TECH: Where do you get your ideas? (2)
Dec. 12th, 2010 09:02 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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writercisesOriginal Posting 25 Oct 2010
And while I'm thinking about it... I've got another scrap where I wrote this down.
LWE "The problem isn't a shortage of ideas; it's choosing which ones to use."
Ring changes -- Take a basic idea, and stretch. + standard plot Expand, select, plan, do
LWE? Dr. Google? Aha! Lawrence Watt-Evans. And the article is right over here.
http://www.watt-evans.com/wheredoyougetyourideas.html
Right up top, he says, "I get them [ideas] from the world around me -- from everything I see and hear and read. Just look at anything and ask yourself questions about it. The problem isn't a shortage of ideas; it's choosing which ones to use."
Ideas are cheap? Well, LWE talks about Orson Scott Card's "1,000 ideas in an hour" talk. Take an idea, such as "magic has a cost" and start cross-referencing possibilities. What kind of costs could it have? Now consider variations within that, from minor to catastrophic. Keep ringing changes. This is where combinatorial explosion is your friend -- thousands and thousands of ideas.
"Ideas are cheap. The hard part is turning them into stories -- and at a certain level, even that gets easy, really; it's just a matter of finding time to sit down and do it, and do it well."
Watch for the ones that seem really interesting, though. And for the variations that you want to do. Dig into the background.
"Once you've got a premise, you just fit in a standard plot -- there really are only a few, but you can vary the details infinitely -- and you have a story."
Take an idea. Grind changes. Add a plot. And then write it.
Go for it.
And while I'm thinking about it... I've got another scrap where I wrote this down.
LWE "The problem isn't a shortage of ideas; it's choosing which ones to use."
Ring changes -- Take a basic idea, and stretch. + standard plot Expand, select, plan, do
LWE? Dr. Google? Aha! Lawrence Watt-Evans. And the article is right over here.
http://www.watt-evans.com/wheredoyougetyourideas.html
Right up top, he says, "I get them [ideas] from the world around me -- from everything I see and hear and read. Just look at anything and ask yourself questions about it. The problem isn't a shortage of ideas; it's choosing which ones to use."
Ideas are cheap? Well, LWE talks about Orson Scott Card's "1,000 ideas in an hour" talk. Take an idea, such as "magic has a cost" and start cross-referencing possibilities. What kind of costs could it have? Now consider variations within that, from minor to catastrophic. Keep ringing changes. This is where combinatorial explosion is your friend -- thousands and thousands of ideas.
"Ideas are cheap. The hard part is turning them into stories -- and at a certain level, even that gets easy, really; it's just a matter of finding time to sit down and do it, and do it well."
Watch for the ones that seem really interesting, though. And for the variations that you want to do. Dig into the background.
"Once you've got a premise, you just fit in a standard plot -- there really are only a few, but you can vary the details infinitely -- and you have a story."
Take an idea. Grind changes. Add a plot. And then write it.
Go for it.
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