“He was cloaked and his face veiled so deep in shadow that it could not be seen, but the firelight caught his eyes.”
Problems:
- If someone is “cloaked” it is a general indication they are “hidden” inside the garment, meaning, they are wearing the hood as well as the cloak. No need to further describe how deeply hidden the cloak makes the character, or that the hood is up, or that the hood is also a cowl.
- It’s extremely difficult to have a hood so deep that a person’s face is completely hidden by shadow, yet they are still able to move about, notice the scenery and participate in any action other than staring at the ground. Let alone then be able to see firelight in their eyes. Don’t believe me? Try it.
- If you can see the firelight in the eyes, you can also see firelight on the cheeks, nose and chin. (That’s because these are the raised parts of the face, which the light will hit first before getting to the eyes.) Further, if you can see these parts of the face, then the face is not hidden deep in the shadow of the cowl. Consider the direction of light and shadow. Firelight is generally going to be at ground level (from a hearth or campfire) or from waist level (as in a candle or lamp on a table.) That means that in most cases, the light is angling up and will hit the neck and chin first, then the cheeks. By the same rules, the hood is shadowing the face from the top, so the shadows are going to be darkest at the hairline and gradually lighten toward the jawline. That means the eyes will actually be more difficult to see than the person’s chin and lower face.
- LoTR already did this and had to use special effects to make it work. Unless the character has magical eyes that glow in the dark, this kind of description does not deepen the story.
