Bisky's Twitterling's Scribbles! discussion

What works better for you?

Writing a little everyday, or having a short amount of time to just let the words flow (like NaNoWriMo) ?

A steady discipline everyday works well but sometimes I just write and keep going until I have finnished.

A bit of both, for me. Usually I try and do a bit each day, but then there have been times when I've just been hit by lightning (ideas wise) and have sat and written between 10k and 20k words in one stint.

I love writing chunks, I had one on monday. It's slowed this week, but I've just put it all into scrivener and I see where I've been going wrong ^^

It really depends what I'm doing. A deadline does tend to get the best results out of me for short stories, but for longer work and translation I try and do a modest chunk a day.

I try to sit down and write at the same times every day, but I write only what comes out. It may be a little ,or I may write a few thousand words, I just write until it stops.

Writing every day tends to drain my motivation, because I usually just sit there staring at the page with a dead brain for a good half hour, not sure where to start.

Lately I've only been able to get any decent amount of writing down on the page if I take a few days away from my works. Then, when I go back, I can to throw out a few hundred or a couple thousand words. Sometimes more, if I'm on a roll! c:

I'm usually at work coming up with ideas for how to handle the next scene that I am going to write. When I get home it sometimes flows out right away and other times it drags because I already know the story down to the smallest detail. Working with a deadline sometimes helps me, but if I get too close to the deadline the ending may get rushed.

It's interesting how draining blank pages are. I'm finding I have to switch between Scrivener and Word to stop it this time.

Bits 3-5 days a week.

Bisky wrote: "I love writing chunks, I had one on monday. It's slowed this week, but I've just put it all into scrivener and I see where I've been going wrong ^^"

Bisky, what is this "scrivener" you are referring to?

It's a writing software, you can move paragraphs and chapters about really easily. Look it up on youtube its really helped me be efficent :3

I've done a search on the net and it sells for only 40$... not a bad price but I couldn't find anywhere in what format it saves the files.

You can compile the documents in anything g.g its really easy to put it in word or pdf. It saves in its own project file while your working on it.

It even has a format for ebook :)

wow... ok... another thing I'll have to think about then. :)

I love Scrivener and use it to generate both my paperbacks and my ebooks. I am getting better and better at the more advanced features, cutting down on any reformatting work that needs to be done once the manuscript is exported, and learning how to best adapt my workflow.

One caveat, and that is that the Windows version isn't nearly as good as the Mac version. I got a MacBook Air pretty much just for that reason, and it's been a great investment.

If you do Nanowrimo, you can get 50% off.

Scrivener lets me outline and use corkboard right there inside the program, lets me sync to an external folder so that I can also do edits on my iPad/iPhone, allows me to do just about all of my planning right inside of Scrivener. I can set word targets per scene or per book, and it will automatically calculate where I should be.

I am currently rewriting an old manuscript, and I have the old manuscript side-by-side with the new one.

One thing that isn't great on Scrivener is if you are working with an editor who doesn't use Scrivener (and most don't), in which case you have to export to Word (easy) and then either accept changes and re-import to Scrivener, or enter changes into Scrivener one at a time.

Pam

Do you know how to "import and split" in Scrivener? Just indicate what text you are using to separate the scenes, and it will import it into scenes. Then you'll just have to search for "chapter" to add your chapter folders back.

Watch it in action:

http://vimeo.com/31433040

You can define whatever text as you like as the scene splitter. If you just have a Word document with two hard returns separating each scene, do a quick search and replace to replace the two hard returns with a # or whatever, then "import and split" it into Scrivener, and you're good to go.