Rather than show you how I went about this with my actual tools – and these outputs do sit on my computer in files and a directory, which is where the real work will take place when I begin writing – I thought that given the novel seems to want to remain less structured than others before it, and in a more conceptual and graphical way – well, fine. I will then show you the concepts in a graphical way also, in a series of screenshots.

Introduction to My Second Life Writing Tools

Through the Writing Shack Window

To get your head around it, Second Life can provide both a supportive community of writers (a good look at this can be found with the Writers in the (Virtual) Sky blog) and you can use the environment of Second Life as an environment to write in.

Yes. Totally.

I’ve previously written about my own creation of a virtual ‘Writer’s Shack’, and I use it for a base in which to put all my virtual writing stuff (which you’re about to see). No, that doesn’t mean you can actually write in there – but I use the Shack as a background to my actual writing (or in this case, writing planning). So, I logon to Second Life, and walk to my writing shack, either sit at the virtual desk there, typing on my virtual laptop (all supplied by in-built animations in the chair or laptop itself) or I sit at my virtual grungey couch. I then open up all the rest of the tools necessary to my writing, or planning prep, and have Second Life in the background.

My virtual shack is setup with a complete ambient scenery – I play some bird calls from my New Zealand home country – there are calls from native birds, and a chirping cricket sound. Beside the shack, there’s a large hidden cave with waterfall – so you can hear the gentle sound of water also, if you listen hard. Above my property I have a circling seagull, and his (I presume its a ‘he’) shriek occasionally penetrates into the cabin also.

With Second Life playing in the background, my real life writing is accompanied by gentle ambient sounds.

(Well, they would be aside from the one sound output I’ve not mentioned – my chicken farming experiment. Occasionally the shrill peep-peep-peep of hungry chicks in my coop wakes me up from a natural loll.)

If I’m in a different mood, I have a jukebox in the shack which can play heavy rock or ambient music via the fifty or so internet radio channels programmed into it. All these sounds simply pipe through Second Life, out via my speaker system and as background to my actual typing on my keyboard in real life.

Sunset and Pizza - what more could the writer want?

My virtual desk with laptop and mouse sits under a window, and in my shack I’ve surrounded myself with many other writing implements and reminders. These provide a real kick in the bottom to actually get writing. I have posters on the wall which make me feel inspired, and these can be changed quickly with new textures, so I never get bored.

Many of the excellent writing groups and businesses in-world also supply writing equipment for inspiration. I have collected a can of alphabet soup for writers, a marathon bar for writers sits on my desk, and there are clipboards, virtual paper and writing books sitting around the place also. It’s fun, and an interestingly inspiring environment to work within (or without, as the case is).

On my ram-shackle coffee table (propped up on concrete bricks) I’ve got another laptop (for when I want my avatar to sit on that couch and work) and a half eaten pizza and can of non-diet coke. Sustenance is important for the writer, yes?

And if I don’t feel like writing, I can always read. I have a reading ottoman that allows my avatar to lie down and read, and I can actually read ‘real’ books in-world – and buy these also. Many Second Life magazines come free also. They work with flip-page technology, and you can re-size many of them for readibility.

But of real importance and relevance to this post is my WIP writing board, which started off as a purchase of a large low-prim blackboard. This sits on my working wall beside the desk. As I can change the texture (or picture) inside the frame, I decided to create both blackboard and cork board working images of my own novel in progress, as it’s developed. So, here I’m going to show you both WIP boards in-world. Although, as I said earlier, I have bigger working copies of these outside of Second Life, available as I move on with the planning and preparation stage.

MindMapping the First Brain Dump

Shhh! Novel hard at work, and it's late, too.

Theme, motivation, what’s the story really about? I find that once I really start trying to document this, other ideas spring to life. Using my trusty mindmapping tool (I use Mindjet MindManager, but many others will do) I set about starting a braindump of ideas, starting off with ideas on the theme and motivations behind my main character.

This novel is character-led. However, the main character is not a hero by anyone’s estimations, and ends up in prison for her crime. Struggling with the fact that I wanted to build a character who was ultimately never going anywhere, I also had the realisation that this wouldn’t also lead to possible serial characters. From my original brain dump map came another main character to fit this need. And from that character came the point of view, and a large sub-plot which could be taken out into a series of books, should this one ever find publication.

That’s as far as I went in any planning treatment however. The mindmap itself is very shallow, but I then took it out graphically as a screenshot, and enhanced it using graphics also. From a mindmap with only three roots off the main central theme, I added the blackboard elements you may make out, using my graphics editor (I don’t have photoshop, but Corel’s Paint Shop Pro does an equivable job). And I added some chalk figures and handwriting to add to the blackboard theme. I have some To Dos for research I need to concentrate on, and some possible setting lists written down on my blackboard (graphic) also.

