter planning with post-it notes on the living room wall. Luckily, I have an understanding spouse.
This is really good advice. And it's the thing I always struggle to remember.
@haneul
Actually, I have several sim stories that are more unplanned, just playing, taking screenshots, writing captions or notes. I even have one that I really developed into a written story in that manner, though I still have not finished it and haven't worked on it in a long time. Most of the gameplay driven stories, I don't really write much for, they're more in my head. I don't tend to refer to them as my SimLit stories in the same way I think of the more planned and crafted ones. I just share them in really brief explanation form in emails I send to a good friend of mine.
I've found though, that when I just play, I am too nice to my sims. I tend to just play "happy family", which makes for cute screenshots, but not a lot of drama. When something bad happens, I take care of it quickly, or even cheat it away, and get everyone happy again. So to actually have conflict, tension and drama in my stories, I have to plan for it. As an author, I can be tough on my characters when it's part of my planed story, apparently, but not as a sim-god. Sim-god me just wants my sims to be happy.
Thank you for sharing this thought. Honestly, it's what I have observed as well. The SimLit writing community in general seems very supportive of each other. I just am always afraid I am the one person everyone else will, for unknown reasons, decide they don't like. Probably all that bullying way back in middle school messes with my head more than it should 35 years later. That, and the fact that other places on the internet sure remind me of middle school.
Maybe I shouldn't admit this... but I'm actually downplaying it a bit.
@RipuAncestor
It's comforting to know I am not the only one who feels anxious about sharing stories. I think the feeling of community you describe is really what I want, and by not sharing what I write with other SimLit writers I know I'm missing out on that. But it sure is hard to take that leap.
@GlacierSnow That makes a lot of sense. I think that's the way it is with a lot of gameplay-driven stories, but I put myself and my legacy in a gameplay box, so I'm going to stick with it and try to see what I can make of it. I'm a low-conflict, happy family kind of person (and probably more so if I'm planning because I don't want to plan bad things). BUT gameplay-wise I don't cheat and I don't think my Sims are particularly likeable or relatable so I don't have a picture-perfect family story, which hopefully adds some interest. Still, I agree that planning is probably the best way to go about having a good story, but…
For whatever reason (laziness? and because I want to play the game), I want my Sims to tell me their stories with them/the game AI making most of the big decisions. Now, I want to focus on words and not directing scenes. I've accepted that things might turn out less-than-ideal because of that, but that's also part of the fun and the challenge for me. My idea is to make my legacy look like a narrative with a plot that was fairly planned even though it wasn't, so I might have some shenanigans going on during post-processing, but not too much.
I also initially asked my questions because I like hearing everyone's perspectives, and because my low-conflict, slow-paced style is always in danger of being too boring.
Nothing wrong with that, especially if it's a process you enjoyed.
No need to rush. Feel free to share or not share as you feel ready.
I've wanted to answer before, but I've been pretty busy.
How do you keep your stories interesting?
The most important thing is that I can keep myself interested in my characters.
I often get very involved with the Sims I write about and they often start living their own lives (on screen or in my head). I describe them with positive qualities as well as flaws. The more complex they are, the more they interest me.
When I start a new story, I like to start with a special problem or a few rules / restrictions.
My style is somewhere between the plot driven and the game driven story. I love to be inspired by the coincidences that arise in the game. I think I will be bored if everything is carefully planned in advance. The coincidences in the game feed my imagination and give me inspiration to exploit them in the story.
I can hardly guess what catches my readers, but here it obviously helps if I get comments. That Rasmus has been given so much space in my current story is only due to the comments he has received that and he happened to meet Alice / Blue.
The community of SimLit writers is definitely one of the things that keeps me going
How long does it take you to prepare each chapter and what is the most difficult part about it?
I spend a really long time preparing a chapter. At least one week per. chapter. Luckily, I no longer work, so I see this as a kind of self-developing job. If you ask my husband he will say I spend too much time
I really take a lot of pictures, to be able to choose between them. Maybe several hundred for a chapter.
Although my texts are very short, it may take a few days before I have found the wording that appeals to me the most. It is a style I also used when I wrote stories in Danish. Short texts and many pictures. I have always loved comics and I love pictures that have a story.
Some chapters I build up to over a long period of time. It can take several months. These are the more plot-driven chapters.
What's something you really like about your own writing (for example, a favorite character, scene, or story arc)?
I especially like to describe development stories.
