#thank u for this ask anima i took great delight in answering it LOL

[ofmermaidstories]

Hello!!!

Ahh I recently read the first chapter of 'The Sun God's Bride' and omgg I'm so sooooo excited!!!!! It looks like it's going to a fun and emotional journey!!!

I love your world building!! Its so realistic but fantastical?? Idk like it just seems sooo lovely, pls I wanna live there 😫🤲💖

I'm curious! When building a world what's your process?? Do you use references such as art and photography to build the world along with your own imagination?? I've noticed that you like to draw, do you draw concept art???

Also!! Pls I'm so in love with how you reference 'flower girl' in your work! Its such a cute and fun little nod to surrender!

Ahh I look forward to going along this journey with you!!! Super excited for the next chapter!!! 💖💖💖

Hello Anima!!!!!!

I want us to live in the Sun God world too. 😩 We could be temple brats, surely it’d be easy… swimming in pools and idk…. eating fruit, LOL. (Oh my gosh though LOL i’m…. so glad you like the florist references :’) IM SORRY GUYS, but that little joke/thread makes me way too happy so i’m just going to include it in everything LOL. like a multiverse theory — somewhere out there, a flower girl version of us is just living their best life, over and over again, falling in love a hundred different ways :’)))) )

But okay, to the crux of your ask — I like to make moodboards when starting a story!!!! I do this for everything, literally, not just fanfics (I made a moodboard for my friend’s and I’s summer trip last year LMAO no chill :’) ). But I have a weheartit account that’s like a million years old, so I use that to collect inspo. Basically, like, if I’ve decided to write something I generally know the feel of it, if that makes sense? So I use my moodboards as a way to pinpoint key visuals/feelings I wanna convey (or just for extra inspo!). Like, for instance, this is just some of the images I have saved under my Sun God board:

Not everything will make it into the final product that is the fic — but this is generally a good way to remind myself what I was trying to achieve LOL. They also have the added bonus of being the images I’ll use when I post about the chapter updates, here on tumbles!!! But as I continue to work on a story, I’ll keep adding to each board as needed — weeding out pictures that don’t work anymore, adding new ones. These are some of the latest ones for something (just like this):

My process for any kind of world building, whether it’s trying to create a fantasy world, or just expanding on a canon one is pretty much just to give myself visual keys!!! Like, I’ll make a few written notes of things in my initial outlining of stuff, but generally, I’ll know a story is sticking if I’ve driven to scribbling for it, or doing this collecting of inspo. Like, with the Todoroki x Reader fic I wanna do, after Deku’s, I’m currently in the “throw everything at the wall and see what sticks” stage:

So what I have currently is just…. flat-out inspo, Idea collecting. The earlier images I have for it are very ocean/sea based, because I started musing about this before I wrote The Widening Sky — so a lot of my oceany-inspo can be seen here, LOL, I dunno if the final product will be as…….. dependant, on the sea, for all that it starts off on a beach.

Doodling for the fics isn’t as common as it is when I’m working on something original — what I’ll draw instead, if I need to, are like, key details. So for example, this one here is — a rough idea of like, how I visualised the cove in The Widening Sky. A priestess/temple Sister sketch for a ceremony in The Sun God’s Bride. And some details from the outfits I’m going to force Y/N to wear in Chapter Four of something (just like this)! LOL

What I really like to draw is how I imagine the characters to look like — with fanfiction I don’t really need to do that, lmao, since most of our cast already exists, but I have drawn what I personally see the Readers as?? I’d never share those sketches though lmao, because I wouldn’t want anyone to like…. see that, instead of what they want. And it’s fun seeing other people’s interpretations!!!!

Saying all that, I guess the “world-building” process kind of looks like this, all together:

this is something I’ve compiled for the manuscript I currently have collecting dust lmao. Doodles, moodboard, mock covers because i’m vain LMAOOO dslkfjsdlkfjkldsfjkldsfj. I’ll have all these bits and pieces in their own folder!! they make me happy to look at ldfkjksdlfjkdlsj. I like having things in front of me, LOL.

whew this was longer than i intended dslkfjsdkljsdkljfkdlsfj i hope it was somehow enlightening??? basically — i just think of something, and then collect a bunch of pictures LOL. and if that fails, i’ll draw some. :’) Thank-you for asking me LOL, i had fun talking about my little visual aids — I’m excited for The Sun God’s Bride, too, and excited we’re starting out on it together. 💖🌷 Here’s to the adventure ahead. 🌅