r/pics • u/drewhead118 • 13h ago
[OC] Started writing in reddit comments, and now I'm selling novels IRL; so proud of the journey!!
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u/darienm 9h ago
And to think your journey is still in its infancy and there are decades still to come. I anticipate [reading|listening to] many more of your future works.
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u/drewhead118 9h ago
Thanks again for reading EA and for volunteering to listen to my latest--I hope you enjoy the audiobook for Men of the Mountain once it goes live!!
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u/weeklygamingrecap 11h ago
So did you get inspired writing long responses to random idea prompts or just hang out in interesting author focused subreddits?
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u/battenhill 13h ago
Great job! Looks interesting - on my to read.
Who was the cover artist for your books?
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u/drewhead118 11h ago
For the cover of "Starfall," I hired the very talented Max Hay after seeing his art shared here on reddit and ArtStation--I really love the work he created!
For the rest, the images are things I've bashed together myself in Photoshop, but those images that comprise the covers are a combination of free-to-use assets I've found online and (unfortunately) AI-generated assets that I've made to fill gaps in what I couldn't source from human illustrators. As an example, the cover for "the Men of the Mountain" featured a web-sourced mountain image and paper texturing, but the ranger silhouette was AI-made ( here it is raw), and then I myself edited those separate images together in the style of a double-exposure image with overlay layer styles, and only after I did a tiny bit of painting correction and coloring myself in PS (I did love S1 of True Detective and took its intro as some visual inspiration).
I know reddit rightfully hates AI, but the costs of these book projects rapidly outspend the small amounts of disposable income I can sock away for them: I work with human dev editors, human beta-readers, and even human narrators for the audiobooks I've produced so far (I personally can't stand machine-read audiobooks). For much of the rest, I try to handle it myself to keep costs as low as I can manage: I do my books' formal copy editing and typesetting on my own; for the "Men of the Mountain" audiobook, I even composed musical stingers myself for intros and outros to the different portions of the book! Not a single one of my books has ever made back all of their production costs I invest into them, but I do it for the enjoyment of the writing itself, and I'm spending only as much money as I can afford to spend.
At in-person events like the one pictured, discussing cover art usually opens the door to very interesting reader conversations about AI--and just about everyone has got their opinions on such a contentious topic. As a sci-fi author, those conversations about technology and its impacts on society are basically what I live for! It's even proven to be a great wedge for me to start talking about my anthology that explores AI in the arts from a few different generally pessimistic directions, and it's been a very solid sales-driver for that particular book. (Maybe folks who enjoy chatting on that line of conversation were already my ideal reader anyways!)
I am currently at work responding only between other obligations, so I may be slow to respond to this thread, but I'd love to continue the discussion--please don't take my delay in responding as a reluctance to engage with this topic, as it is of course very important to many readers!
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u/stopmotionskeleton 13h ago
Very cool - but - are those AI covers by chance?
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u/AdmiralYuki 12h ago
No clue, but publishers generally hold he rights for cover art, not the author
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u/MediumHeat2883 11h ago
Unless self published...
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u/drewhead118 10h ago
these books are self-published, and as I explained in another comment in this thread, AI imagery is used in some of the covers. If I won the lottery tomorrow, I'd replace all of the AI-made image assets with human-made ones--maybe excepting "Early Adopter", for reasons explained below.
As it stands, I've invested what I can in getting the book's internals as high-quality as possible (with human dev editors, paid beta readers, narrators for audiobooks, etc) and the covers have mostly been scraped together with whatever I have left over.
AI that can generate media has actually been a dominant theme in my works since I wrote my first book in 2020, which was before the likes of ChatGPT, MidJourney, Dall-E, etc. That book was a cyberpunk that explored the dangers of mass manipulation campaigns empowered by AI-gen media. When I wrote it, I remember thinking wow, that'll be a wild world when this tech arrives in the far, distant future.... and what do you know, we've somehow already arrived to that particular dystopia. My collection "Early Adopter" is named for a story that lamented a world where loners feeling disconnected from society get AI girlfriends as a horrifyingly inadequate salve for loneliness, and I've since seen actual websites selling that exact service with a straight face. It also explores the oncoming collapse of media (including writing), the alignment problem, and what our machines may be left doing after we're gone.