I still like Finn a lot from 'A turtles journey' due to his development from injured boy to grown man. The bad boys from the orphanage Jeff and Tom also hit something in me. They deserved their own development.
My current main characters also have their demons they must overcome. This probably applies especially to Tusnelda and Rasmus. Martin is in many ways mr. perfect guy ... but that does not mean that everything succeeds for him.
I loved writing the whole drama around Rasmus and Blue and I love that Tusnelda is so full of mistakes.
Now I want to spend some time reading all the many answers. Maybe get some new inspiration.
I also really have a hard time getting time to read what I want to read
i got behind too. then after i got glasses i was catching up
now i can't read again cause masks are more important than glasses. i have to wear a mask at work now that work changed my hours its dark when i get back.
This one has been asked before but for the newer people in the thread, how much do you edit your screenshots? Do you leave them as-is, change a little bit (like brightness or colours), do you edit heavily, use ReShade/some other program?
I edit mine heavily but I don't use ReShade (primarily because I never did manage to figure out how to use it properly, haha). It's a mix of the long-dead Adobe Fireworks and pixlr for lighting/colour contrast.
@SnowBnuuy This is actually amazing.
@_sims_Yimi Sometimes, I edit them a lot... It doesn't show so much in the part of my legacy that I've posted until now, but even with those screenshots that are up, I sometimes take some shady liberties. As a gameplay-driven person, I try not to do too much, but on the rare occasion, I will edit a Sim's expression to better convey the atmosphere of what's going on.
My latest screenshots (without poses) below the cut and some of which I've shared in other threads. They were taken a bit out of time (not in sync with my gameplay) so I don't know if they'll be incorporated into the actual story of my legacy.
If my Sims are taking portraits and I'm using poses, I always! try to use the photography lights that came with Moschino or Get Famous to light my subjects because it often makes a big difference and reduces the need for post-processing. I can adjust the brightness of the lights in game to make sure they're not too bright/dim. For example, compare the below (and again, I tend go a little bright, so most would probably not end up quite as bright as me).
Placed them and probably upped the exposure just a little bit more in post-processing.
[I got my edit post to work and changed this photo to make the difference clearer. I love those lights.]
You’re right about lighting, mine is always dead simple because the insides of the houses always seem dark so I just use the flat ceiling lights everywhere so I need to experiment more with lighting, especially lighting colours.
did you know you can adjust lighting intensity?
I am really impressed with the work you put into your photos. It may not surprise me because I consider you to be an artist once I have followed your photos.
Thanks for the amazing tutorial
how much do you edit your screenshots?
Personally, I edit my photos to a lesser extent, with some simpler tools. I mostly use Paint 3D for cropping and texting and Windows photo editing for various color effects.
In my latest chapter, I have experimented with Gimp.
@SnowBnuuy I used to use the flat ceiling lights for inside too. It was the easiest option. Not the prettiest thought, which I’ve only realized later.
What do you guys do when you have a scene outside, in the middle of the night? When it’s clear skies it looks somewhat okay still, but whenever it’s overcast, my pictures always end up being either A) a blue-and-black blob or B ) unnatural lighting from the overhead lights that I placed and way-too-dark surroundings. It’s rather frustrating 🤣
@MonaSolstraale I remember the drunken effects and the text messages from your story! They looked really nice 😁
I love the Mochino package, especially due to the camera and tripod, the many positions and the ability to photograph smaller groups that come with the package.
Several lamps came with the package. Is there anyone you prefer and how do you place them in relation to your motif?
This is a great question. I've seen some gorgeous screenshots in some SimLit stories and have been utterly blown away. I know a lot of work goes into a great shot, both before and after the picture is taken, and I'm always impressed.
My edits are somewhat rudimentary. Partly by choice and partly because I'm still learning digital image editing stuff. I try to get the best shot I can in-game with lighting, camera angle and so forth, because no amount of editing will fix a bad shot. But I definitely do some post-processing and effects stuff.
I usually adjust brightness and contrast, to get consistency, so that as a reader is scrolling through the story, all the pictures look good within the same range of dark and light (trying to prevent there being any pictures where details are hard to see due to being much too bright or dark compared to the others).
In addition, because I have many characters with very different skin tones, I sometimes find I need to adjust brightness and contrast on them individually using cut-out and masking tools. Especially when this lady in the pink jacket (a detective in the story) is in the same screenshot with my main vampire character (in the gray jacket):
If I adjust the whole screenshot to make the detective look good, the vampire gets so washed out that he practically looks shiny, and if I adjust it to make him look good, then the detective becomes so dark that all detail in her face is lost and you can't see her expressions well. I want all my characters to look their best, so I will cut out one of them (whichever is easier) and adjust them each independently.
