This week is going to seem a little random in topics, but I wanted to share five online resources that have helped me on my author career. These are tools for any part of your author journey, whether you are building a brand, brainstorming a story, researching facts, or just wondering how finances will work out. Hopefully there will be at least one source on this list that’ll help you where you are at in your career.
1. Color Gradients
When I was looking for brand colors, I spent hours searching color schemes. I shared in a previous post some good websites that helped my search, but I recently came across learnui.design. They have some cool tools for graphic designers, but I fell in love with their color gradient generator. You can put a color on one side and another on the other side, and the generator will fade the colors together. The tool created the background for this post’s picture. What makes this website so much better than any other gradient generator I’ve found is they reduced the gray scale that often happens in the middle when merging colors. If you start with blue and end with red, often there is a muddy looking purple in the middle. With this tool, the middle is a brilliant purple instead. I highly recommend it if you want some cool backgrounds for your graphics.
2. Electronic Signatures
When I developed my newsletter, I wanted to add some personal touches. One of those things was my actual signature at the end of the newsletter. I did a wide search for electronic signatures and found many either costed or looked nothing like my signature when I was done. Then I found signaturely.com and was impressed. I just used a stylist to write my name on the touch screen, and it actually looked like my handwriting. You can even adjust the ink color and the width of the pen stroke. It’s free, and you can write and save the image as many times as you like. The images have clear backgrounds so you can place the signature anywhere.
3. Brainstorming With Pictures
Pictures are a great way to get your creative juices flowing, whether it’s for setting, character, or story inspiration. You can search images on any web browser, but the results are often varied. I came across the website same.energy that is solely for searching images, and it’s magical! You search any word or phrase, and tons of pictures will come up. Then, if you like one but it isn’t quite perfect, you can click on the picture, and the website will pull up any results that are similar to it. I like to have images in my character sheets to give me a quick reference for what each of the main characters look like, and this search engine works for finding the right look I see in my head. The best part, for me at least, is I have never seen an inappropriate picture in my searches, and I can’t say that for other websites.
4. Health Questions
I like to write action stories, and inevitably fights occur where someone gets hurt. The problem is that sometimes I’m not sure how an injury will feel or heal. I have some friends in the medical field, and one suggested using the Mayo Clinic website. The information is reliable and just what writers need to accurately portray health issues. You can search an injury or disease, and the results will show a description, diagrams, symptoms, causes, healing time, risk factors, and more. Sometimes it’s hard to find sources that are reliable online, but this one is recommended by medical professionals.
5. Earning Out Your Advance
For those of you considering traditionally publishing, I’ve come across a fun tool that can help you estimate when you will earn out your advance. An author built this website to help other authors. I haven’t had a need to use it yet, but I’ve played around with the website just so I can have realistic expectations going into a publishing deal.
Final Thoughts
I know the topics this week were sporadic, but I wanted to share these resources in case they can make your writing journey easier. They have definitely improved by author career. As I come across more free tools, I’ll compile a new list to share down the road. Until then, have fun playing with these websites, but don’t forget to write today too!
Thanks for reading!
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