I’ve often found myself in the company of comic creators, both Pro and Amateur, as they discuss their story ideas in a summarised form and it’s almost always followed by them saying “You know, it sounded a lot better in my head.”

Often I’ve seen people give up on a premise because when they explain it to others it just sounds terribly mediocre and unoriginal. Lately I find that if I’m present to when that statement is made, I will encourage the person to not give up and pursue the idea.

Maybe the premise is unoriginal but that’s just the tip of the iceberg and like many icebergs out there, what lays in the depths is inevitably something very different and often unique.

Take 10 of your favourite movies from a certain genre, summarise them all using a single sentence and I guarantee that all of them will have the same summary as one or more of the other titles in your list.

Originality is in the details. What sets your story apart from the rest is your vision. Your characterisation and pacing will play the biggest role in your piece. You have to give your idea a shot, because ultimately, you’ll discover what works and what doesn’t from this. Learn from it and your next piece will improve substantially.

The stories that have been told will always need a fresh way of being retold. People often scoff at Hollywood for making remakes of old movies, stating how they’ve run out of original stories to tell. But a retelling of events in a modern way is often welcomed by the young. To them, everything is new. Everything is original.

There is such a thing as being a little too original, merely for the sake of being different. A good story will allow its audience to empathise with it. Usually this is done using conflicts the characters face that are familiar to the readers. The best way to learn how to connect with your audience is to listen to critique, learn from your peers, take advice. But don’t lose faith in your own vision before you’ve even had a chance to flex it a little. Let it grow and mature.

Don’t let a cynical world dictate what you should or shouldn’t write. Saying that, try not to be crap at it either ;)

I’ve come to the realisation, doesn’t matter how small your character is, give it some dimension or you’re just sabotaging your own scene!

Something I said on Twitter the other day, figured I’d like to talk about it in more detail. I’m reminded of the quote from Horton Hear’s a Who by Dr. Seuss “a person’s a person, no matter how small”. Great story, even got the original book :)

In this instance, I’m referring to ‘side characters’. You know, the ones that you use to get your story moving from Point (A) to (B). Those characters need character.

If they are totally vapid, it knocks the mood you’ve created in the story so far right on the head, causing it to have a concussion. You are creating a ripple effect in your work. It carries over from one scene to the next and chances are, you’ll make the same mistake again.

These are not your ‘extras’ in your story. I’m not talking about the man standing in the background fiddling with his tie. We’re talking about your ‘Smuggler No. 1′ who has a line to say that gets the scene moving. Or your ‘Plane Inspector’ who only shows up for a very small scene and then is never heard from again.

Their dialogue is just as important as your leading Protagonist / Antagonist. They must have mannerisms, a way about them that makes them that little bit more interesting.

“What? All this over a single line?” you say. Not quite. That one line may be the result of you being lazy and wanting to rush the scene along. You have to be honest with yourself on that one. It could be a perfectly fine line. You probably don’t need to change a thing. It’s really up to you.

I myself have fallen victim to this many times, but gone back often to expand on these characters. By adding a little more depth to my ‘Smuggler No. 1′ most recently, the scenes got a little longer but those ripples appear to have subsided and the story, at least for me, is flowing nicely again.

I’ll leave you with this rather classic moment from “Wayne’s World 2″ that kind of reiterates my point :D

Spent this morning updating WordPress on a bunch of sites, making sure I don’t break anything. All seems fine and blogs are functioning as normal. I’ve been working towards launching a new version of the site since January when I’d realised that I’m using far too many plugin’s and tweaks to run my last template. Updating WordPress back then kept breaking features I’d coded.

This version is very streamlined, built on top of the rather spiffy PocketT theme. Most of my tweaks are ‘behind the scenes’ coding to accommodate the way I wanted to display my blog posts and image updates. Mostly PHP/CSS bits and bobs. I’m happy to say that this site appears to be a much more solid build, thanks to a good foundation. On a related side note, many thanks to Faye and Joanna for their help with the logo :) The avatar was part of my Birthday present from Faye haha but had to go on hold till she finished her Merchant of Venice commission (that should be out sometime in the next few months, by the way).

I had to put off posting on the old site as I knew I’d have to edit every single old post to work with the new theme. Primarily, I needed to resize images and thumbs.

On a more creative note, still writing, still pushing ahead. Lots of bumps in the road, but there’s always bumps in long-term projects. You just have to keep going till you get it done. That’s what separates you from the crowd. However, I always find that the longer something takes, the more time you have to look over it and reflect. I’ve often gone back to stories to rewrite scenes, cut scenes out, sometimes even went as far as cutting characters out and starting again.

Unfinished work invites tampering, while polished, mature work seals its integrity.

# Robert McKee

You’ll see me quote this man often. A brilliant lecturer who has a far more poetic way of saying the things that I want to say. Hopefully, I’ll have a more revealing update in a month’s time.