How to turn a photo into a story character

What can you turn into a character?

Anything a child would want in their story, as long as you can take a clear picture of it:

• Your child, a brother or sister, or a grandparent.
• A pet: the family dog, the cat, the hamster.
• A favourite toy: the stuffed rabbit that goes everywhere.
• A child’s own drawing: the monster, superhero or princess they invented.
• Something bigger: the family car, a camper van, a treehouse.

The character becomes an illustration, not a copy of the photo, and is drawn in each story’s own illustration style.

What makes a good photo?

• One subject. Crop out other people and pets.
• All of them, if you can. Head to toe for a person, the whole toy, the whole car.
• Good light. Daylight shows true colours; a dim room can change an eye or hair colour.
• Nothing hiding the face. Sunglasses, masks and big hats get drawn too.
• The clothes you want. What they wear in the photo usually becomes their outfit. You can change the outfit at any time.
• A JPEG, PNG, GIF or WebP under 6 MB. A phone photo is fine.

Step by step

1. Open the Characters tab and tap + New Character.
2. At the top, under Upload a photo or drawing, tap Choose image… and pick the photo.
3. The Create character from photo window opens. Give the character a Name and say what they are in Species / type: “girl”, “Border Collie puppy”, “stuffed rabbit”. Personality, quirks, favourite things and a backstory are optional. A short note is enough for the backstory: InkStak builds on it.
4. Tap Generate character from photo + details. InkStak writes how they look, and their Character Bible, from the photo: what they are, age, build, face, skin or fur, eyes, hair, distinguishing features, outfit and accessories.
5. Check the Character Bible. Fix anything the photo got wrong, such as an eye colour in dim light or hair hidden under a hat. Do it now: once the character is in a story, everything but the outfit, accessories and carried item is locked, so every book matches.
6. Tap Save Character. If you changed a field, InkStak may first suggest gentler wording for the pictures; take what you like. Then it paints the portrait, using the photo as its guide. Tap Regenerate for another one, Looks good — save character to keep it, or Save without a portrait.
7. Make a story. On the Create screen, pick the character first to make them the main character.

What happens to the photo?

InkStak uses the photo only while you make the character: to write their description and to paint their portrait. It is never saved on InkStak’s servers. What is kept is the painted portrait and the words in the Character Bible, and those are what every story uses.

Tips

• Say what they are plainly. “Boy”, “golden retriever”, “knitted owl”. InkStak keeps what you write here and never changes it.
• Give them a personality. “Brave but hates getting wet” gives a story something to work with. A pet’s real habits make the best quirks.
• Things they hold go in Carried item. A wand or an umbrella there appears when the story uses it. Under Accessories, it would be in their hand in every picture.
• Keep the character for a series. The same character can star in every story you make, and look the same in each one.

You can make characters from photos on every plan, including Free. Start with InkStak, or see how characters make a personalized children’s book.