As I’ve created all this as separate components (the mindmaps can be changed as I go) and combined into a graphic, I can use the large graphic to enhance my inspiration, perhaps as a desktop wallpaper on my working computer, or I can simply use it within Second Life on my WIP blackboard. After uploading the image, and putting it into the contents of the board on my wall in-world, I have the following reminder for my novel :-

Image Boarding the Main Characters

Working with the Character Image Board

The original mindmap – plus extras added around the sides – triggered a need to further develop my understanding of the two main characters. Normally I have a rough idea of the age and start off with a simple internet search for relevant photographs. Yesterday I started on this work, but ended up developing an entire career and background history for both characters. What I didn’t want to do – because this novel doesn’t seem to ‘want it’, was end up writing streams of pages of character dossiers etc. I wanted to keep my preplanning to a more graphical element this time, and not super-impose anything other than images overtop of what I was already thinking.

To store my images, I decided that the blackboard concept could readily become a corkboard. I found a cork background and began building the image board onto that, complete with pin tacks and sticky notes, poloroids and other graphics to enhance the model.

As I had chosen the career of Forensic Psychology for my main narrator, I went more in-depth in researching her career. Sitting on this simple image board is a fake ID for the London Metropolitan police force, and from that, I suddenly had to fill in a name for her. So she has a name now, and it all feels right.

The cork image board took several hours to create, but behind the scenes I have also implemented quite a lot of research to get an understanding of these characters. Because of the specifics, I also have a lot more research to do, before I can consider if I’m ready to go with the actual first draft. But developing the characters using an image storyboard in this way was a method which worked very well for me. Within one day, I had the characters, and the story has developed well along with them.

The framed board within my Second Life writing shack can change from the blackboard texture / image to the corkboard one with one simple click. Any additional images or work I upload into it will be accessed quickly also. The resolution is big enough that I can zoom in with my camera tools, and read all the fine detail if I need the prompt. And with one-click access to all these novel images, I have developed a very efficient prompt to my writing.

Other Tools Used

As this is a graphics intensive project, I am using software – both client and online to create my models for the novel in progress. These include the Second Life tools I’ve gone into depth with above, and Mindjet MindManager, with a graphics editor which can take screenshots of the projects in these tools, if the files can’t be exported automatically into a graphic format such as .jpeg. Most do allow for this, however.

In the character image board you see above, for instance, I have worked on and inserted a family tree. It has been placed on a notepaper, set centre-top of the corkboard. This family tree was created as a simple flow-chart image in a free online program called Draw Anywhere. I do have a family tree program on another computer, but for the work involved, decided I only needed a simple chart. Draw Anywhere allows the export of its files into PDF. From the PDF – which I have filed in my WIP directory, I took a screenshot of the image, and inserted it only the notepaper for the sake of the image board.

Coming up, I have some more research / background work to do, and some scenes to plan out. I normally do my scene cards in a commercial tool I like, called Writer’s Blocks. Writer’s Blocks allows you to view the cards in a structured card form, or as an outline, or as a manuscript. Or I can simply take a screenshot of the blocks with large titles, and stick that into a graphic for my corkboard if I want.

Another popular (and less expensive) notecard software for writers is Mindola’s Super Notecard (note – requires Java). Again, there are various export options and I could take screenshots to act as a WIP board as I went.

My own scene cards become the outline plan for the novel draft itself, but 80% of the time, as the novel progresses, the scenes and outline change also, so these are kept updated on a daily basis. I doubt that it will be efficient to take these moving cards into Second Life as a graphic, but I will put up a corkboard or blackboard of some initial critical scene thoughts to start off with.

There are many other worthwhile tools available online to make use of for the writer, and with the use of screenshots and exports, I am developing a graphical package for pre-planning of my next novel. Putting it into such a graphical format is also having the added benefit of providing two interlinked writing environments for me – real life and virtually. And it’s really making me inspired to start on that first draft (once I’ve done the minimal research I require).

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

This post will guide you to some note-taking database tools which work to keep character profiles, scene notes, research notes or what-have-you’s. Most of this software is freeware.

Of course, there are also some excellent full writing applications available both freely or commercially which include not only text editors for the actual writing, but various project management and organisation modules which allow you to take down notes on characters, settings and plot point. The Ultimate Guide for Writers lists pages of these for both Mac and Windows users. I am including one of my own favourite free ones in this post (yWriter) as a comparison.

