From Ideas to Stories 2/2

I especially love reading or watching an original idea developed into a great story, which is a big reason why I love science fiction. Several such stories come to mind, a few of which came out -- or saw new light -- this year. A few, slightly older goodies (note: these are all movies).

First, a slightly older one: The Incredibles. According to the 'making of...' on the DVD, this story came to Pixar with a few similarities to the final incarnation, but much more generic. Essentially, a super hero story, where all the heroes were in the same family. Pixar, in their genius, developed the story much further, using some of the tried and true tropes (villain is created by hero, for example) but delved much more into the family side while adding their own great twist of heroes being outlawed (admittedly, this last one quickly became overdone in the superhero world, and almost all major superhero franchises incorporated such a story around this time). I particularly liked the way the kids dealt with, but hid, their powers at school, and the middle-aged, fat Mr. Incredible working for the man at an insurance agency. Overall, a strong idea made stronger by good story telling.

This year saw a UK production 'Attack the Block' released. I'll admit I debated seeing this because the characters in the trailers weren't very sympathetic and were, frankly, a bit annoying. But I did see it. And I really liked it. There were two things done particularly well in this story. The first is to take very unsympathetic characters (they mugged a woman in the first scene) and develop a story were they become sympathetic (the unsympathetic 'posers' were killed off). Even more interesting because it was an alien invasion sci-fi story, yet the character developement didn't suffer.

The second thing 'Attack the Block' did was to develop an original alien invasion story. Without giving away spoilers, it was a credit to the writers/producers to create this story line an to develop it in a manner consistant with setting--especially without resorting to gratuitous nudity. As you might gather, the story line is not 100% original, but it's rare enough to be uncommon, especially when previous attempts turned largely into farces with attractive, naked, killer women having sex with everyone.


Cowboys and Aliens, a recent movie based on a comic of a few years ago. I feel a bit bad commenting on this as I haven't seen it, so don't have first-hand opinions. The story seems inherently interesting, bringing in the ideas of aliens in the wild west.The imagination goes crazy. Unfortunately, according to the vast majority of critics, professional and casual, was that the movie (and book) stories were very poorly developed, not promising on almost any of the potential.

A movie just out which, again, I haven't yet seen. In Time poses the interesting and highly alegorical idea of time being a literal currency with salaries being paid in time, marked on your arm, and purchases being made in said time. Again, overwhelmingly, all critics have suggested that this was a great idea that simply wasn't developed to it's very high potential.

These examples lead directly from the last post and the realization that a great idea does not, itself, make a great story. Great writers will spend time analyzing their ideas from all angles, constantly asking themselves 'what if'. They will brainstorm how those ideas will affect society, then throw-out the first thoughts and dig deeper to more interesting ideas. They will also look at what have been called (by Charles Stross at the last Eastercon) 'secondary effects' of the idea. As one example, the rise of the smartphone with excellent large-screen image and quality camera gave rise to the highly unanticipated 'sexting'.

So the take home message is that, a great idea by itself can lead to a good, although more likely, mediocre, story. But with a bit more thought, that great idea can lead to an amazing story. Professional sci-fi authors will say, time and again, don't be satisfied with your first thoughts. Always dig deeper.

From Ideas to Stories 1/2

There are some great ideas out there. I'm sure we've all had dozens (or at least several) that we've though 'wow, that would make a great story'. When I first started writing, I would create a new file for each idea, keep it in mind and add new thoughts around that idea when something came to me. Needless to say, I was building up dozens of 'stories'... which, as any experienced writer soon learns, aren't really stories. They're just a collection of disparate ideas.

So, once I realized I could never possibly write all the 'stories' that I was developing, the next step came to me: I would start combining like-seeming ideas into a common story (yes, this thought was undoubtedly only original to me, I'm sure almost every serious author goes through this stage, most probably more quickly than me). At this stage things really start to get exciting as you juxtapose ideas you hadn't considered bring together before. The setting really begins to gain some depth, and interesting story twists start peeking out of the corners and introducing themselves.

