Disciplinary Actions

Tuesday, September 11, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
Okay, yeah, yeah, I've been slacking lately . . .

Ever since my all-too-brief vacation in Hawaii, the muse has decided that she and I are no longer on good speaking terms. As a result, I have stopped waiting for her to snap of her current snit and use more direct methods. (Many of my characters have gone silent. It's been kind of spooky. I don't know if she didn't like Waikiki, or if she didn't want to leave.)

A page a day . . . write a page a day . . .

For the past two weeks it's been working. The first draft of Battlefield is coming to a close, albeit more slowly than I would like. I know where it needs to go, but it's been a struggle getting there in a way that makes rational sense in terms of the overall plot and characters. What I thought was going to be one more chapter is likely to be two, but that's how it goes sometimes . . .

For those who read this blog (all three of you ;) ), I wanted to give a brief explanation of the frequent lengthy gaps between posts. With limited writing time, my priorities are generally:
  1. Paying (or potentionally-paying) work. (The aforementioned page a day.)
  2. New ideas that might lead to the above.
  3. Posts for the gaming group forum (some of which will lead to the above).
  4. This blog.
There are only so many hours in the day, after all. (And, no, I don't believe that sleep is overrated. :) )
Labels:

Playing in Boxes

Thursday, August 30, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
Boxes have always been an effective tool of the imagination. Who among us has not spent hours as a child using an empty box (large enough to climb into, of course) as a race car, secret fortress, spaceship, or just a comforting place to sit and relax?

Several months ago, as part of a department-sponsored training exercise, I once again took the Myers-Briggs personality questionnaire. (This was the second time I had done so; the first time had been about eight years earlier.) For those of you who care, this time around I was determined be of type ISTJ. One of the things that the facilitator said when summarizing the traits of this type was that ISTJ types don't tend to be as good at thinking "outside the box". However, if you want to know everything about the box and what you can do with it, we're the people to ask.

Several days ago, this came back to me (I don't really recall why), but it got me thinking about the ways that I explore characters and situations in my fiction (also including, this case, my gaming characters). I like to create what I like to refer to as a context that the characters exist in--essentially the world they live in and some of the people they regularly interact with. For two of the characters, I have also created their "evil" mirror images.

Emerald Flight Sapphire Night Scott Skott

It has been suggested that I've limited myself by dipping back into the same pool over and over again. There might be some truth to that. Thinking about it now, though, I think it has more to do with wanting to learn everything about the box. I have a good sense of who the original characters are, but what would they be like if they walked the other side of that often ambiguous moral line? (Consider the persistent fascination Star Trek fans have with the crews' Mirror Universe counterparts.) As discussed somewhat in a previous post, after creating Hope's Fury, what else is there to know about Aerians? How did they and humans meet for the first time? What was that like? What other aliens are there?

As you can probably tell from this, the "box" can sometimes become galactic in scale (think Star Wars or even The Lord of the Rings). The broader the context, the greater the potential for a larger box. The kind of stuff that long-running television and movie series are made of.

I was also thinking about this in the context of when I was writing "Building Baby Brother". As I wrote that story, and it grew, I found myself wanting to explore all of the possibilities and implications raised during the course of the story. Hence, what started as a 2,000-word short story eventually became a 21,600-word novella. I had found a new box, and--darn it!--I wanted to explore it! (This might also explain why so often when I start a writing new novel, ideas for potential sequels come unbidden to mind not long after the original one is started.)

Have you found any good boxes today?
Labels: ,

Oceans of Consciousness

Monday, August 13, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
Tonight I watched a sunset from one of the beaches on Waikiki. What is it that drives us toward the sea? Is it some primordial memory stored deep within our cells that calls us back to the place where we spawned all those countless millennia ago? Is that why the sea so often brings us peace and solace?

As I watched, my turned to thoughts of how others might view such sunsets, not only real people I have known, but also how fictional characters I have created might each react to one. I also thought of my own life, the choices I've made, the decisions I have both faced and avoided, and of the events that might still lie ahead. Even in my own life, I find that it is as much a vision of future fantasy as much of my fiction. What of it will come to pass will largely be the result of chances I am willing to take, of prices I am willing to pay, and whether I eventually I decide that the costs are worth the accomplishments.

