Star Charter — How Do You Do Mood Boards? I'd Like To Do One But...

dezzydoesthings said: How do you do mood boards? I'd like to do one but idk how

Great question! My process is pretty simple. Details below the cut.

Step One: Pick your subject matter and theme

This first step might be the most important of them all.

I try to keep something specific in mind when making a board—like a character or a chapter, for instance. Picking images that pertain to a single chapter is easier than trying to pick pics for a 400,000 word story (or at least it is for me, because there’s just too much to choose from if your theme is too broad). The more specific your subject matter, the more specific your images can be.

Your theme, meanwhile, is the overall mood of your moodboard. A moodboard has to have a mood, right? Is it happy, joyful, sad, angry, etc.? Picking a theme as well as subject matter further refines which images you should use (and typically your subject matter will inform your overall theme, btw, so that’s helpful).

Let’s say you’re making a board for a really dark chapter of a story. I’d pick images with dreary color schemes to convey that darkness. If your chapter is funny and light, pick brighter photos. If your character is depressive, choose photos in greyscale, perhaps. Note the tone of your subject matter/theme and tailor your pics to it. Planning ahead is important!

Step Two: Find images that fit your subject matter and theme

I use Pinterest a lot, as well as plain ‘ol Google, to find my images. Free stock photo sites are also great (a quick Google search should show you some sites). When searching for images on Pinterest, it helps to add the word “aesthetic” into your search terms. IDK why, but it gives you prettier images.

Typically I know my color scheme in the process of picking a theme and my subject matter, but if you haven’t thought about color yet, this is where you should do so. It’s good to envision a color scheme ahead of time so all of your pictures match each other, look cohesive, and don’t clash. Knowing your scheme ahead of time allows you to weed out potential images if they don’t match your color scheme/mood/theme.

If you’re having trouble finding matching photos…

Step Three: Edit your images

If you find a photo that fits your board but is the wrong color or color scheme, add filters to adjust the color! :D Adjusting brightness, saturation, contrast, and adding filters can turn a “meh” image into a “wow” image that totally fits your board. You can make a color image black and white, or you can turn up the saturation to make colors more vivid. You can also flip the orientation of the photo if you need to.

There’s a built-in photo editor in just about every smartphone these days, and there are tons of free photo editors online that can help you make adjustments to color and brightness. I use my phone’s photo editor, but I’ll add links to some sites later. Searching “free photo editor” should get you results in the meantime.

Step Four: Compile your images

To compile your images into a moodboard, use an app or software program that has a grid-maker feature. I use an app called “PhotoGrid”, and its entire purpose is to put photos into a grid for you. I make literally all of my boards on my phone with this app. There are lots of sites online that will compile your chosen photos into a grid, too, so with a bit of Google-fu you should be able to find something that works for you. I’ve heard the program called “Canva” works for some and has both an app and a desktop site.

Also, PhotoGrid has an in-app photo editor that lets you crop, adjust tone, rotate, mirror, zoom in, and add filters to your images—and you can do this after you put them in a grid, too, which is nice since you see all your images side by side and can get a sense of how they work together as a unit as you edit them.

Step Five: Make it work

Now, it’s easy to find images, add them to a grid/moodboard-template, and just walk away, but you should take the time to fiddle with the composition of your board. There are dozens of layouts for boards, and some layouts might suit your chosen photos better than others. For instance, some layouts might have a lot of landscape-oriented spots for pictures, but if all of your images are portrait-oriented, you’ll have to crop your photos to fit the spaces, choose a different layout with more portrait-oriented spaces, or just grin and bear it when they don’t fit right. Note how your images flow together, how their colors complement each other, and how “balanced” the board feels in terms of areas of light and dark, bright color and muted color, etc. Take a step back and look at your board as a whole. You might love a photo you’ve found, but if it doesn’t fit the others you’ve picked, you may have to let it go.

In conclusion…

This is the best advice I can give regarding moodboards, short of making a tutorial for the specific software I use (and IDK if you intend to use that same software or not so I won’t outline that software here). I learned the software just by diving in and messing with it until I figured it out, TBH, and it’s pretty simple to use once you get the hang of it.

Basically, my friend: Get your hands dirty. Pick a theme, find your images, and find grid-making software that’ll compile them into a board. Mess with it. See what works and what doesn’t. And send me a message if you have any questions. The most important thing is that you have fun with it, so best of luck! :D

((NOTE: I tend not to use fanart in my boards because I don’t want to appropriate an artist’s work without permission. If you want to use fanart, try to get permission from the creator, or at least provide a link to your source material once you post your board.))