I occasionally use layering to create scenes that can't happen in the Sims game. For example to get this train car scene on the San Myshuno bridge, I look the bridge shot independently (making use of the wider roaming range of the camera in TAB mode) and then layered it under the interior train car image with the windows cut out:
And I have also used layering to get this sort of transparent effect for a "ghost-like" background image of something being thought about or talked about:
Because I'm doing comic book style, I also add speech balloons and some sound effects or snarky narrator commentary to images as well.
But that's about it. I haven't needed to learn anything fancy for what I'm doing so far. I enjoy image editing though (reminds me of my old dark-room days, but without the chemical smells
I love taking outdoor night shots (which is good, because I have so many vampire characters
I have always loved high contrast and bright colors against dark backgrounds for dramatic effect, and doing nighttime scenes in my SimLit gives me a great excuse to play with that. They're actually my favorite scenes to shoot. I usually get the contrast as dramatic as I can in-game, and then punch it up a few notches in image editing. I also will turn up the intensity of certain colors to draw attention to specific details and get that dramatic color effect like the paintings I love.
So, I'd say my approach is to lean into the "unnatural" lighting of bright lights in the dark, and really use it instead of trying to minimize it.
Hardly at all. For me the screenshots are about capturing the moment so I watch the action and then pause at the point when I think something interesting is happening. Then I go into free camera mode to line up the shot just as I want it. I've only used after effects twice in Sim 66...once when John Action had a Vietnam flashback, I desaturated the colours in the screenshot (and I sneakily created a character that looked like Action in an entirely different video game but which had a Vietnam War setting and screenshotted that) to look like it came from his memory.
Another time I made a series of screenshots black and white and added grain so they resembled black and white photographs. With every enlargement of the images, I added more grain. The final photograph; an enlargement at maximum magnification, was actually a still from the movie "Blow Up".
Read Sim 66 here:https://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/978195/sim-66/p1
https://kelloggjkellogg.blogspot.com/2020/10/sim-66-prologue.html
@_sims_Yimi I would change it in Lightroom/Photoshop.
But, ideally, if I were to do it now I would first mess around in game with ReShade and if I were doing SimLit, I would try to find the proper lighting or construct the proper lighting. By construct it, I'd use the Moschino lights (probably the stage soft box light because that's my favorite) or get some random wall lights from the base game and make them float in front of the subject but not so that they show up in the picture.
I actually just went in my game and had Adelise dance outside at night in the cold Windenburg rain in her Winterfest dress (after changing clothes twice to create a more interesting feel)…
I was able to get some dramatic shots by leaning into where the limited light was shining, and adjusting the exposure, temperature, and then sharpness (technically clarity/texture) in Lightroom afterwards. I'm fortunate in that I can use Adobe products, which are extremely powerful but pricey, but ReShade is incredibly powerful on its own. I just began using ReShade regularly a few months ago and still have around 2,000 non-ReShade screen captures to go through and upload to my legacy blog… I wish I had started using it earlier.
I don't think there's really a way other than creatively using lights in game, using ReShade, or doing a lot of editing afterwards. The first picture of Adelise in the rain is a bit too horror film-like for my personal style, but it looks interesting and she caught the light well there.
Thank you! I'm in a really warm mood these days when it comes to pictures.
Your screenshots are spectacular, by the way!
@Kellogg_J_Kellogg That's a cool idea, to use a different game for the flashback scene!
I didn't do a whole lot of editing screenshots. About the only time I did was to indicate a flashback, or a memory. And even then, it was usually just putting a tinted color over it.
For, say, dreams, I just fashioned up a completely black room and went accordingly with what I had planned.
Part One(Complete 9/24/16) /Part Two(on hold)/Short Stories(on hold)/Twinbrook 1996(on hold)/Ten Crystal Hearts (on hold)
I own the TS3 Store as of 12/11/16 (sort of. It's complicated)
Does music affect your writing? For example, do you listen to anything while you write, find any songs inspiring or have any writing playlists? I know that @Kellogg_J_Kellogg often features songs in Sim 66, which I think adds another dimension to those chapters, so I'm curious if anyone else does something similar. Most of the time I find it distracting to listen to music while reading, but I'd still like to know if writers think there are certain songs that capture the vibes of their stories or a particular chapter or something similar.
Do you read a lot?