The natural instinct for most (myself included) is to throw the ideas into paper (virtually or otherwise) before they have a chance to dart past the cochlea and escape into the ether. While I support this practice, it's not always easy to build a story off of a jumble of words and half-baked phrases including things like "motorcycle guy leaves gang, building explodes, army of evil puppies."
...although not everyone finds it hard to build a story off of something like that.
Idea dumping is best when you're first putting thought to paper and trying in earnest to produce something out of the open cage of your imagination. It's not so great when you're actually sitting at the crest of Chapter One and trying to figure out where to go from here.
That may be an overstatement. It's more accurate to say that you'll notice it about a half-page before the climax, when you're trying to remember what exactly is exploding, why, and how the guy with the motorcycle fits into all this in the first place.
That is not the point where you want to look back and realize that you have nothing.
Thus, storyboarding. Some writers honestly have trouble writing anything at all without it, the rest of us just have trouble writing anything printable without it, and of course there are those who don't need any planning at all to pen something stellar from the word "go."
...Jerks.
For the rest of us here on the mortal plane, storyboarding (or outlining) is the necessary scaffold that allows us to build up to the awesomeness that is "explosion, motorcycle guy," etc. You can see in an instant where the gaps are, how things flow together, and even opportunities on what other pieces to add in, tie in, or rearrange to get a great story without having written a single clause.
The process may seem automatic or even childish, but I recommend giving it a shot any time you get stuck on a new work (or before you start a work you really care about) to save yourself hours and days of post-production madness.
Here's the basic gist: buy a set of index cards, or find a virtual equivalent of the same. On each, jot down one and only one scene or scene part, a plot point, or a "junction" in the story. Stick to simple sentences as much as possible, and make them singular events. Examples include:
- Hero meets Motorcycle guy
- Villain kidnaps Hero's puppy
- Love Interest escapes trap
- Hero finds clue to Villain's secret plan
Note the lack of specifics. If you have names, I recommend leaving them out for now: put them on a separate card with the character's role (i.e. "hero," "friend," "motorcycle guy") on one side and the name you tentatively picked on the other. Then, if you change your mind on names, you don't have to redo your notes.
First, build cards based on your idea dump in any order. For my example above:
- "motorcycle guy leaves gang, building explodes, army of evil puppies."
- Motorcycle Guy Leaves Gang
- Building Explodes
- Army of Evil Puppies
The order doesn't have to match the order they'll appear in the book, just get them each down on a separate card.
Next, you'll need a nice, flat, clear surface, like a coffee table (which you'll probably need to clear), a white board (especially if you have magnets), a desk (after copious cleaning, no doubt), or even a floor (assuming you're not in a high-traffic area). Any place will do, but give yourself about ten square feet if you can manage it, plus another couple of feet for you to be able to stand back and review what you've done.
Lastly, get a camera (or a cell phone with high resolution), and write in pen or sharpie. You'll have more index cards in a pack than you're likely to need, so if you mess up, start with a new card. You'll want to record your work when you're done, and gluing things to the hardwood is probably not the best way to please your roommates/spouse/parents.
Next we need to fill in some basic gaps. You'll want to make sure you have the skeleton of a story, and it may look a little different depending on the type of story. Grab a card each and just write the basic structure you're aiming for:
- Exposition - Introducing the world, the characters, the "setup" for the whole thing
- New Direction - The first driving force that takes the main character(s) out of his or her routine and throws him or her into the throes of the plot
- Major Conflict - The point of contention, the quest, the drive, the point: what the heck are our heroes going after / caught up in?
- Turning Point - Where things either go from bad to good, or good to bad for our hero. Sometimes both, in rapid succession
- Climax - The peak, and the lead up to it. The final battle, the chase to stop a madman, the confession that keeps them together, you get the idea. (This is very likely part of the idea dump you've already done. Our minds love scenes like this, and they stick with us for years, even when we're the ones writing them)
- Resolution - How it all works out in the end. The epilogue.
