Progress ver 1.1

A little update. Got my sysnopsis and treatment done a few weeks ago. I then decided to take a look at an old short story. What started as an attempt to revise it turned into a painless page-one-rewrite. And I like it. Got some minor tweaks to make, then I'll send it off to Asimov's, eventually working my way down the list of magazines that accepts short sci-fi.

Then it's vacation. Sort of.
I never seem to take all my vacation days, which is a bit of a headache for my employers. So as of tomorrow, I have a week and a half off from my "day job" and I'll be using that to get to work on my next feature length script. It's something I outlined in the summer, so the first couple of days will be dedicated to reviewing the outline, refining it, and taking a stab at a treatment. The goal is to have a comleted draft by the end of January, but I'm hoping to be done much sooner than that.

I'd cross my fingers, but that just makes typing a real pain.

Treatments - A Necessary Evil

Now, the title sorta screams, “Duh!” We all know that they’re needed for marketing a story, selling it, etc. Here’s the thing that I’ve known for some time, but have failed to put into practice. They’re necessary as a writing tool. As proud as I am of the latest draft of my sci-fi spec, I’m finding little areas that need improvement as I work on this piece of crap treatment. Little things that fell through the cracks, things that didn’t even occur to me in the heat of blasting out my action and dialogue. Little bits of missing story logic coming up in the treatment and it’s giving me the opportunity to make a quick note or two in a separate file I’ve marked down as a “to do” list before I submit the script. I’ve always known that I should try to work on a treatment before, or while writing the screenplay, but now it’s something I can appreciate. The scary thing is, I think I need to try writing more than one at different stages.

Before sitting down to write my next screenplay, I want to take a stab at a treatment. Just a quick compilation of my notes and outline in prose form. Then I want to update it as I write the script. The hope here is to be able to look at the original version, and the updated one, for a quick painless tweak and presto: marketing tool.

But after today’s brief stab at the treatment before going to work at my day job, I know it’s not going to be that simple. The reason a treatment is an invaluable revision tool AFTER I’ve written the screenplay is because I’m not “in it” as I read and write. I’ve got some distance from the script which gives me a different perspective. Now, another contributing factor could also be that I have gotten some distance from the script since I haven’t worked on it in about a month, but something about the process of writing a treatment, I suspect, forces a different perspective. And I think that’s because it’s a different way of writing.

I’m not at all suggesting that this is how the pros do it.  How the hell do I know?  Besides, everyone will tell you they have their own process.  This is just an idea, a theory I thought I’d share.  And let’s dispense with the industry jargon to further that different perspective:  If you’re plugging away at your script or novel or whatever, and you want to know how the bigger picture is shaping out, try summarizing it in prose or outline as you go along and include what you’ve already written.  You may be surprised at what’s there.  Good or bad, you’ll definitely be ahead of the game for your first (or next) revision.

Does it Always Suck?

Recently, Mary over at Ruts and Grooves had something to say about not being afraid to write crap. Now, I’m paraphrasing here, going on memory as I’m in my “writing” coffee shop without internet access. The thing is, even before I read that post of hers, I was already telling myself that first drafts suck. I really did, and have done so for some time.  Of course, I would always forget, and still do. I let myself have hope that the next project will be AWESOME in the first draft, thus I won’t lose any sleep during the revisions. Of course, that’s never the case. But here’s the scary thing… I might just really suck. Seriously.

I’ve been fretting over this 5 page treatment so I can upload a script to Greenwriter.org and be better prepared with material for when I (finally) start marketing myself, and (finally) send out some queries. But man, it ain’t easy. Not five minutes ago I was reading my treatment and found some common writing mistakes. Mistakes that I always make. What the hell? Have I not learned anything? Well, I know I have. In fact, I’ve learned a lot. I guess moments like this remind me that I have a ways to go. I also wonder if every writer makes the same mistakes over and over. I wonder if that’s me making excuses for myself. I wonder if I’m just in a rut, panicking, and using the panic and my stupendous gift of procrastination to write up a blog entry.

But worst of all, I wonder if I’m kidding myself with this whole writing thing.

So here’s what this little bit of therapeutic blogging has taught me today.

1. I keep coming back to the fact that I love to write. So, when I consider that, and the fact that I’ve invested too much time and energy to give up, I know I just gotta shut the hell up and chill.

2. Recognizing those mistakes for what they are on the first read through is progress in itself. So I should just shut the hell up and chill.

3. Wondering out loud in a coffee shop in the middle of the night incites strange looks from late night truckers. So I should just…..(say it with me now)

Un-Fun 1.2 – Making it Fun

The outline is done. Now comes the hard part… the other hard part. Making it -- forcing it -- into prose. Exciting prose. Not flowery, not literary. It’s just gotta get the story across while revealing character, but it definitely needs a voice. And I’d like the voice to be representative of the tone, and of me.

Last night, after I finished my outline, I decided to skim over an unfinished novel from a few years ago. It made me cringe in some spots; the immaturity of some ideas and the writing, and made me smile in other spots. There were plot points, characters, and setups in that prologue and first two chapters that I completely forgot about.

It was never my plan to re-read some of my own prose before sitting down to hammer out these treatments and synopsis, but I’m glad I did. Writing a treatment isn’t the same as writing a novel, but they share some obvious things in common and reading that stuff last night actually has me looking forward to what I used to think of as a daunting and painful task.

Un-Fun

I’m still here.
Currently in a bit of a rut. You see, I stress over the “un-fun” things. Writing a synopsis and treatment falls under that heading. I had hoped to get it all done in a couple of days, but here I am, two weeks later. In a bit of a rut.

I’ll be done by the end of the week.

Here are some links I found on the “un-fun.”