Camp Ended Early

The Camp NaNoWriMo writing is a failure for this month. The story’s fallen apart and my attempts to rejuvenate it have failed. I’ve still got the characters in mind but I don’t know what I want them to do, where I want them to go, or what I want to happen. It started off well and crumbled as the month got worse and worse. Unless things get stupendously awesome and I have a magical epiphany about what I can do with this story, it’s done. I’m going to put that one to the side and think about what I’ll do next time around. Maybe I’ll completely redo the story and rework the characters once I’ve gotten a little more experience with fiction in. As it is, the story’s dead. Blah, July. Blah!

Laying It Out

Planning out a story ahead of time hasn’t exactly been my thing so far. I don’t usually lay out a lot of the plot points or motivations or do up character designs. My method typically involves me sitting down and hammering on the keyboard as things happen and people do stuff. Not exactly the best way to get anything done. It’s great for the freedom and the flow, the gentle outpouring of creative juices, but not so great for anything that feels more solid.

Not to say I’m not enjoying this. On the contrary, I’m getting more ideas from building up more of this structure and foundation. I like the idea of creating characters and some general points and letting the story flow from that. Much of the character designing came out interesting and kind of weird. We’ll see how this turns out.

I’ve finished up the character layouts. Now it’s on to motivations, desires, obstructions, conflicts, and consequences. If I can get that down tonight I’ll be doing well. If I can get that and get the body of the story laid out then I’ll be doing great. I’ll probably end up tweaking it tomorrow but there will be something to tweak!

Joy! Sorrow! Love! Hate! Critters! Creatures! Conundrums! Office supplies! Arguments! Gum!

I’m sitting at a word count of zero for the last three days. Character designs don’t really count. Not really. I’m only on the dock for about 2250 words. So, not hard. Once I get in the swing of things it’ll come together quickly. I’m just hoping the well of ideas doesn’t dry up in the stupid summer sun. Of course, that’s why I’m plotting this thing out ahead of time. Having the framework gives me something to work towards or to jump off into a new direction in. I’m going to plot out some weird moments too. I always enjoy writing those.

Ooh, I’ve got to do artwork… Hrmm… Interesting. I’m better at characters. My backgrounds suuuuuuck! Crap.

Well, I’m off to plot and scheme!

July and Ren’Py

It’s Camp NaNoWriMo time again and I’m doing something a little different. I’m going to try writing a visual novel! I’ve fiddled around with Ren’py, the open source visual novel engine, and I like what I’ve seen so far. I have some graphics together, I’m getting my characters down, started whipping up some conflicts, and I’m going to lay out some of the fundamentals of the story tonight. This is going to be great!

I’ve cut back on my word count for the month since I’m trying something drastically different from the straight fiction story I’ve written before. Since I’m including graphics, music (probably not original), and gameplay, I’ve cut my word count down to 25,000. I think that is doable in the time I have and will let me get some game programming in as well.

I’ll see about posting some progress pics on here while I’m working on the game. I’m going to investigate a few places to advertise and post this online once I’m finished. Hopefully some of you can play this thing and have a good time with it!

Wait… If I tell you about it… Crap, now I have to do it! I can’t tell you about it and then drop the ball! Well. I imagine you may not be interested in visual novels. I can understand. If you are, I’d like to hear what you think about it when I get it out there! I’ll let you know when it’s available to play and I’ll keep you appraised of the work as it comes together.

Oh yeah, one addendum. I don’t feel like I’m that good at art so the art’s going to be sub-par this time around. Maybe I’ll find an artist for the next one and possibly a musician. Or maybe I’ll die of shame from putting out such a terrible game and never do it again. Time will only tell.