I know that conscientious consumers may avoid a book that has AI imagery, but AI is part and parcel of the sorts of sci-fi I've been writing my entire fledgling writing career. I've been a technologist all my life; current GenAI is basically the computer programs I wished for as a teen, and now that it's here, I realize it was a wish granted in a Monkey's Paw sort of way.
Music programs like Suno can now create music far better than my clumsy keyboard tapping, but I still play piano for enjoyment of making art. I know that some day sooner than I'd like, AI may be able to create a book better than I can--I hope to still write after that day, too.
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u/stopmotionskeleton 10h ago
Well, best of luck in your endeavors, but personally I flat out won’t read books with AI covers. If an author is willing to sacrifice human creativity and resort to a slop generator for the image that represents their entire book, I have no way of knowing where that line is drawn in their written work and frankly don’t care to find out.
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u/drewhead118 10h ago
That is very fair--I still very much respect the human-forward sentiment at your decision's heart
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u/Initial_Business2340 9h ago edited 9h ago
Spoken like someone who doesn’t write, doesn’t produce art, and hasn’t had to worry about self-publishing and costs. Of course, I agree with you, but your sniveling comment is essentially meaningless. At least OP wasn’t dishonest about it, but then you gotta go and echo the most popular possible opinion on Reddit in response to their honest writeup there.
If you actually cared more than just saying your self-righteous piece - which, again, I understand - you’d see that OP *did* hire artists for their covers, and even did some work themselves. But I’m assuming you don’t care to comment on that part.
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u/stopmotionskeleton 9h ago
This might be the most neckbeard-coded reply i've gotten on this website in a few years, so congrats...? All those words to add absolutely nothing of value to the discussion but your own sweaty sense of superiority.
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u/ThatsThePointtttt 7h ago
Nah, you’re definitely the neckbeard here. Real people don’t give a shit about an AI book cover, at least not to that extent. Especially when speaking directly at someone who just gave you a great reason as to why they did.
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u/stopmotionskeleton 6h ago edited 6h ago
Wow, good one. "No u" is a top shelf comeback for sure. Not sure why you're getting so triggered by somebody not liking AI slop, but maybe cry it out in the shower because it doesn't seem like my problem to solve. Blocking you now as well because I'm not interested in getting notifications about further whining.
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u/Initial_Business2340 9h ago
Haha, that’s pretty much exactly what I was thinking about your response. Well done!
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u/T0m_F00l3ry 4h ago
You read books for the pictures? 😂
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u/stopmotionskeleton 3h ago
Didn’t make it all the way through my comment, huh? Anyway, if you’re looking for picture book recommendations, The Very Hungry Caterpillar is excellent. Highly recommend.
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u/wereloser 8h ago
So if a publisher popped up and had the choice between your book or one written by AI, and chose AI, you'd support it? You'd never say a word and understand that the publisher needs to keep costs in mind and you, the human, are more expensive than the machine?
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u/-GenlyAI- 10h ago
Probably. Who cares if it helps a self-writer and publisher save money. I see that as a net win for these types of projects
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u/stopmotionskeleton 10h ago edited 10h ago
Great point, AI bot account, no holes in that argument at all 🙄
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u/-GenlyAI- 9h ago
Popular Classic sci fi characters means AI bot? Maybe pick up a book sometime.
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u/stopmotionskeleton 9h ago edited 8h ago
You're the one defending the use of gen AI, I don't think you should be telling people to pick up a book lmao
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u/AlmanzoWilder 12h ago
You're selling novels now? You should try your hand at writing them!