Character Keeper [Free, Adobe Air App] http://magicalwords.net/software/ Created by the Magical Words group blog, Character Keeper is designed on Adobe Air. You will need to install Air if you have not done so already. Version 1.0 is free. Simple text notes can be input and categorised into the clip database.
Debrief [Basic Free, Additional Functions – Commercial] http://debriefnotes.com/ Debrief calls itself “software for saving notes on your PC”. By far the greatest amount of features – calendars, discussion notes, meetings, reading lists, day planning, decks of notescards etc belong to the Professional version ($39.95), but there is a Standard version ($29.95), and the Basic version, which allows simple notes in a folder structure, is free.
Idea Cruncher [Commercial] http://www.ideacruncher.com/description/how.php Idea Cruncher is a very simple little database application which lets you create a list in a tree-like structure and put notes against each list item. You could actually use it as a simple outliner for a piece of writing work, or to hold ideas for your writing. There is a 30 day demo version, after that you will need to purchase the unlock code, for $9.99.
Key Note [Free] http://www.tranglos.com/free/index.html KeyNote is free opensource software from Tranglos. It works as a RTF Notepad, keeping a tree-like structure on the left, and multiple richtext notes within the one file. It integrates with WordWeb as a dictionary, and can import from html files and exporting out as .rtf or .txt files. Also can work with other freeware notes application formats such as those from Treepad.
Plot Craft [Free] http://farook.org/PlotCraft.htm#faq Plot Craft is a small free database application designed to hold a writer‘s ideas. You can create as many databases as you need, or use just the one, and categorise the ideas you input under various categories (such as quotations). Ideas can be grouped, categorised into genres and sub-genres to help in filtering to find them again, once recorded.
Text Tree [Commercial] http://babykatiemedia.com/texttree/#.I. Text Tree is a small outliner program which allows you to build tree like structures  or outlines with a large text panel to the right. There is a free downloadable demo for 17 uses, then Text Tree will cost $10
Treepad Lite [Free] http://www.treepad.com/download/ The free lite version of Treepad provides a useful utility for organising text information in a windows tree-like format. Each item entered into this tree can have formatted text notes entered. The items themselves can be customised with small icons selected from the range available within Treepad Lite. Various licensed versions of Treepad are available if you want more functionality such as adding images into the notes, a secure database, or hyperlinks. There is also a free to download ebook-creator to configure your Treepad database into an executable eBook. Can be installed as a portable app also.
yWriter [Free] http://www.spacejock.com/yWriter5.html yWriter is an extremely popular feature rich Writing application created by Spacejock Software. It is best known for containing copious features, yet being free. Create scenes and chapters, character profiles and setting profiles. Use the internal editor to write these scenes and chapters, then build into a manuscript. Or you can export out as RTF documents to be edited in Microsoft Word or Open Office. You can now use these Word / Writer applications to write your individual chapters and then import into yWriter also. Also check out Spacejock‘s other free software such as Sonar and yEdit. yWriter 5 is now available from Spacejock.

Additional References

I actually operate with a combination of organisation tools for writing. These can be summarised as -

• Main Writing and Project Management – research notes and databases, images, character profiles, corkboard type notecards, timelines, tree-structured notes and text editors – I use Liquid Storybinder for this (the closest equivalent I could find to Mac user’s famous Scrivaner software).
• Plot structuring itself – I use Writer’s Blocks
• General Pre-Writing Outlining and Structuring – I use mindmapping software – MindManager 8. (This is one of the most popular posts here at JOW – MindMapping to Prepare for a Novel).
• Note-taking and organisation including web clippings – outside of my larger writing projects I use a combination of OneNote and Evernote. Evernote allows me to also take notes on my PC, and on my iPhone, and these are synchronised onto the web database.
• A few writing productivity tools on the desktop. You can get some good project timers in Adobe Air applications.

Related posts:

1. Writing Software Updates There are a couple of writing software updates out which...
2. LSB Next Version – Moving Builder Items for Scene Writers For those interested in using (or currently use) Liquid Story...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

I am currently in the throws of developing my next ‘idea’, and just beginning to research it. I have the idea, but it’s a very emotionally rich one, and seems to also want to steep or brew – for a long time, before I feel willing to start writing it out of my system.

Researching and steeping a creative writing idea is an art unto itself, and here is my take on the subject as I go forward with this.

How to Steep / Research a New Fictional Work

0. The Conception of an Idea

This article is not about forming processes and working them to conjure up ideas for your next novel. Author and writing tutor, Holly Lisle has a process to do this she calls “Bringing Down Lightning”. Others call their processes many other things, and some authors don’t even have an option in what they write about, as their work is dictated by a publisher for a series, or by thematic requirements from other areas. But creating ideas is not what this is all about.

Once you’ve filtered out all the unworthy ideas and located that ONE – the little blighter that just has to be written, then you’re into the Steeping and Researching phrase that I find myself within.

I like to think of the conception of a worthy idea as being akin to something like a pregnancy. Many creative writers are never short of ideas, but gestating and growing a ‘good idea’ within you can take some labour. Sometimes my labour has gone really quickly – in a matter of weeks or days. In this case, my third novel, it appears I’m in for a long-term first phrase, and perhaps a pregnancy and labour more related to the gestation period of an African Elephant rather than a human being. Or the brewing period of a fine Indian tea, perhaps.

To return to this metaphor, consider the conception and selection of the idea as being like the selection of the finest tea leaves for drying and mixing. This is your basis for the brew. Only the finest will be allowed through into the pot.

1. Let it Steep

Unbelievably, writers have one of the only excuses out there (aside from perhaps sleep research lab-rats) to sleep on the job. Or at least day dream, stare at the ceiling, lie down for a very long time, or literally do nothing more productive with several hours of your time than sitting out on the grass and picking daisies.

This need to sleep or dream on the job is not something many writers are ready to admit to, certainly not in public. But there is a scientific standing behind the human being’s need to sleep and process things within their subconcious minds, and from this results the reasoning that the same must go for a writer, perhaps two-fold.

If you don’t spend time lying on the sofa immersed in the world you are imagining, why would any reader want to lie there as well?

- Val McDermid

How Long Do You Steep (or Sleep) on It For?

Good question. How long is a piece of string? I found with my last novel idea, I thought around it – not legitimately as a process – for about a month, before I started developing and outlining it on paper. Other times the story has arrived fully developed almost immediately.

