Field Trip!

     Despite the fond memories of not being in school, in most cases a field trip will mean some form of inconvenience.  By field trip I mean the shocking notion of getting away from the keyboard and doing some form of outdoor research.  Yes it's scary, and there are people out there *shudders*, but on occasion it can be kinda cool.  I recently made my second such trip (Which I'll cover in another post.).  The previous trip I decided to take after writing the first three chapters.  They're set in the area I was working at the time ('Dead Moon' is set on the island of Oahu in Hawaii.  So far it all occurs in the Honolulu/Waikiki area.).
     I was pretty unhappy with the descriptions I had done of the area.  It just seemed like more of a backdrop/movie set than a living environment.  So armed with a camera I borrowed from my Aunt (Thanks, again Auntie.) I got off work at 0600 and walked the path my characters would be.

The parking garage where my protagonist encounters his first Zombie.

     I started at a parking garage.  You wouldn't think bringing something like a big-ass, hollow cinder block to 'Life' would be important, but I knew that if I couldn't animate something this simple, how would I pull it off with anything more complicated.  This shot (LEFT) I took during my shift the night before.  The scene itself takes place at night, so before I went for day-shots to get detail I caught this mainly for the feeling.  I actually deleted the clearer shots and kept this blurry one (With the tremor in my hands I'm lucky I got any clear shots.) because it gave me a better sense of the color in the scene.

     So far I've found that walking the locations in your book can really bring home, as well as make you aware of, small details that you would normally miss.  The way the garage smelled like salt water and exhaust, the way even the smallest sound echoed within and the landscaping muted the ones trying to get in.  And the elevators.

     The H-U-G-E frakkin' elevators.

     From there I headed North, my next stop the Neil S. Blaisdell Center.

The Blaisdell from afar.  Elvis' "Aloha from Hawaii" concert was held here.
I do bad things to it in my book.

     Had to do a bit of rearranging after getting a better grasp of the area around the hall.  Keeping details like this straight aren't necessary per se.  Nothing wrong with taking poetic license but it was an easy decision to "keep it real" in this case and it was mainly an issue of tweaking with little details and switching a few things around.  A band-aid problem.

     I actually found myself enjoying the trip itself despite my fatigue from working a graveyard shift and going for a nice walk in the hot sun.  For the first time I felt myself slipping into my characters minds with ease.  What they might be thinking, where they would go.  And things that won't even end up in the book (Though who really knows.) also helped pull me into the world.  The pics below for example:

Bronze (I think.) statue on the North end of the Blaisdell property.

Cemetery I found across the street from a hospital.

Same cemetery.  Full of Nuns, Priests, and Cardinals.

Statue of Father Damien in front of the Capitol building.

     A big reason I felt this trip necessary, and why I made sure to put work into describing a parking garage, was a big scene I had yet to write at St. Andrews Cathedral.

Cathedral Church Of St, Andrew, Honolulu (Side note, an opening scene in MST3K movie 'Codename: Diamond Head' was filmed here.)

   

Just looking at this place was a little intimidating in terms of 'how-the fuck-am-I going-to-describe-this' and 'why-do-I-know-nothing-about-architecture?'.    I wasn't able to get a picture of it (Because I didn't know it existed at the time.), but one of the figures in the stained glass around the entrance is Jesus with a surfboard.

     Cool as St. Andy's was, my favorite part of the trip had to be the final leg when I strolled Hotel St. which runs through the center of China Town.  There was some...  interesting signage to take in as well as a few pretty beautiful works of art.  The whole area is a bizarre mix of contrasts.  Post-Apocalyptic sections that would be at home in any Romero flick right across from spit-shined, well-kept grounds.

This statue of a sea turtle is to the left of the fountain (below-right).

Both the fountain...

... and this statue...

... are right next to this.

Don't know of it's still running, but the sign made me laugh my ass off.

Many of the buildings have been her for quite awhile.

If you can read this without laughing, you are mature and I weep for you.

    In the end I found myself at the beginning of my book.  This place (Below) has always caught my attention.  Even in China Town it stands out, and is one of those buildings that everyone knows and uses when giving directions.

Two of my main characters live in this corner piece.

As you can see they are plainly living the high life.

     While it kept me up past my bed time the trip paid back in spades (Whatever the hell that means.).  This one trip fueled my imagination from Chapter 1 up to Chapter 11, which I just finished.  It even helped with the locations I made up.  I get that it's not practical to do this with every location, but researching this beyond what I could find on the internet gave my descriptions a much needed kick in the ass.  Sometimes I get so focused on my world that I cut myself off from the one that actually exists, and I think its important for us (Writers.) to get out of our heads and experience the real thing.  I can't recommend doing this enough because the sights, sounds, and smells (Good and bad.) are the details that put your readers in the scene, and firmly sets them in your world.