Disipline and Discovery.

Ratteler · Forum Member Joined: Jun 10, 2002 Posts: 551 Location: NYC

I have been told I write really well. That the worst part of my writing (well, besides my spelling :lol:

) is that the reader is left wanting the finish of my story that never comes.

So my question is... how do you keep going?

I don't have a fixed writing method. In fact, I kind of look at writing as this terrible thing I have to get through in order to tell the story in my head.

In my writing I ussual have and idea of where the story is going, some cool scenes on the way there. I ussually know all the plots and twists I want to put in... but when I start to put everything in, I "Discover" things. It's line the differance between reading the spoilers and actually seeing the movie.

It seems if I'm disiplined and keep to a schedual, my stuff comes out really bland, and I don't enjoy it. If I take my time and "see" what happens, it becomes far more developed, but I end up getting sidetracked. Like, obviously I'm a graphics guy as well as a wanna-be writer. So I'll take a break from writing to try and visualize something in 3D, that will lead me into endless texture details and modeling...

My best trick so far was getting myself a Palm Tungsten T|C. With it's nice built-in keyboard I have a word processor in my Pocket at all times so when the mood hit's I can sit down and let the magic flow. But that's more of solution to living with my handicap than trying to correct it.

Do anyof you have the same problems? If you do... how do you manage yourself to actually get some thing done?

How do you force yourself to be inspired on a schedual? How do capitalize on inspiration while you have it?

radiosilence · Posted: Sat May 15, 2004 10:36 pm Post subject: Re: Disipline and Discovery.

You make a very good point when you say you turn to graphics to visualize more of your story. I'm a writer but not a graphics artist, but I have my own version of that technique. If I'm writing a short story or even a novel and I run out of ideas for a chapter, I usually open up a new page in my word processor and explore a scene writing it in comics format. Panel by panel, describing every detail and trying to make every detail relevant to the story, even if it's just a tiny symbolism. Usually, what happens is discovery. If I had the scene in my head but it wasn't coming out right, 90% of the times is because I didn't know it or see it deep enough. Writing it panel by panel, with descriptions, captions, dialogue lines and so forth, helps me to see it in a different way.

Of course, they're different mediums, and you can't do exactly the same things in prose and comics. But usually the fundamental part finds a way to remain when I rewrite the story into prose. And if it doesn't, well, then the story was meant to be a comic.

I disagree, though, in your point about discipline. To me, discipline is not to keep a schedule. Discipline is closer to carrying your Palm wherever you go and using it. It is to carry your story at all times in your head, actively, letting it develop. Discipline is to see the world with a writer's eyes (everything that happens could be a story, or something in a story) and doing something about it. Writing down that world.

OK, a disciplined writer will probably write every day. But that's not because he forces himself to do it. It's because he/she constantly has ideas, because he knows what he wants to write, and because he's been thinking about that all day and is willing to spend his weekend or nights putting it down to paper. And he/she knows it because that's where his mind is all the time: creating the story and all its possibilities in his head every second he is awake.

I personally don't believe in inspiration as having to do much with the writing process. When one is inspired, it is much better to use that time to think your story than to write it. Inspiration is very convenient to find that plot twist you couldn't find, or that witty reply for one of your characters, or an original scene that will leave the reader begging for more. OK, maybe you could do a first draft of something in a rapt of inspiration. (I actually write what I think when I'm thinking about a story, to see it better).

But the real art is in the actual writing. That's where you most need your consciousness. Everything must be produced in a very calculated way, as if you were hammering a sword and knowing why and where you hammer it every time. And that takes a lot of discipline.

Ideas? Ideas are pretty hard to find, though they are everywhere. One thing I usually do is to join two elements and see where that leads, trying to do some lateral thinking. A comb and a cathedral that's just passing by the window of the bus I'm in. Maybe I could pluck out some relationship between both elements, and if I can, there probably is a story there, or a character, or a scene. Maybe the comb is old, really old, a piece of antiquity that I'm carrying to the Museum. Maybe I'll stop by the cathedral for some reason and an old clerk there will see the comb and be surprised. It once belonged to a monk --there are pictures of this, he shows them to me in the library-- and the presence of the comb begins to awaken his spirit. (I know, it probaly sucks as a story, but then it's almost 3 am and I must get some sleep). But that's sort of it. Two, three, four elements and how the combine. The way they combine can produce a story, or a scene, or whatever you're looking for.

Sorry for such a long first post. Hope to start interacting more in the forum if you people don't hate me so far for my long posts

Ratteler · Forum Member Joined: Jun 10, 2002 Posts: 551 Location: NYC

Oh yeah... no one is going to want long posts in a Writing forum. :wink:

(That was sarcasm by the way.)

In many ways I'm the opposite of you. I have absolutely no problem coming up with ideas and stories. I just have a problem getting them down on paper/Word Processor.

