Yuffie's Writing How-To's

How to WRITE STORY NOTES

Unless you're some supergenius who can remember every detail of everything, you probably make a lot of notes with ideas for characters, plot, setting, etc. Especially when you're stuck and can't think of what to write next, writing notes can be extremely helpful in getting those creative juices flowing. Most of the time, I just write random thoughts that pop into my head messily on a photoshop file (but if you lack photoshop, a piece of paper and a pen is just fine, too!), draw arrows, doodle some pictures, write it in rainbow colors, make stars, throw in some photographs for character appearance references, and so on.

On the sidebar is an example of one of my notesheets for SuperHero. Click the External Link for a bigger view. As you can see, it's really one big mess that probably only I can figure out, but that non-organized format is just what I need to get my ideas going. It really helps to get your ideas on something you can LOOK at. It'll help you see things from different angles and organize your thoughts (in a messy way that only you can read).

Let me explain my note sheet a little. Someone gave me the idea of giving Hero an arch-nemesis, so I wrote that down at the top. Then I wrote "male" and "female" and a few other possible personality traits, names, hairstyle, etc. After laying all those out, I used a "pick-and-choose" system and drew a yellow star next to the traits I thought might work well together or gave me the feeling of "that arch nemesis" that was struggling to come out of my head and onto paper. Don't you ever get that feeling of a character, but you're not sure how to put it into words? This is how I do it, and it seems to work very nicely. 

If you're writing a scene in an action story where your characters are infiltrating an enemy base or something, drawing out the entire compound/building/place and actually marking your characters' path helps a LOT. I did this during war battles for The Guardian Legend and the climax scenes of Stray.

In Stray, Annie is locked in one building, and Darren and Flynn and coming in from the outside to get her out. Both sides run around the entire compound separately, and that would've been hell to keep track of in my head. Drawing it out and mapping out exactly where they go (even before I knew where they went; I just drew swirly lines from one building to another, made X's, and scribbled on my notesheet) made writing those chapters much cleaner and smoother and less plot-holey.

Mapping things out before you yourself know what's going to happen will help you figure out what happens next! I drew in buildings and found a dead-end from a fence, so that's where I led my characters. Try it out! 

And remember, be as messy as you can! The messier, the less concrete the ideas will be, and more different ideas will fill your brain to try and replace those initial ideas until you have some mega-awesome ideas. Don't be afraid to write down the most innane, ridiculous, and preposterous ideas that pop in your head. Even if you know that won't work, write it down anyway! It might just lead you to an even better solution.

Does this method work for you? If not, what kind of notesheets work for you? Post below in the comments!