This time around, it’s been three months, and only snippets or minor ideas or scenes or maybes, if, buts, and characters arrive very occasionally. This latest idea of mine seems to want to steep a very long time. That’s not a guarantee it’s of any more elite parentage, however. Maybe it’s going to be a doosy, maybe it’s really a stinker with a poor sense of timing. Longevity in the steeping stage does not necessarily denote quality or even quantity. It’s just what feels right for the story.

How Do You Force the Steeping Along Then?

1. Only force it along when you feel the time is right to force it along. This is a gut feeling for when the time is right to move onto something more tangible (unless you’re on a contracted deadline, that is).
2. There’s nothing wrong with augmenting one idea’s steeping process with other fictional or creative work. Write a short story, poem, edit another novel, start work on another project. Some authors are reknowned for taking years to steep an idea, even decades for some famous works.
3. When the time is right, then there are several methods to stir up the story and steeping process a little.

2. Stirring Up the Story Brew

This is the point that I find I have now come to. A point where my inners are starting to suggest some frustration with lack of progress with my story, even though it’s still quite nice to have a quick flash or day dream about it. Even though it’s still quite muddy.

For my own story, this feeling has been moved along by external forces this last week. My story centres around, although it’s very different to, a subject which has suddenly taken precedence in the world media this last week, with two different destructive events happening in the U.S.A. Those events aren’t exactly what I’m thinking about writing around, but some aspects of them are close enough to trigger in me a need to move on from the dreaming stage.

Methods to Stir Up the Story

To be done in cohesion with more dreaming. These methods, I’ve found, help to stir up those dreams and thoughts, and characters and story arcs begin to develop. It’s perhaps still too early to write these down, but if the same thoughts start creeping back, then you know you’re onto something.

1. Brainstorming – simple key words – these may start off with a very large picture, dealing with themes and ideas, and drill down more into characterisations and smaller details. I will stick with the bigger picture initially, stopping myself from getting down to details, because I want to give the story time to develop and change.
2. Read the genre – something you’re probably doing already anyway.
3. Media Events – as with my example above, if you find some world or news events are compatible with your idea, search these out. Clip out the newspapers, or look the news up on the internet. Go through and highlight the elements of those stories which trigger your own thoughts.
4. Ring the most appropriate key words out of all of this, and take to the internet with a good search engine.

A Good Research Tool Kit

Before I go any further, once I’ve found that very first piece of research at the stirring up stage, I setup my tool kit to take these into.

Many who have read here at my blog may be aware that I have a few research databasing and organising methods. But it’s not the tools that count, but the process of starting and organising those materials which can trigger additional thoughts.

For web-clippings and general notes I start off creating and labelling a project notebook within Microsoft OneNote. That’s where I’m currently concentrating my efforts. Once the actual story develops more – with character profiles starting to develop, then I will do that within my own writing and project management tool.

For fictional work, I tend not to take internet or web links or bookmarks – I never go back to those same sites, and don’t find I have a need to do so. Instead, I take full pages or partial text clippings into my notes database. The copy and paste facility within OneNote brings in the original URL for reference, should I ever need it.

Note that other more general research and clippings – those that I find outside of a planned research session for my novel – are filed elsewhere. I use Evernote, which has an online database, and I can use on a PC client copy, and synch with my iPhone.

3. ‘Proper’ Research

Once you’ve made that first step into stirring up the dreaming process, and setup your research tools / databases, you’re possibly ready to move into the ‘proper’ research phrase of your writing project. I’m not quite there yet with my own story, but regarding this phrase, I have to state that I love it! (see Point 4 Below, it’s important too!). But to get the best out of this phrase you need to develop some good methods behind your research.

There are two points which you should already be developing before moving properly into the research phrase of your fictional work -

• Genre(s) – where does this story fit? What patterns are expected from readers? What elements?
• Key Words and Phrases – which words really trigger your ideas – are they theme, emotion, event specific? Which need research?

A Good Research Methodology

Non-Fiction writers – particularly journalists, students, and even some professional vocations are provided with training and knowledge on developing research and analysis skills. Fiction / creative writers often come into writing without an initial sound understanding of how to go about researching at all.

Developing this is often a little hit and miss, and certainly too locale specific for me to advise anybody else how to go about doing it.

The Pleasure (and Pain) of Books

As an example, many authors suggest spending some time at their local libraries, and certainly developing a good working relationship with their friendly neighbourhood librarian. This doesn’t work for me, where my local library consists of a small volunteer-driven pre-fab building holding mainly children’s books and the odd best-seller, but no periodicals or reference books.

Others suggest if you can’t use a local library (or don’t have one) you can order in reference books. This is a brilliant idea, and one I, as a book lover, have previously pursued. But from this, I can give you one word of warning from one new writer to another – until you find yourself set into one or two genres, reconsider whether your huge love of mythical fairy reference books will still be needed several months or years down the line. Sometimes once that new story is out of you, you find all those reference books are now no longer really needed.

For those who are pretty sure you will be writing in the same genre for some time, then go ahead – buy a few books. Try to locate ‘the’ reference ones, and do a bit more research through internet sites on the genre itself – writing websites will often give you a list of books and journals which make good additions to your reference library, particularly those dedicated to the genre.

