For myself I found distorting or warping mental images make them stick in my mind. How about you? What was most helpful thing for you in creating memorable mental images?
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I stopped “creating” them and paid attention to what they ancient books on memory were actually saying.
Particularly Robert Fludd and Giordano Bruno, matched with Aristotle and Aquinas. Later, I found of Hugh of St. Victor mind-boggling for his proto-version of the PAO.
Bruno’s more logic and conceptual-based image-alterations have been especially useful in my practice, but not at the expense of the basics found all the way back in Aristotle and Rhetorica ad Herennium, etc.
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I like character images, because I create stories around various characters (I memorize names and faces that I add to various systems of my use such as alphabetical ones in different orders) and I create images like the following based on these characters (1. hair, 2. eyebrows, 3. eyes, etc.) such as 1. red hair, 2. eyebrows that look like locks, 3. with flashing blue eyes, etc., etc., their clothing, partner, friends, relatives, etc., I can create a story that includes all of their characteristics… Also use known characters place them in a certain order or series such as comic characters, manga, movies, books, etc., create characters based on concepts programming = programmer, mathematics = mathematician, geometry = mathematician with a triangle on his right hand, etc., add exaggeration and characteristics that exist in the imagination with which I would use the 10 Aristotelian categories.
What works best is a combination of everything, you can be like a painter or a sculptor of an artistic shadow.
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I noticed that with time images are reduced to a few defining/main elements - which are not always visual.
Of course, the elements that are used as hooks to put memories on are the ones that I’ll keep in mind naturally.
What helps me the most is not to add more details to an image, but rather to ask myself: what makes this person/objet/place different than other similar ones?
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As @Magno mentioned, I also use characters. I place a number of familiar (fictional or real) characters in my memory palace and then attach the things I want to remember to them. Maybe I just visualize them interacting with the information I want to remember, or if the information is so abstract or I can’t come up with a proper mental image, I create a mini-story between that character and the information I want to remember. The next time I visit my mind palace and see my characters, I will be reminded of the information I have attached to them.
I do this for important information that I want to keep in my long-term memory.
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Another thing that really helps is to turn your mental image into a character. If it’s a car, give it a face and human-like emotions. You can also give it a personality for deeper encoding.
The reason for the memorability of characters is that our brains are naturally good at remembering faces and personalities of people. You may have experienced this when you say to yourself: Uh! That person’s face is so familiar, but I can’t remember when I last saw him!
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And stories! (probably because emotions are bound into it)
“The guy that stole my bike” is a very memorable character for me, even if his appearance has nothing memorable about it. When I see him in my mind’s eye, it’s always going to be “hrrmf it’s the guy that stole my bike 
”.
You can use it for anything really: it’s the place where the prime minister got shot. It’s the suitcase that we found on the train and it was full of lingerie…
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Yeah is the same for me i’m always Made a mini story Made it interact with the information and i also Made the visual i created beting interact with loci so with that every Time i want to recall just remember the visual with the loci
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That’s the best idea combining your emotion and memory technique is the best way to created a memorable image
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I like to visualize my mental images from my own perspective. For example, if I want to memorize a mental image, I imagine seeing it from my first-person view and then touch it.
This will help you remember the image more easily.
In memory competitions where you don’t need to remember things long-term, just make them big and exaggerated.
I just browse through images without putting any effort in and see what sticks and what doesn’t. And then I try to figure out what images stick by comparing the ones that don’t. I’ve found the ones that do have a particular structure and characteristics.
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