C.J. Moseley's Blog, page 40
April 14, 2017
cinemagorgeous:Colonizing Mars by artist Sam Chivers.
Looks…
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Looks… appeared first on CJMoseley.co.uk.
April 13, 2017
h-yp3r:
sosuperawesome: Solar System by Jian Guo on inprnt
See…
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sosuperawesome: Solar System by Jian Guo on inprnt
See… appeared first on CJMoseley.co.uk.
April 12, 2017
just–space: The Elephants Trunk in IC 1396 : Like an…
just–space: The Elephants Trunk in IC 1396 : Like an illustration in a galactic Just So […]
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April 10, 2017
run2damoon:Alien spaceship – Anastasia FilevaAn amazing…
Alien spaceship -
An amazing image
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run2damoon:Alien spaceship –
Anastasia Fileva
An amazing…
Alien spaceship -
An amazing image
The post run2damoon:Alien spaceship –
Anastasia Fileva
An amazing… appeared first on CJMoseley.co.uk.
April 9, 2017
megarah-moon:
Animal friendships are both weird and amazing at…
Animal friendships are both weird and amazing at the same time. We all know that opposites attract, and when it comes to interspecies friendships, we must admit, it’s pretty awesome. Even more so when animals which normally interact as prey and predator, become best buds
Normally, you would think that a cat and an owl would have a pretty clear relationship: they either do not interact, or once in while, the cat tries to catch the owl and have it for dinner. Weeeeell… think again, cause here’s Fum the cat and his unusual best friend, Gebra, the barn owl, proving us wrong.
Gebra’s owner is astonished of the relationship between the two. Everytime Gebra flies in or takes off, Fum is right there waiting and greeting the owl with a jump worthy of Cirque Du Soleil. And it’s clearly obvious that the boss in this relationship is the owl… whenever Fum gets overly excited, Gebra gives him a peck on the head just to remind him to keep calm.
Watch the video here
They clearly bonded over their love of mice.
April 8, 2017
April 7, 2017
Science in Science-Fiction: Dude, Where’s My Flying Car?
Ways to un-stick a stuck story
Do an
outline, whatever way works best.
Get yourself out of the word soup and know where the story is headed.
Conflicts
and obstacles. Hurt the protagonist, put things in their way, this keeps
the story interesting. An easy journey makes the story boring and boring is
hard to write.
Change
the POV. Sometimes all it takes to untangle a knotted story is to look at
it through different eyes, be it through the sidekick, the antagonist, a minor
character, whatever.
Know the
characters. You can’t write a story if the characters are strangers to you.
Know their likes, dislikes, fears, and most importantly, their motivation. This makes the path clearer.
Fill in
holes. Writing doesn’t have to be linear; you can always go back and fill in plotholes,
and add content and context.
Have
flashbacks, hallucinations, dream sequences or foreshadowing events. These
stir the story up, deviations from the expected course add a feeling of urgency
and uncertainty to the narrative.
Introduce
a new mystery. If there’s something that just doesn’t add up, a big question mark, the story becomes more
compelling. Beware: this can also cause you to sink further into the mire.
Take
something from your protagonist. A weapon, asset, ally or loved one. Force
him to operate without it, it can reinvigorate a stale story.
Twists
and betrayal. Maybe someone isn’t who they say they are or the protagonist
is betrayed by someone he thought he could trust. This can shake the story up
and get it rolling again.
Secrets. If
someone has a deep, dark secret that they’re forced to lie about, it’s a good
way to stir up some fresh conflict. New lies to cover up the old ones, the
secret being revealed, and all the resulting chaos.
Kill
someone. Make a character death that is productive to the plot, but not “just because”. If done well, it affects
all the characters, stirs up the story and gets it moving.
Ill-advised
character actions. Tension is created when a character we love does
something we hate. Identify the thing the readers don’t want to happen, then
engineer it so it happens worse than they imagined.
Create cliff-hangers.
Keep the readers’ attention by putting the characters into new problems and
make them wait for you to write your way out of it. This challenge can really
bring out your creativity.
Raise the
stakes. Make the consequences of failure worse, make the journey harder.
Suddenly the protagonist’s goal is more than he expected, or he has to make an
important choice.
Make the
hero active. You can’t always wait for external influences on the
characters, sometimes you have to make the hero take actions himself. Not
necessarily to be successful, but active
and complicit in the narrative.
Different
threat levels. Make the conflicts on a physical level (“I’m about to be
killed by a demon”), an emotional level (“But that demon was my true love”) and
a philosophical level (“If I’m forced to kill my true love before they kill me,
how can love ever succeed in the face of evil?”).
Figure
out an ending. If you know where the story is going to end, it helps get
the ball rolling towards that end, even if it’s not the same ending that you
actually end up writing.
What if?
What if the hero kills the antagonist now, gets captured, or goes insane? When
you write down different questions like these, the answer to how to continue the
story will present itself.
Start
fresh or skip ahead. Delete the last five thousand words and try again. It’s
terrifying at first, but frees you up for a fresh start to find a proper path. Or
you can skip the part that’s putting you on edge – forget about that fidgety
crap, you can do it later – and write the next scene. Whatever was in-between
will come with time.
These are largely summed up by Chandler’s “have a guy burst in with a gun” . Plan your story, plan the conflict, knock those heroes down.
April 6, 2017
rhubarbes:ArtStation – Grux, by Zak ForemanCoo, that looks…
ArtStation - Grux, by Zak Foreman
Coo, that looks real and mean.