Speaking with Experts

My next story involves a number of crimes. For this, I’d dearly love to be able to get a grasp of the police procedures in this country, and not just those I see possibly erroneously portrayed on U.K. television soap series. But finding a friendly professional copper with enough time to support my many questions is a large thing to ask. I personally may have one inroad to this type of expert, as I happen to be living next door to two detectives for the county, and if they don’t have the time or patience, at least they may be able to put me onto some person who may welcome my interest in getting things right for the story.

Such experts have a two-fold promise for your work. There is a secondary side to finding and cultivating these gurus – if close enough, or if you’ve really built up a good relationship, they may be available as a sounding board for your starter ideas – in fact they may even add some more ideas to the pot.

But primarily, your gurus or oracles can provide detailed and up-to-date real-life information about how things work.

Which brings up the subject of interviewing and questioning such experts if you are lucky enough to source them. Whether your interview is going to be in-person, over the phone, or via email, you must be organised in your approach.

To be fair on their own time, I would suggest that asking them such random questions early on in the research piece may be very unfair. Better to store up any questions as they occur in your own story development, and if need-be, even through the actual writing. Develop a questionairre sheet, referencing to what part of the story you need that information for, and see if you can not find out the answer from elsewhere first.

That elsewhere could well be the internet, naturally.

The Web

Now that we’ve moved onto the internet, the need to develop a good methodology in research goes three-fold. How easy is it to become distracted by something you’ve seen on a website, and go off winding along the web and never find that one website again? How many hours can you spend and come off the web without anything productive? Yeah, I know. I’m absolutely brilliant at this so-called research. I can spend days and get nowhere.

I have developed a method where I never move onto one page without first taking a web-clipping of anything I may want from that first one. I also open up subsequent pages into new tabs, occasionally closing down older tabs in my browser. I search via key words and phrases, but also have learnt to look outside of the main pages, at sidebars and advertisements. After all, you never know for fictional work, what might trigger that one dazzling plot turn.

Here’s a list which may be helpful of certain types of research you may want to contemplate over the internet: -

• Genre Specifics – if your story is a romance, horror, science fiction, or crime, then there are associations and websites out there with lots of information and help for you (including the lists of reference sites and books I spoke of earlier).
• News stories search – enter your main key words. See what comes up.
• Key Word Search – enter your main key words. Follow the trails.
• Specific Research Requirements – as one example – for a historical piece, you may have set your mind on a certain time period, certain civilisation, or certain place as a setting. Another example – your crime story will require some knowledge of the laws within your country, and policing. You may need to research these to add detail…

4. How Much Detail, and When Do I Stop?

Initially I thought this was another piece of string question. It all depends, or does it?

For a plausible crime story, for instance, the author should have a good understanding of many things – how the crime can come into reality, for instance (is it really possible to die from an exotic spider bite? Does a body really decompose like that? ) And the people and procedures around the crime – (Would a police team really be made up of a student anthropologist and a Detective brought out of probation because he’s really needed? And how many policemen really are on probabation out there for hitting their superior officer? Heck – do they call their manager’s ‘superior officers’, even?)

For a plausible science fiction piece, the world is your oyster, right? Wrong – there are certain laws of nature and elements within even science or speculative fiction and if you break some of these, with no proper explanation of how these could be broken, then you reduce the acceptance of your story by the audience you’re aiming for.

I love to research – I perhaps should have been a Researcher by trade, but even then, I would have gotten bored with the same subject materials, and only like now to research things I am extremely interested in.

But I could spend months on researching my subject, I’m sure. And what would I do with all that pleasurable effort? Why, I’d want to prove it worthwhile within my story, wouldn’t I? My story will end up with lots of lovely little facts to build the theme and belief of that crime, and all my readers will see the fruit of my months of research, won’t they?

Well, I hope not.

I hope that I research to get an understanding, but that it doesn’t show in the book itself. I hope that I don’t just stick in so much detail that it reads like I’ve done lots of research. I hope my research doesn’t show at the seams, that it forms a plausible background, but doesn’t take over the story. My research should never be showing, it’s like a woman’s petticoats in the older days where we did wear them (I can just remember). It’s something private.

So that’s the answer to this question – yes, how much to research depends on many factors, including what your knowledge of the subject is already, how you are going to research, and how much detail you do need to provide. But in front of house, only enough is good enough. Stop as soon as you have the answer. In fact, stop as soon as you know where you can get the answer, and get on with the writing when it feels time. If you find you have holes in your knowledge when writing a certain passage or scene, then note it down, and add it to your research / question pile for a later date.

5. Pouring Out the Brew

So, you’ve stopped steeping, and stopped researching, right? Right? Okay, maybe you still have a bit, but not too much. Maybe use the additional research as an incentive or reward system. Write 2000 words, then do a half hour of research at the end of the session…

Now it’s time to get into the writing – whether you are a structionist who likes to outline a plot to the scene by scene level, or somebody who likes to wing it with a few idea cards. But of importance, stop researching and start pouring out your findings into some actual written fictional work. Oh, and stop to have a real cup of tea.

Related posts:

1. World Building Resources for the Writer Unbelievably (considering I am 1. On holiday and 2. About...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

The experiment documented at WebMD sampled only red and blue, and colours of the same intensity, and found that

The color red makes people more detail-oriented, the color blue boosts creativity, and those color effects often fly under people’s radar.