So. That’s my big news, my big creation idea for the July Camp NaNoWriMo. I’ll see how far I get with it and see how the word count I’ve set for myself works out. It could be that I surpass 25,000 words. It could be that I don’t get anywhere close and die of shame. I intend to pound on this keyboard and put together some chicken scratches for graphics and then put it out there for people to try once I’m done. There. It’s public. I’ve committed myself. Hopefully I won’t be committed once this is done. Now I’m going to go off and do some more character designs and fiddle around with Gimp. Wish me luck!

Can’t! Write! Post!

Okay, so I’ve slacked off for a while this evening. The laptop had to charge, dinner made and consumed, and enjoyment gleaned from the internets.

I’ve encountered a rather unusual form of writer’s block. It’s totally bizarre. The trouble isn’t that I can’t write. I can. The issue is that I find myself having a hard time writing blog posts but an easy time writing fiction. How completely strange is that? The only way I’m getting this post out at all is by being honest about the process and the troubles I’m having. I literally can’t come up with anything else to write. How very odd.

I think part of it stems from working through the Gotham Writer’s Workshop: Writing Fiction book. My fiction writing is crap. My complete lack of knowledge of the craft of writing fiction is limiting me. I’ve tried reading through the book and doing the exercises before and hit something of a rut. The book has languished on my bedside table ever since, its yellow cover taunting me. Unfinished, it whispered in my dreams… Unfinished… To be quite honest, I had a falling out with writing. We didn’t really get along for a while. Yes, I put out blog posts regularly and that kept me writing daily. It just wasn’t in me. I think doing Camp NaNoWriMo wore me out. I’m starting to refresh, to get interested in the craft again, delving into learning the basics and practicing more.

As far as not being able to blog, well… Perhaps I’ve just run out of things to write about. I wrote for a while earlier and, upon finishing, deemed it all worthless to post. Massive quantities of suck. I worked on my fiction and was a little relieved when my computer insisted I plug it in. It’s very insistent. If I don’t agree it tends to give up on me and go to its happy place.

So… I suppose I’ve cheated on my blog with the world of fiction. It’s not you, blog, it’s me. I’ve created fictional characters, written a few little short stories, and even (horror!) plotted. I still love you, blog. Nothing’s changed between us. I’m just writing fiction too. Maybe I’ll break this weird barrier I’ve put up and post a little fiction every once in a while. Not tonight. It’s too soon, I agree. Sometime, though.

Let’s not let this get too awkward. Nothing’s changed. I just feel like writing other things. I was going to say writing other people but that just sounds weird and… dirty… A lot of time has passed since I even attempted to write any fiction and it feels awkward and uncomfortable. Off balance. Out of practice. Like trying to relearn a skill you learned in junior high but never used again until now. You didn’t fully learn it then and you never got good at it. Now you’re trying to use what little you remember and it’s all awkward and strange and a little familiar. Keep at it and eventually you’ll get a lot better. That’s what I’m doing.

Camp NaNoWriMo starts on Monday. I’m half thinking about writing up a few character profiles this weekend and maybe a rough plot outline, cut my word count a little to give me some breathing room, and write a little fiction in July. 50k felt a little forced last time. It’s okay for November but hard to do in other months. Plus I’d like to get my fiction chops built up a bit more before I try the November challenge again. Hmm… I’ve got some ideas about what I want to do for July, maybe not a novel. Maybe a script or something, something different and just a little bit fun.

So I might be writing posts that are the same and I might be writing posts that are different. I still love you, blog. You’re the best.

Creative Expansion

It’s fun to come up with new ideas, to invent new things, to be creative in new directions, and experiment with things you’ve never tried. Life is about new things, about learning, about growing. If you sit back and do the same things you’ve always done, how do you know if you can do new things? How do you know the ways you react in new situations, under pressure, in the clinch?

Expand outwards. Try new things. Look at what you do and see what you can experiment with. The world is full of possibilities. You could do what everyone else has done, follow their footsteps perfectly, only ever copy and never create new. It would still be yours but it would be the equivalent of directly copying a painting or a game or anything else. Yours but not yours. Something you did but didn’t actually create. The world is full of copies. Let us see something new and grand and weird and you.