I really need to be inspired to write it down instead of playing the little movie in head over and over and over.

My background is more Film and TV based (I just got my Bachelors in film! Yay! FInnaly!), so I think more in that medium.

Currently in my head, I've got roughly 13 1 hour episodes of a sci-fi series including a 2 hour pilot and "season ender", and some loose plans for Season 2, 3 seperate Horror/Comedy/Sci-Fi feature leanth films that are growing. A 3 part Epic Fantasy/Sci-Fi, and two Comedy/Dramas.

2 of those project I'm stuck for an ending for because I came up with them a little differently, but the rest have pretty solid story plots with a good begining middle and ends.

My problem is that when I sit down to write, 2 hour go by and I end up with maybe a page in novelization form.

I know one of my bad habbits is that I re-write as I go. Maybe I should try just writing a real crappy version fist with big details in, and then start re-writing the whole thing.

At any rate, my personal week point is my process, not my concepts.

For me Graphics end up being more of a distraction than a help too. I need to stop the brain storm long enough for me to commit things to the written word.

Otherwise I'm always going to be that lunitic who walk around in circles in his aprtment talking to himself in different voices.

radiosilence · Posted: Sun May 16, 2004 1:10 pm Post subject: Re: Disipline and Discovery.

OrcaDesignStudios · Posted: Sun May 16, 2004 4:33 pm Post subject: Re: Disipline and Discovery.

Working in stages is the best method I've found for keeping yourself on track. Start with a simple skeleton, laying out your catalyst, big event, crisis, etc., then let it sit for a few days. Once that's done, do a four or five page treatment that outlines your entire story. Again, let it sit for a few days, or even a couple weeks. When you come back to it, expand your treatment into an outline of ten or fifteen pages. From that, you should have established enough detail to get going on the first draft and enough structure established to prevent yourself getting lost along the way and by taking breaks in between the stages, it prevents burnout.
_________________
Jim Harnock - ODS
www.OrcaDesignStudios.com

Ratteler · Forum Member Joined: Jun 10, 2002 Posts: 551 Location: NYC

One tip I have... never show work in progress. I think getting the little aplaud for what I've takes away the hunger to actually finish it. That was the downfall of a lot of my Fan Fiction. I would post a chapter, get a bunch "great!" and "more!" comments and than a certain thrill was gone.

I've tried to structure myself... but I always end up going to far at one point and ignoring the rest.

A lot of stuff changes as I "discover" what's happening in the story. I sit down to write a treatment and the chapter starts to unfold at some point. Then I end with half a treatment and semi-cool chapter.

What I actually LIKE about writing is when I'm sitting there tryping and read what I've wrote and have a pure readers reaction of... "NO WAY!"

My other problem is doing research. If I start to research something I ussually end up closing the browser 4 or 5 hours later and only when I see the blinking coursor in my Word Proc do I remember... "Oh YEAH!!! I was writing."

Of course the pleasent side effect is that I actually do know almost everythig now. :-D

OrcaDesignStudios · Posted: Mon May 17, 2004 8:36 am Post subject: Re: Disipline and Discovery.

The best thing about working in stages, as I do, is that no matter how long a break you take between stages, you're always coming back to something that's "finished." Obviously not a completed manuscript or screenplay, etc., but I mean you aren't coming back to an outline that that only covers the first third of your story -- you have the whole thing laid out in front of you. A couple read-throughs and you're ready to jump back in. I'm currently working on a story I first outlined almost ten years ago. It needed a lot of adjustment and updating, but since I had the outline from begining to end, it was actually fairly easy to fix.
_________________
Jim Harnock - ODS
www.OrcaDesignStudios.com

Navel · Moderator Joined: Mar 28, 2003 Posts: 34

Ratteler, you sound like a budding Gene Roddenberry or something. Maybe just skip the writing and become a producer, hire somebody else to write your stuff. Since they work for you they have to write what you tell them.

Some people can't finish anything they start (like me), unless they're working on it with friends. It's just not as fun to be all alone with no feedback sometimes.

finister · Forum Member Joined: Oct 21, 2002 Posts: 97

Perhaps if you have problems keeping interested in writing the whole story, then write the ending first and then begin from the beginning.

I'm like you. I have a thousand ideas swirling in my head and if I don't write them down I'll forget some of them.

I also usually get my best ideas while I'm in the middle of a story and have to go back and make changes to fit my new idea. I've found this type of workflow very frustrating with visual storytelling, as in Poser. Once you start rendering something, it's not as easy to change the story around a new idea as it is in pure text.

I think it might also help if you approached each scene/chapter as a mini-novel/story in itself. Each scene having it's own 3 part act as it were - so you were totally involved in each scene.

Another thing I can relate to is trying to edit as I go along which slows my creative flow down. The remedy I've found helpful is to turn off the computer monitor and just write blind, so you can't go back and edit or correct things.

Don't know if that helps.