Red was found to benefit focus (memorising information, detailed work) , blue made the test subjects more creative (design, imagination, brainstorming).

The sample and findings were quite small, but possibly not new information to some of the creative world. For a long time the study of colour and colour’s effects have been part of many hobbyists and artists, with some well known implementations of certain colours ie. red is often used in restaurants because it makes people more hungry, and pink has famously been used on prison walls because of its calming effect.

Colour Therapy itself is a big business – do a search on the internet and you’ll find many practising consultants who will apply various colours to heal our ailments. Without getting into the world of chakras and silks applied to the body, we do have a good base knowledge of what colours signify what feelings or emotions for many human beings.

Colour Meanings

Generally accepted amongst colour coaches and others are the following interpretations of colours, although these can be different amongst cultures.

__Red____________

The colour of fire and blood. And because of high visibility and connotations of danger- it’s used for stop signs, stop lights and fire safety equipment.

Red is associated with anger, rage, heated feelings, danger, war, passion, erotiscm and desire. Oh, and love and Valentine’s Day, of course. In heraldy it’s often used in shields and flags to signify courage. And red often is associated with energy.

As an extreme colour it’s not a great idea to go into negotiations or debates wearing red. That’s like a ‘red flag to a bull’. Red is worn as an attention seeker, and says something about the person’s personality if willing to wear it.

Because of the intensity of red, it has been found that it can affect the human metabolism – stimulating respiration rates, and raising blood pressure. No wonder it’s associated with human desire then (and the appetite, if you’re in that restaurant).

With all of this energy, and quickening of metabolism  there remains little doubt that the effects on many humans are towards quicker decisions and increases of focus and concentration levels, as the MedMD study may have found.

Light red represents joy, sexuality, passion, sensitivity, and love.
Pink signifies romance, love, and friendship. It denotes feminine qualities and passiveness. And with the mixture of white, which calms down the intensity, is known to have calming qualities on human beings.
Dark red is associated with vigour, willpower, rage, anger, leadership, courage, longing, malice, and wrath.
Brown suggests stability and denotes masculine qualities.
Reddish-brown is associated with harvest and fall.
Dark-brown can be very sombre, sad or wistful.

__Yellow____________

The colour of sunshine, and therefore happiness.

Yellow is also associated with energy (which makes sense as sunshine gives us energy), alertness, and intellect. It gives a warmth, and warming effect, and arouses us, stimulating our mental activity.

The happiness aspect of yellow is used in cohesion with bright red in a famous brand of fast food restaurants we all know.

Too much yellow, though,  can have a disturbing affect – babies in bright yellow rooms have been found to cry more often, and people are so stimulated, that they often find more arguments break out in yellow rooms. Bright yellow acts as a warning or attention getter also – it is used in the U.S.A for taxi cabs for this reason, and for hardhats and safety equipment in the U.K. Conversely, yellow is not seen as a stable colour at all.

People often associate yellow with either cowardice or as a babyish colour. Adult products, particularly selling to men, are very rarely found in yellow. Paler shades of yellow, although useful in cheering up a room, can easily become seen as being dingy also.

Because of the alertness and energy effect, yellow can stimulate concentration. It is used on legal pads for this reason.

Dull (dingy) yellow represents caution, decay, sickness, and jealousy.
Light yellow is associated with intellect, freshness, and joy.

__Orange____________

Orange, as a combination of red and yellow, combines the energy of the first, and happiness of the second. In this combination, orange is thought to provide a ‘balance’ – use it for balancing your life or feelings for instance.

The colour is associated with joy, sunshine and warmth, and often used to symbolise wonderful tropical holidays. People understand orange as being hot – but not aggressive as a red may be. From an emotional level, orange is understood to symbolise vitality with endurance.

As a citrus colour, orange is associated with health, and stimulates the appetite. In heraldry, orange is symbolic of strength and endurance. And with a high visibility, orange is used often to catch people’s attention – you will see it used in product designs, highlighting particular features, and for promoting food and toys. This can have a negative effect, particularly with orange being used to promote many Halloween toys. Sometimes orange can be seen as cheap.

As a good hot colour, orange still stimulates the metabolism – increasing blood supply, making people feel refreshed, and increasing mental activity.

Dark orange can mean deceit and distrust.
Red-orange corresponds to desire, sexual passion, pleasure, domination, aggression, and thirst for action.
Gold evokes the feeling of prestige. The meaning of gold is illumination, wisdom, and wealth. Gold often symbolizes high quality.

__Green____________

Green is the colour of nature. It symbolises growth, harmony, nurturing, healing, fertility and freshness. In Japan, the colour green symbolises ‘life’ itself. It is used to therefore symbolise new-ness, a new beginning, hope or birth  and sometimes to the negative ie – in being ‘green behind the ears, or a ‘greenhorn’ – somebody a little naive, or inexperienced. With the Irish, green – as in leprechauns and four-leaf clovers – now has a ‘lucky’ connotation also.

With green’s ecological connotations – nowadays the colour is associated with safety (perhaps of self) and spirtualism. Dark Green is commonly associated with conservatism, masculinity and money – yes, even outside of America. In heraldy, green denotes growth and hope.