Copying doesn’t feel like creating. If you copy, word-for-word, the entire works of Terry Pratchett or William Shakespeare, it’s not really creating what they created. You can get a feel for how they created and the way the words came out, the pattern of their writing and the feel for how they wrote. That’s not the same as creating. Take that knowledge and use it. Make something great from what you already know. Spread like water to fill the creative space available to you.

I have a creative project in mind that I’m getting ready to start. It meshes well with the arrival of Camp NaNoWriMo for July, 2013. I’m going to work on this project throughout June and hopefully have something to show out of it come August. It’s an endeavor that will take a variety of creative skills and I’m a little scared of going into this with as little information as I have, as little experience. I’m going to learn, though. I’m going to push ahead and make it happen. I’ll tell you more as it comes together.

I’m not perfect. I don’t have perfect writing skills, or artistic talent, or any of that. I just want to create something new, something different, something strange and exotic and bizarre and funny and insightful. If I can do it with all my limited skills and resources, you can do it too. Go! Create and show the world!

Games and Books and Blank Slates

I really just want to read for a while. On Writing seems excellent. I should have read that one first. The workshop is waiting for me to work my way through the writing assignments. The Rum Diary calls out to me with its fantastic story and excellent writing from a simpler, nicer age. I have stacks of books needing to be read but those are the ones on my bedside table, the ones I’ve dedicated myself to reading and reading soon. Having them right next to me makes it easier to get into them. Such easy access.

There’s so much to read and so little time to do so. I can’t really say that. I spent part of the evening playing video games. Part of my little payment to myself for finishing Camp NaNoWriMo ahead of time. I finished two days early and now I’m getting some bandit blasting in. It’s fun, it takes up a little time, and I enjoy it. Why not?

Ah, but the books call to me as well. Plus the blank page, that empty space I know will always await my beck and call. All I have to do is crack the clamshell, type a few keystrokes, and I’ll have an empty slate I can pour an entire universe into and never fully fill. A few keystrokes and it’s clear again, what I’ve put down saved for posterity, the white of the page mocking me. I can write and write and write and never fully run out of stories, of jokes, of poetry, of sadness, of anger, of happiness. There’s always a place for me to deposit my thoughts, my dreams, my laughter, and my tears. Until I can’t write any more, I’ll write. If my fingers are gone, I’ll use my toes or I’ll use my nose. I’ll dictate to a system that will translate speech to text. If I have to, I’ll wiggle out binary with my head. I’ll write until I’m gone.

Fear of Editing

I wonder if there’s a purpose to any of this. I have a tendency to write things for NaNoWriMo and then it… well, it kind of falls by the wayside. Part of it is my lack of any kind of motivation to show it to anyone. I’m a bit fearful of showing my work to anyone, having someone else read it and judge it. I know it has to be done for me to progress as a writer, to learn where I’ve made mistakes and grow from that knowledge. On the other hand, I hate having other people read my work. I’m… anxious about it. Up until I show it to someone else, it only exists to me. It was something I created but it’s personal to me. If I show it to someone else, I’m afraid they’ll point out the flaws. Which is why you show it to other people.

I suppose it’s like anything else that you want to improve upon. You make it and show it to others and they point out the flaws. So you correct and tweak and show it again. Then they point out other flaws but they’re smaller flaws this time. So you correct again. You do this because you want the final product to be seen and to be great when people see it, or read it, or use it, or anything. That’s the hardest thing, letting go of your anxiety to improve what you’ve done to the point that others will love it. It still won’t be perfect but you can do better next time. Find the right person and they can help you improve upon your work.

I’m just trying to pump myself up to find someone to read this and let me know how I did. I need an editor, someone who can be brutally honest about the flaws and what I might be able to do to correct my book when I’m done writing.

