Mining Someone Else's Precious Gems

I mentioned that we were delving into one of Lee's ideas that he's been kicking around since he was a kid. Now, on the one hand, that makes him a much more involved collaborator and gives me access to all kinds of details on weapons and spaceships and stuff that have always fascinated him.

On the cautious side, however, I have to be very careful. In this case, I'm trying to put on paper someone else's idea, someone else's vision. There's nothing wrong with injecting a bit of myself into the final product, but I have to do so without corrupting his own vision. I can influence it, try to trim out the ideas that we've both outgrown, but I have to do so carefully. It's hard to give up little bits of yourself, like ideas and stories are, even if they no longer work. Those scenes and character traits are precious. I have to be gentle any time I want to make a change in what I know he already loves.

And I have to be careful that what I add is harmonious, that is just adds to the story he thought up, adding depth and color and texture without changing the structure, the bones that were already there.

It's a challenge, but then, I like challenges.