Green has tremendous healing powers – it is restful and calming on the human eye, the easiest on the eye, in fact. Many people also speculate green can improve vision. Green can make people feel calmer and more in touch with their own feelings. People waiting to go onto television programs are sat in ‘green rooms’ to relax; and hospitals use green to also relax patients.  Green is safety – the opposite of red’s danger connotations.

Dark green is associated with ambition, greed, and jealousy.
Yellow-green can indicate sickness, cowardice, discord, and jealousy.
Aqua is associated with emotional healing and protection.
Olive green is the traditional color of peace.

__Blue____________

The colour of the sky and the ocean or water. Blue is associated with stability, loyalty and depth. It symbolises trust, loyalty, wisdom, confidence, intelligence, faith, peace, truth, and heaven.

Blue is considered beneficial to the mind and body. It slows human metabolism and produces a calming effect. Blue is strongly associated with tranquility. peace and calmness. It is one of the most popular colours. As opposed to emotionally warmer colours such as red or orange, the calmness of blue is thought to be linked to consciousness (meditation often involves images of the sky), and intellect, precision and knowledge.

It is thought to be quite a masculine colour, with dark blue – depth, loyalty and stability – being the colour of choice for Corporate businesses worldwide. Blue is used to promote products with a cleanliness or purity connotation, but not used on food products – the calming effect suppresses appetites. Some shades of blue are thought to be, however, depressing and cold.

Studies have shown that people are actually more productive in blue rooms. Weighlifters, for instance, have been studied and found to be able to lift heavier weights in blue gyms. Now the MedMD study has found that blue may affect or increase our own creativity levels also.

Light blue is associated with health, healing, tranquility, understanding, and softness.
Dark blue represents knowledge, power, integrity, and seriousness.
Turquoise – calming, emotional healing, refreshing, sophisticated – a great combination between blue and green.

__Purple____________

Purple combines the stability of blue with the energy of red. It is associated with royalty, rulers, leaders and dignatories – with power, prestidge, luxury and therefore ambition. Purple suggests abundance, wealth and extravagance. It also has a feminine connotation, perhaps because of this luxury. Or perhaps because of the below.

With these connotations, there is no difficulty in seeing why one of the world’s best known chocolate producers, Cadburies, chose purple to wrap their chocolate into.

A study showed that over 75% of pre-adolescents preferred purple as a colour, however this must drop with adults, who sometimes see purple as being quite an artificial colour – it doesn’t make a huge appearance in nature, for example.

Light purple evokes romantic and nostalgic feelings.
Dark purple evokes gloom and sad feelings. It can cause frustration.

White and Black

White – snow, ice, coldness, purity, innocence, babies, virginity, goodness. And simplicity and perfection. Although white can signify coldness (as in temperature) the purity and angelic connotations normally mean white can produce positive symbolisms – success, cleanliness, beginnings, good intentions, safety, healthiness, coolness.

Combined with other colours, white produces pastels and paler tones, taking off some of the more negative connotations of most colours.

Black – space, holes, unseeing, death, grief, darkness, evil and mystery. Fear, the unknown, and mysterious forces. Black holds itself better when considering some of the other connotations – power, formality, elegance, timelessness,  – black is used for formal attire for instance – tuxedos and suits, ‘black tie’ functions, and in timeless fashion items such as ‘the little black dress’. And black is the colour of authority – many police forces throughout the world use black in their uniforms.

Black gives the feeling of perspective and depth, but black backgrounds reduce visibility and readibility. Black contrasts well with white and bright colours, of course. And when paled down with white to various tones of gray – the colour waters down some of the more negative connotations.

Applying Colour to Writing

Looking at the above, I can immediately see some applications to my own writing projects and work. As I write normally on a computer, I can use a desktop wallpaper featuring the colours chosen, sitting behind my writing software, for a start.

When thinking back, I realise I’ve already used some knowledge of colour meanings in my previous work. In writing my first novel – it was about fairies (okay, don’t ask) – I specifically went through and chose a green natural colour scheme for my writing software – it allows for different styles and themes. I also purposely chose images of nature to use in my in-line software gallery. And I downloaded and setup a playlist of Celtic music and natural sounds – waterfalls and the like.

I recently also bought myself a new moleskine notebook – in racing red. I’ve found that my entries in that notebook are very different from my main pink writer’s notebook. The pink one is obviously more creative, with story notions, even little poems, descriptions of places and events. In my red one I’ve got detailed lists, even with checkboxes and the like. Until now, I was wondering why.

I have therefore already used certain colours to stimulate moods and the feelings and actual types of writing I want to incorporate into my writing, in the case of my notebooks – quite accidentally. Using red for a romantic writing piece, or grey when writing something about a business or office seems quite natural.

Taking these theories away from specific themes in fictional writing, I must admit that I don’t like a bright red enough to use it in the way that the MedMD study suggests – for focussed writing. However, orange I can get on with, and orange inherits many of the stimulations of red, so I might hope therefore that it could increase my focus levels on detailed work.

I would suggest that orange therefore, may be useful as a background to the planning and outlining sessions for new novels or articles like this one. Whereas when looking to increase creativity, and stimulate more ideas, I may well turn to blue – a nice aqua or sky blue rather than something too bright.

