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Dramatica Tip
of the Month
March 2008
More
On Creating Scenes
There
is no single "right" way to build scenes. The Dramatica theory
book and Armando's book, Dramatica for Screenwriters, as
well as the structure templates shipped with Dramatica, each give
you different approaches to accomplish the same task, namely storyweaving
your encoded story points into a finished work.
There
are MANY ways to approach this process. What you include and
how you organize your scenes depends on your personal taste and
the constraints of the form of writing you are doing (e.g. screenplay,
novel, stage play, etc.). Screenplays have limited space to
cover a lot of material, whereas novels have relatively more space
to explore the storyform at leisure.
If
you are an organic writer, then write and rework it after the fact. If
you are a structural writer, then I suggest you lay out your story
in plot order FIRST, then figure out how you want to rearrange things
through storyweaving for the finished work (e.g. reveal early plot
points at the end of the work such as "Whodunit?").
In
any case, here are a few tips:
-
There are
four acts. Make sure all static story points
(e.g. Story Goal, MC Problem, OS Issue, etc.) appear at least
ONCE in each act.
-
Make sure each character appears at least once per act.
-
Make sure
there are elements of Character, Plot, Theme, and Genre at least
once per act (it's hard NOT to do this but it bears mentioning).
Everything else is personal preference--YOUR personal preference.
I
have found that Armando's New Instant Dramatica is a good start
for putting together your plot, but that's all it is--a good start. Whatever
methodology you use you will customize it to fit each story differently.
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