In the majority of my stories, it is the villains who are petty and selfish, willing to achieve their goals at the expense of anyone who might oppose them. The heroes are brave, noble and—while having their own flaws—are not willing to sacrifice their ideals or win their battles at the sacrifice of those they hold dear—nor at the cost of their souls.

I find that I seek such a balance in my personal life as well. But such a fantastic view of real life does not hold up to scrutiny under the harsh light of reality. Those who should be allies will—on occasion—succumb to pretense and pettiness. Those who have been cast as evil may provide the salvation we seek. It is because they are human and because they are real.

Writers can (sometimes) control the actions of the characters they create, casting them from specific molds, forcing them to perform explicit roles. Real people, being products of their own volition, possess no such limitations. They assume whatever roles they choose at the moment, regardless of the ones that the rest of us have chosen for them. Each of us, it seems, sits in constant judgment of those around us, weighing each word or act within the context of our own beliefs.

In a seemingly vicious cycle, when such judgments are given voice, we then react with judgments of our own on the correctness of such opinions. We often forget what the original purpose was, so caught up in the need to express ourselves, particularly when we perceive that we have been, in some way, wronged. We often to fail to recognize that our context is not necessarily any more right than anyone else's, but it seems that most of us have an innate need to win—to prove that our beliefs are the correct and proper ones.

Does victory necessarily make one the hero of a story? While it is true that it is generally the victors that write history, it is equally important to note that many of those who have won have later been reviled by history. Words and deeds have a habit of catching up with us when we least expect it—unforeseen costs to acts we have committed. Like the fine print of a loan document, not all costs are evident at the time of signing.
Labels:

Fun and Games

Monday, July 16, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
Gaming, for me, is a form of recreation and escape. I hardly believe I would be classified as a "hardcore" gamer, nor do I think I really fall into the "casual" category, but in some strange nether land in-between. I know I will never be as good or skilled as many of the more experienced players, not because I don't want to be, but chiefly because I don't take it as seriously. I do want to be a good and skillful player, but there are limits to how much energy I am willing to devote to something I consider a recreational activity.

I'm in it for the fun. I'm in it for the stories. I'm in it for the characters. For me, now, the game provides a framework, a setting, a context in which other stories can occur.

I play to associate and spend time with people that I come to consider friends. I play to be someone other than I am. (Okay, we can argue that one at a later time. Yeah, yeah, I know how characters often mirror ourselves. Shush! I'm trying to make a point here.) I suspect if it weren't for role-playing, I would have left the game for something else a long time ago. If I wanted to just run around and shoot things and blow things up, I can go back to XBox Live and take out the Covenant on Halo night after night.

Mostly, I want to have a good time. I want to laugh, tell stories, crack (usually bad) jokes, and gain some XP and gameplay wisdom along the way. I think I'm a better player today than I was a year ago, six months ago, or even three months ago. Will I ever be as good as the best among you? Doubtful. Do I care? No. Because that's not my primary goal. Will I also ever be able to put in the hours that a lot of players do? Also doubtful. (This part used to bother me—a lot. People who I would team with would out-level me night after night until my character was no longer really a viable teammate. My solution: I try to keep a slate of characters of various ranges available so there's a high likelihood that I'll have one in the right level range. While this can play havoc with storyline RP, it seems to generally work.)

Why is all this important? Because I believe that how a player views their goals for the game colors how they play, who they play with, and how long they stay interested and active. For me, if I'm not having fun, then why the heck am I doing it?
Labels:

From Hope to Blood: A Curious Journey Down the Path of Creation

Friday, July 13, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
You never know what people will pick up on. You toss ideas out there, hoping that one or more will resonate with others, but there's no sure way to know which ones will stick or what directions they might head in. I've always been interested in the process of creation and how it works. For the most part, I believe it's the result of synthesis of other ideas, but it can also happen suddenly like a lightning bolt.

For no other reason than because I found it interesting, I wanted to share the journey down one particular path of creation. In this case, the path that led to the idea for the Emerald Flight series of stories.

It all started with the concept for the design for a character for the game, City of Heroes. Someone I used to team with a lot was creating a new Super Group and I offered to make a character specifically for it. So, I started playing around with a visual design to see what inspiration might strike. (It often goes one way or the other for me: I either have a character personality in mind and try to design the physical representation to match, or develop a physical design and then work toward a personality that seems to fit.)