Camp NaNoWriMo

Camp NaNoWriMo starts tomorrow and I’m totally unprepared. Typical. I get all excited about doing a novel in a month and I’ve done nothing to get ready for it. No characters, no outline, no layout, no back story, not even a few names or an idea about where it’s starting or where it’s going. Hell, I don’t even have any idea about what I”m going to write about. I just know I want to write a novel in a month again.

I say again because I’ve done NaNoWriMo before and “won” by passing 50,000 words in a month. However, what I wrote was terrible and will never see the light of day. Truly awful. I never prepared for either of those experiences either. Not a lick of preparation. Just started writing and that was it. Anything that came out in regards to the story went down on the keyboard. There was a lot of fiddling about, a lot of completely screwy logic and odd happenstance and useless palaver. I don’t know why I tried to continue on but I did and I finished.

It starts tomorrow. The closest I’ll get to preparing, probably, is reading over this workshop book I got on writing fiction and “No Plot, No Problem” which I picked up a long time ago. I’ll sit down with my laptop over the next few weeks and I’ll read some of the book and I’ll do the exercises and between those times I’ll read about writing. Hopefully I can improve on my novelization skills while I’m writing a novel. I’ll put some wear and tear on this keyboard and see if I can totally pound out 50,000 words again. I’ve done it twice before and didn’t really blink or balk.

the hardest time I had before was figuring out what was going to happen next. I spent a lot of time trying to come up with a path the characters could take. I finally gave in and let the story come out however it was going to. I don’t know that it’s the best way to write a novel or the best way for me to write a novel. I was convinced that I could do it and I did. Now I need to improve on my skills and write something better. Maybe one day you’ll get to see the product of my month-long assault on the keyboard.

I know the math. 1,667 words a day, roughly, for a month. don’t backspace, don’t delete, don’t edit, just write. I’ll keep you abreast of how things are turning out as the month sidles by. Maybe I’ll turn out something great. Maybe I’ll quit after the first day and never try it again. Maybe something else will happen. I plan on starting and that’s as far as I’ve gotten.

Wish me luck! I’m going to need it.

Going to Camp

I’m interested in doing up a book for NaNoWriMo in November. I found out the other day that the folks behind NaNoWriMo also do a kind of practice run for NaNoWriMo called Camp NaNoWriMo. The first one is in April. I might very well take it upon myself to write a little something fiction-wise in April. I’m in the habit of writing daily. I think I can do it. Time to start practicing my fiction writing, get some fiction out of my head and onto the page. To effectively write fiction, I have to read fiction. Yet another point for reading.

What am I going to wrtie about in April? I have no idea. That’s the fun part about writing. You start out knowing nothing about what you’re going to write about but you write anyways. You write and the story assembles itself from your mind, your knowledge, your interests, yourself. You build up the story as you go along and let it write itself. You just have to start.

I’ve written for NaNoWriMo quite a few times. I’ve actually cleared 50,000 words in November twice before. I believe that was in 2009 and 2011. No, I’m not going to show you what I wrote. It’s horrid. Terrible. If I did some extensive editing I might be able to turn it into a short story. There were quite a few problems with my writing at that point. I had no idea what the story was going to be about, what perspective it would be told from, who the characters were, where they were going, what the eventual end of the story was going to be. I didn’t even know what kind of story I was going to write. There’s two sets of over 50,000 words on my computer that completely and utterly suck.

Writing those two crappy collections of 50,000 words was quite a lot of fun. The story rambled and wandered all over the place. The characters did all sorts of weird and strange things and became somewhat real to me. The story wasn’t anything anyone will probably ever see but I had a lot of fun writing it.

I don’t know if I’ll ever finish the April story. I don’t even know if I’ll start. I may have such a busy month that I won’t be able to get the kind of writing in that I want to. I have no idea what the story will be about, where it will go, where it will end. If I do decide to write I think I’ll try getting a basic outline and some characters together a few days before April starts. Other than that, I’ll be winging it. I’ll let you know how it goes when April gets closer.