And then some "components" that we're going to use to fill in the holes:
- New Character (make about 5 of these to start, though you'll likely need more)
- Big Change (write at least 2 or 3 of these)
- Clue (2 for your average story, 5 or more for mysteries and crime dramas)
- Tension Point (or "Awkward Moment," for romantic comedies - 2 to 3 at least)
- Character Fact (something not immediately obvious about a character, but important to the story)
- World Fact (mostly for fantasy/sci-fi, or obscure locales/sub-cultures - 5 to 7 of these)
Now we've taken a serious dent out of that stack of index cards and we have a handful of pieces to play with. First, set down the core pieces (the second set of cards we made) to line up the general structure of the work, as least as you know it thusfar. Don't worry if it's a little sketchy right now: that's the whole reason for storyboarding in the first place.
Next, add the set of plot points you already devised (the first set of cards we made), and line them up with the major pieces of the story. You can either keep the structure off to one side and list the plot points beside each structural element, or actually stack the specific plot points on top of them as appropriate. Dealer's choice.
Then, fill in the gaps. Look at the uncovered or empty pieces of your structure, and add new cards to fill the voids. If you don't have all the pieces yet, that's perfectly fine: you know what you need to work on next. Fill as many as you can before proceeding to the next step, you can always repeat this process later.
The last piece is organizing your components. First, find the plot cards you made yourself (the first set) and tuck a component card under each wherever you can. If a plot point doesn't fit either a component or a major structural element, set it aside for now. If you wind up with a large "slush" pile, see if there's an emerging trend: your component list may be missing a key piece.
Make sure everything has a place, and then make note of the gaps you've got left: those will be your focus to work on. Start small, like "Hero discovers Villain's secret plan" under your Turning Point area, and then grab a couple of Clue cards to help the hero piece it together. Once you have the Clues, put them anywhere in the story you like so that the discovery flows naturally out of what you've already created.
Once your first few structural cards are covered and you feel you have enough components to get started, it's time to deal with the slush pile: all the pieces that don't fit. These, sadly, are a natural part of the process. Our imagination has an affinity for "cool things" that don't necessarily work at all in our story. That said, the pieces of a "cool thing" can often be applied to other useful or appropriate scenes.
For each element in your slush pile, search for a component card that matches. If you find a match, look for the other components of that time in your storyboard. If you already have a half-dozen clues, for instance, you may be close to overdoing it. If you only have one or two clues, you may have just solved your own problem.
More often, though, you won't find an exact match. Look for the closest fit, and understand that you may have to shave a little off the "cool thing" to line up the edges, so to speak. If you have a scene that you're dying to bring in but can't find room for, consider pairing it with a Character Fact or World Fact. Now a humorous or exciting scene has a good place in the story, and you're not just wasting ink.
Some of these cards just won't fit, and it's best not to force them. Keep them anyway. As you go back to your storyboard later (even after the work is finished), you're going to move things around, remove things, add things in, etc. By then, these spare pieces may suddenly open the door for the new gaps that get created later on.
If possible, take a picture of your cards as they're laid out so that you at least have an idea for the structure. If you can't make out the details on every card, that's okay, so long as the major structural cards can be read.
Lastly: mark your cards. In one corner (or on the back), name the component type it ties to. In another corner, mark which structural element it's bundled with. Any other trends (or "tags") you want to include that might help you rebuild this storyboard later, do so.
Ask anyone who every coded on punchcards and you'll understand why.
Once all this is done, you'll have a dynamic, visual realization of your story in neat, movable chunks. Like Whitney's famous industrial redesign, the interchangeable parts of your story will make it easier to see what you lack and to rearrange items later when you need to make edits on the fly.
Now the really cool part:
As you're writing, keep your story cards nearby. When you get done with a chapter or a large section of your work, take a break and jot down the page numbers of a given plot piece on a corner (in pencil, I recommend). In other words, if chapter three deals with the main characters all meeting, grab the cards for "motorcycle guy meets hero" and "love interest intervenes, forces a truce" and note the corresponding page numbers on each.
Now, months later when it's time to edit, you'll know how to zero in on a given piece. If you decide to move, remove or change a given element, you can zip right to it in your manuscript.
[Naturally, programs like Microsoft Word and Google Docs allow for comments, labels and bookmarking that probably make this unnecessary, but if you either aren't familiar with those tools or simply prefer the low-tech method, I personally find it easier than pausing to set the anchors as I go.]
The last great thing about a story is seeing what it looks like laid out: is it one single line straight through to the end? Is it an endless sprawling web of frayed edges that never find their way home to the main plot? Does it match what you wanted in your mind for it to be?
If not, grab some more cards: it's time to get to work.
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