Thus, the character of Hope's Fury was born. As soon as I saw her in her uniform, I knew she was the medical officer of whatever group she belonged to. It was evident from her face that she was not human, so I decided she was from a race of aliens known as the Aerians. At that point, however, she was only a solo character, with no additional background beyond that.

I had another character, Emerald Flight, who I had created one day solely to test the archetype and build, who had kind of worked her way into the storyline established for the Raynes brothers, but I had not really worked out her background and story. So, she became the captain of a time traveling starship that Hope served on as the medical specialist (among other duties).

A fair amount of curiosity arose around the Aerians from some of the other players. Who were they? Where did they come from? How do they and humans meet for the first time? Why does Hope seem so arrogant? Is that normal for Aerians? I didn't really have the answers, as it wasn't really necessary to know for the current storylines, but would have made for interesting (and potentially useful) background information.

And then along came StarWing. Created by other of the other players, StarWyng (a bastardization of her true Aerian military rank of Star Wing) is another type of Aerian. Before StarWyng appeared, I didn't even know that there were Aerians with wings! She had a story all her own and also added (among many other details) that the Hope Furies were highly revered among the Aerians. That StarWyng was bonded with a Kheldian (a Peacebringer in this case) also reinforced a half-formed idea I had on why Hope had dark powers in addition to her healing abilities.

Having StarWyng appear got me wondering about what other Aerians might look like, particularly Aerian males. I could easily see a male version of StarWyng. Also, it opened the question of whether the majority of Aerians were winged or not and whether that created some kind of caste system among them.

These questions just kind of hovered around in the background, not really needing an immediate answer, but interesting to consider nonetheless. Then, I decided I wanted to create a character with a, well, more forceful personality than I usually created.

Enter StarBlood. A definite male of the species, he holds the rank of Star Blood. While Star Wings are much like our Pathfinders, Star Bloods are more akin to Marines or Navy SEALS (or, to use a fictional analogy, Klingons, but without the hygiene issues). As one player described him: "he is a Warrior with a capital 'W'". He is confident in his abilities almost to the point of utter arrogance. In addition to warfare, he also concerns himself with improving the Aerian gene pool. StarBlood is on a mission to find out what happened to the Aerians who traveled to Earth and were never heard from again. The Kheldian within has a far different mission of its own.

And so there the story stands . . . Quite a journey from a simple character design to the development of an entire alien species . . .
Labels: ,

Script Frenzy: Final Cut

Sunday, July 1, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments

Okay, nothing to see here . . . Move along, move along . . .

Well, June has come . . . and gone. Script Frenzy has also come . . . and gone. 2,879 words completed out of 20,000. There's all sorts of reasons (and a few lame excuses) as to why, but I figure any number of words greater than zero is a good thing. And I did learn a few things along the way:

  • The muse seems to enjoy working in script format. The entire time, though, I envision her hovering over my shoulder, with her wings slowly flapping, wearing a shirt that reads "What I want to do is Direct" (http://www.cafepress.com/hollywoodgifts/3022725).

  • Sometimes I think it's possible to aim one's goals a little too high. Writing a good romantic comedy is even harder than it looks. One of the challenges of Script Frenzy was to start with an idea from scratch, and that's the one the muse chose. On the bright side, at least I got the idea started and learned several things in the process.

So, in the end, nothing to see here . . . Move along, move along . . .

Labels: ,

Script Frenzy: Week 1

Sunday, June 10, 2007 Posted by SFWriter13 0 comments
My muse selected a story to work on out of my list of ideas. I was tempted to work on an existing project, but in script form, but the Script Frenzy rules, ur, guidelines say that it needs to be a new project&emdash;from scratch. That was actually all right, as I wasn't certain that the idea I wanted to work on would be 120 pages.

After selecting the idea, she promptly marched over, sat herself in a corner, crossed her arms over her chest, and sulked. I didn't try to reason with her—muses don't tend to respond well to logic.

So, as of today, I have 1,509 words completed of my screenplay. Well behind where I should be at this point, but I haven't begun to panic yet. I know that: 1) when the tempermental muse finally stops sulking and decides we're on speaking terms again, the pages will pour forth, and 2) I remember the marathon 8,000 words in 36 hours that I managed in order to complete NaNoWriMo last year.

Stay tuned . . .
Labels: ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)