Ivonia
I know, some people use them, others don't.
However, I find that they're quite useful, especially when you're stuck on a scene, and you can sort of force yourself to see what happens.
For me, I tend to see "the Big Picture", imagining scenes and events here and there, and then trying to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together (I heard someone say that's a right brain person, any clues to that? I am left handed if that means anything). For one of my stories that I really wanted to write, I got the beginning and the end early on, and parts of the middle later, but I never had a cohesiveness for the middle, so that Point A led to Point B consistently (and more importantly, that it made sense. If a guy in my story is an experienced fighter, I want to show how he learned to fight so well, not just suddenly have him bust out two guns and take everyone out and then walk away like nothing happened).
Anyway, I was really stuck on a scene, so I decided instead of just not writing (again), I would outline the story. I ended up with about 11 pages of outlines just from the ideas I had already, combined with some new ideas in an attempt to make the story feel more natural. I figured out a solution to my problem using this method
And the other benefit to the outline is that I can add or take things away as needed, and if I'm ever truly stuck again, or need a more fleshed out subplot, I can check with my outline again and make changes as needed. Granted, it does take a while to make one, but wow, those "road maps" are nice (it took me about a couple of hours to write that 11 pgs, but I was really motivated once I got past that "trouble point").
So, do you guys use outlines? Why or why not?
However, I find that they're quite useful, especially when you're stuck on a scene, and you can sort of force yourself to see what happens.
For me, I tend to see "the Big Picture", imagining scenes and events here and there, and then trying to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together (I heard someone say that's a right brain person, any clues to that? I am left handed if that means anything). For one of my stories that I really wanted to write, I got the beginning and the end early on, and parts of the middle later, but I never had a cohesiveness for the middle, so that Point A led to Point B consistently (and more importantly, that it made sense. If a guy in my story is an experienced fighter, I want to show how he learned to fight so well, not just suddenly have him bust out two guns and take everyone out and then walk away like nothing happened).
Anyway, I was really stuck on a scene, so I decided instead of just not writing (again), I would outline the story. I ended up with about 11 pages of outlines just from the ideas I had already, combined with some new ideas in an attempt to make the story feel more natural. I figured out a solution to my problem using this method
And the other benefit to the outline is that I can add or take things away as needed, and if I'm ever truly stuck again, or need a more fleshed out subplot, I can check with my outline again and make changes as needed. Granted, it does take a while to make one, but wow, those "road maps" are nice (it took me about a couple of hours to write that 11 pgs, but I was really motivated once I got past that "trouble point").
So, do you guys use outlines? Why or why not?