MISSION: Our client, James A. Eggebeen, contacted us with the specific goal of finding Sasti. She was last seen near the home of Kalis, a known affiliate of The Brotherhood. Unfortunately that home has burned to the ground.
NAME: Sasti aka The White Assassin
AGE: Young
HEIGHT: Unknown
HAIR COLOR: White
EYE COLOR: Blood red
GENRE: Fantasy
This dramatic cover was created with photoshop for James Eggebeen. James requested fantasy for all age groups and sent me a blurb about his main character, as well as some stock images.
Unfortunately, we could not do what he wanted with those images, so I helped him choose this lovely lady. As you can see, his new choice was already dramatic to begin with. A nice base image is always helpful in creating a feeling in an art piece, and this image rocked. All I needed to do was turn her into Sasti.
Once all the details were completed I sent him this mockup to make sure I was moving in the correct direction.
Her hair has been recolored from brown to white and eyes turned red to match the main character of the book. Because eyes are important to the series, I created a logo image from stock black and white.
The background was created from fire elements, an abandoned building, and an empty field. A nice firey colored overlay was added to help create the illusion of a raging fire.
James approved the mockup, and I moved on to completing the project by cleaning up the lines, adding shadows to the cloak for dimension, and other small details. After deciding she looked a little too masculine I added the braids and eyelashes, and reduced some of the extra shadowing.
James Eggebeen is a serial entrepreneur repeatedly taking high tech companies through the growing pains of converting from a garage shop into a sustainable and profitable mature business.
He learned the value of hard work after being raised on a farm in Wisconsin where he learned auto mechanics from his saintly grandfather who patiently tolerated him and his siblings always under foot. His most frequent comment growing up was “Why did you people settle here when there are much warmer places to live?”
He confounded his teachers and most grown-ups at a young age writing incredibly powerful algorithms for phenomenally underpowered computers at the dawn of the computer age. This is a skill he has employed throughout his professional career and still takes great pride in (the confounding part mostly).
At 17years of age he made a deal with the US Navy to “Teach me about airplanes and computers. Take me anywhere it does not snow and I’m all yours.” They kept the bargain and started him on a world traveling adventure that has continued far beyond his six-year enlistment.
He has continued his world traveling adventures as a businessman, frequently logging one fourth of his time out of the country. He feels as comfortable abroad as he does at home and has developed an appreciation for a wide range of cultures and cuisines.
He settled in Southern California after his service was complete and studied Engineering, Business and Finance at night while working at a series of start-up firms by day. He claims that growing up on the farm and the Navy have ruined his ability to sleep late and habitually gets up well before the sane portion of population starts their day.
He wrote many technical articles with such titles as ‘Gamma Ferric Oxide is it really safe for the long haul?’ He was cited in the Time Life Books on Computers as an expert in magnetic storage. He has a portfolio of patents for esoteric technology that only a handful of people really understand and hardly anyone really cares about.
He started writing fiction as an assignment for his last required course in his undergraduate degree. He wrote short stories for several years as part of an internet based writing and critique group before the internet was cool and email spam had been invented.
He still lives in Southern California with his wife of twenty-five years who puts up with all his bizarre habits and unusual hours, where he has a better computer infrastructure at home than most small companies have at the office.