It's at this stage that the amatuer writer strongly needs to revisit their characters. For some people (not me) character development comes naturally. An honest assessment of my own work suggests that I can make interesting characters, but for some reason, they are never the main character. He (and it's invariably a 'he') is flat and boring, surrounded by really interesting people.

So, once the world and general story ideas are developed, I go back and have a strong reworking of my main character and his relationship to other characters. Generally, I find all the characters have been too pleasant to each other and I need to build in some conflict and tension between at least some of them.

So, currently, that's how I progress through my story developement process. This particular process won't work for everybody, as some people are stronger at certain areas than others, but I have a feeling it is a good place to start for amateur sci-fi writers--a group who tend to be strong on world building and weak on characterization (perhaps not so different from most amateur writers?).

Digital Film School and other distraction.

It's been difficult getting back into the writing in the last few months, partly due to my latest ACL resconstruction (6 weeks ago) and partly because I'm taking a digital film course from the Open University (T156) that's taking more time that I had thought it would.

Why take it? Well, I think that digital film is an increasingly important marketing tool and means of expression. For example, book trailers are a relatively new thing that I'm sure will become increasing important, especially as e-books begin to incorporate images and video as extra content.

The course seems to be a good course covering aspects of filming and of creating less film-oriented content, say, for slideshows, demos, etc. Of course, the principles of film production are the same, the main difference between the two directions is the different technology required.

It is, of course, suggested that we do the weekly video-creation tasks, and I've been posting mine to my YouTube account. Check them out if you want and feel free to leave comments (I just ask you try to be constructive).

The latest video, as of this post, was a piece to camera climate diary. It's rather awful, made only a bit better through editing. It's made me realize how bad I am at speaking to the camera (primarily with regards to focusing my thoughts), something I'd like to change. So I'm going to try streaming a short vlog on Justin.tv as soon as I get the tech up and running. Feel free to check it out at:

www.justin.tv/eternaltherapy/videos

Anyway, despite this, I am trying to get back to writing. My two goals for year end are to write the new script and to rework the first 3-4 chapters of my conspiracy novel. Being as it's almost November, perhaps that's a little too ambitious? We'll have to see.

Post-apocalyptic Future UK Flood Map

In the process of preparing the backstory for one of my works (I won't say which), I've produced what could be a post-apocalyptic future UK map. Combining a city map with a relief map (with some tweaking) has resulted in the following:

From the upper right scale you can see this essentially highlights the separation between lowlands--grey--and highlands--green to red. One this to note is that the 'lowlands' on this map are still up to 50m above sea level. I intend to use this as a map of future flooded UK, where the lowlands are submerged. Obviously, in addition to polar ice cap melting, this would require some seismic event.

Regardless, the results are interesting, suggesting that England is most vulnerable of the three UK countries and would be most changed by such a series of events, while Scotland and Wales would be almost unaffected. In fact, England would be reduced to a peninsula off Scotland, an island in the southwest, and a small archipelego. The seat of power would possible shift to Birmingham, as London would be underwater and Southerners have very little respect for Northerners, in general.

This new geography is ripe for stories, suggesting many questions about a shift in the balance of power. For example: Could England remain in control or would Wales, and especially Scotland, reassert their power vying for independence or sovereignty over the new British Isles? How would the surviving cities, most now becoming coastal, adapt? What type of society would arise now that the seat of power (government and monarchy) has been destroyed.

So much food for thought :))

Back in Business

My knee is getting bearable and almost walkable again, so time to get back to business. I'll be updating you on some of my novel and script-writing progress (and any short stories, if I get to them).

My latest news is that I've heard from BBC on my first script: a form letter rejection. Oh well. At least I've got a baseline now. I've set myself 3 more scripts to reach some acceptable level (approx. 1/6 months). The next script I'll aim to send by the end of the year.

Oh, I've found an excellent resource on CafePress for universe / empire planning: a map of stars within 30 light years, set in cartesian coordinates with links between close stars and stars with potential habitable zones indicated. I think it will be a great resource for planning my Gateway series.

That's all for now.