Writing vampires (including romance and scariness)

[bluekevlar16]

First off, I'm trying to decide whether or not to make the pairing het or not. I think it would be interesting if the vampire was the girl in the relationship for once, and if it were done well. But on the other hand, I think I would be able to "feel" the passion more if it were Guy Love, between two guys. Imo, there's not really enough romance

Comments

[scribal_goddess]

Reflections: Why do they become reflective?
Also, protip: that's not exactly how photography works. Basically, light of a certain color bounces off a surface while other colors are absorbed, is focused through the camera lens, and recorded either by a chemical process (traditional photography) or by a digital process (which gets into programming and physics, so I can't explain it properly.) If vampires themselves were extraordinarily reflective, lots of light should bounce off them, making them either a) clearer to the camera, b) look like walking mirrors or the silver surfer, but still visible on camera or c) only visible to the camera as the blinding reflection of the camera flash

[bluekevlar16]

Okay, fixed the photography thing. My vampires largely are based on the Vampire Chronicles vamps, and in the second book Lestat mentions that he's become strong enough that he has to wear makeup whenever having his picture taken with the flash photography. I thought it meant he wouldn't show up, as a nod to vampires not showing up on film, but I guess it meant something else, since he never really went into detail with what he meant

[scribal_goddess]

I think Lestat's issue is the light from the flash of the camera. (Though, I'm going by discworld vampires here, such as Otto Chriek, who accidentally vaporizes himself by taking pictures a lot.

I can see red-er after drinking blood, or having more color in their cheeks.

Uncanny valley is good for things that have been undead that long! If they're, say, too symmetrical, they could get uncanny valley... but yeah, I'm probably not a great person to ask about attractiveness of faces having anything to do with the uncanny valley. Usually, I see the uncanny valley in things like this mythbusters clip: http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/mythbusters/videos/mission-impossible-outtakes.htm... )

[bluekevlar16]

I don't think that would be a bother for him though. Neither he or any of the other vamps in the series ever have trouble with bright lights except the sun. (And whenever Akasha and Enkil were just turned, but that was thousands of years ago since vamps had problems with light in general.)

Eek, that's creepy as hell.

I guess "corpselike" isn't the best way to describe them. If you look up the characters in the Interview With the Vampire movie, they look like that. TV Tropes said they look corpselike, but I guess "unnaturally pallid" would be a better adjective.

It's just to make them strong enough to at least be able to compete. Most vampire stories don't have nearly that strong of other types of supes, unless they're gods.

[scribal_goddess]

Running water: More elemental stuff. The great part of elemental stuff is that all you have to do is state the weaknesses/affinities/properties and then stick to them like a rat clinging to a piece of driftwood.
- This has the advantage of having some very specific clauses in which it can be gotten around, just like any good power. They can turn on the motor for a motorboat, set up some sails and get a sailboat, be carried across by willing volunteers in a coffin, etc. It fits well with your other elemental stuff and the shadow thing - can vampires' shadows cross running water?
- The ebb and flow of the tide thing will be a useful exception to your historical vampires, and be a good opportunity to put specific timing restrictions on them.
- Underground beats underwater. This makes sense with the elements thing.

Lastly, they can cross with no problem if there’s a ford. Bridges don’t work, but fords do. This one boggles me. Why

[bluekevlar16]

Actually I just liked the idea of them not being able to cross bridges, but fords doing the trick. Idk why I liked the idea. It also kind of makes sense to me since a ford is basically just a place that's very shallow.

It's actually a nod to traditional vampires. In Dracula and 'Salem's Lot, after staking them and cutting off the head, they'd stuff the mouths with garlic before throwing them into running water.

Actually, if you're just a renter, you wouldn't be able to do the "bring their entire power in with them" invitation at all, but you'd still be able to tell them to get out.

Also, there's the fact that a vampire can just burn the house down.

Just added an explanation on how Rosemary defends you from that, which makes them rely on more difficult to use powers. Don't forget this is also a universe where a large number of people have telepathic shields on their minds.

It's taken from other vampire works, like The Vampire Chronicles, where both Louis and Lestat crawl on walls at some point, and Dracula does the same thing in

[scribal_goddess]

Depends on the mechanism. If it has to be really deep for the vampires not to cross, fords should work, but if they can't touch the water, fords shouldn't. Say, really deep water represents a spiritual border that they can't cross, fine. However, the old running water thing seems like it fits more with "water is cleansing," in which case it's usually a "can't touch water."

Oh yeah, being clever gets you around threshold laws.

Pretty sure the last time I checked, Spiderman did it by gecko-like hairs on his fingers, but there have been so many different iterations of spiderman that it could have been either at any point in time.

[bluekevlar16]

I think it's more of a spiritual border, or at least that's what it seems like in my mind.

I just looked it up, and apparently there's been three different explanations. The gecko hairs never made sense to me because that calls into mind whether they're long enough to go through his clothes and even his boots. Then, according to what I read, static electricity isn't strong enough to give wall crawling powers, let alone strong enough to make it so that it's easier to tear the wall apart then to tear him away from it. So now the most recent explanation is that the subatomic particles are controlled and the friction between them is enhanced. That works, but it begs the question of how got the power because spiders don't work that way. Unless the spider is magic and gave him powers based around the idea of spiders rather than how spiders actually work.