Summarising Colours for Writing

Use these colours for certain writing tasks. Use as a background wallpaper, within a software skin or theme, or perhaps print out a large block of the colour to have beside you as you write. Choose the colours of your writing notebooks – maybe even the pens you use, accordingly also.

Writing Tasks :

• Red or Orange – detailed focussed sessions – planning, outlining, list-making, structuring, research.
• Light blues / Aquas / Sky Blues – creative writing, idea generations, brainstorming, brain-dumping, story generations.

Writing Themes:

• Red – when writing around romantic, erotic, war, fighting or anger topics or themes.
• Greens – when writing around nature or spirtual topics or themes.
• Darker Green – when you just want to relax into your writing and see what is born ie Timed Writing sessions / free-writing.
• Bright or Light Green – to freshen up your writing, to wake it up when you’ve been writing too long or hard.
• Blacks or Grays – when writing around death, fear or mystery;  or around businesses, sombre feelings or authority.

LinkMes:

• Kirsten Wright’s What Color is Your Creativity blog post.
• WebMD – Color Yourself Cautious or Creative article by Miranda Hitti

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

1. How to Effectively Educate Your Blog Readers

Darren Rowse [Problogger] writes an interesting post for anyone who writes a blog.  He gives some rules and links out to Jacob Neilsen’s site and a paper on web reading. Although I’m probably rubbish at following many of Problogger’s suggestions, I thankfully can admit that I’ve never been accused of being a link snob.

2. Unleashing the Book Inside You Home Study Course

Tom Evans has been on this blog very recently commenting about ebook structures. Little does he know, but I follow his Bookwright blog via a feed reader, so am partially aware of his work. Currently he is offering this Home Study Course at a discount. The course involves two hours of narration, plus some applications of mindmaps. As a licensed iMindMap trainer, you can be sure that with Tom you will receive tuition in the best use of mindmaps aka Tony Buzan.

Personally, I can’t yet afford the price of this course, but you can be sure that I keep it bookmarked as a priority to get to, even as a MindManager User myself.  Using Mindmapping for writing is one of the most fascinating aspects of my own writing journey, as readers of this blog will know.

3. Becoming a Writer – Seriously

Tom Colvin is another blogger I am well aware of, having subscribed and followed his blog for several months now. And again, he reminded me of his own precense with a couple of comments on this blog recently. Tom’s blog is full of productivity posts for writers, and is one of my favourite reads. He suggests in one of his comments that he’s re-thinking his website, and I would personally be incredibly saddened to see it go. I’m just a MindMapping / Productivity junkie kind of geek girl writer, I guess. There are a few blogs out there dealing with the technical / productivity side of being a writer, including my own posts on these subjects, and Tom’s is one of the best.

Becoming a Writer-Seriously’s latest post entitled, “Time Management for the Paper-Bound” introduces a spiral notebook system for time management called AutofocusTM. It’s a must-read for all of us looking for a simple system for reminders (and certainly for me, as I move haltingly between completely computerised systems to actually beginning to love a good notebook.

4. Mapping Your Social Networks for Maximum Productivity Online

The Mindjet blog features a post on Brian Solis, who is a prolific social media blogger, and has created a prism chart of social media conversations, and a MindManager mindmap of his own social media life. Now, Brian is one of the top bloggers and writers in this particular field, and from the look of his mindmap – an extremely busy but obviously organised man. I would never personally have the need to create such a map – but then I got thinking -

The recent post of mine sharing my own Social Media strategy involved a lot of links and thoughts. Putting those – including all the search links, statistics links etc, onto the one map would greatly cut down on time spent wondering what I had forgotten.

This is Mindjet’s Michael Deutch blogging towards this. Last time I mentioned one of his posts, he suggested he uses mindmaps for his own planning  and writing process. Now that, I’d like to see.

5. The Writing Base : 10 Twitter Tips and Tricks

Samar is a longtime blogger and recent freelance writer like myself. She has recently started a series on twitter. I know Twitter well myself, but am aware that a lot of writers don’t use Twitter to it’s fullest potential (and some over-extend the marketing aspects of it, for that matter – whoops a personal opinion just snuck in). Samar’s Writing Base gives good tips and posts on the use of Twitter.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

On Friday I allowed myself to play catchup. My email inbox was blocked up with notifications – it seems many Facebook friends wanted to throw various virtual animals and plants at me, others wanted me to attend an event on Facebook, and then there were all the notifications of new Twitter people who were now following me. Plus the literally thousands of feeds I’d let amass into my feed reader, to wade through.

It was a fantastic day, to just give myself permission for the whole day to browse around, update statuses, follow new interesting people, and read new blog and news posts. The effort wasn’t without reward, either, both on a personal and professional front.

I picked up several new Twitter followers (don’t ask me how, because I don’t know) and several new blog post ideas. I received contact from a professional viewpoint, and also chatted to two real-life people via Facebook chat – one was my oldest friend whom I have known for thirty years now, and she lives 12,000 miles away. The other was my boss, who lives around the street from me. In between, I received five replies on a meme note I had published, all from virtual friends scattered across the world, none of whom I’ve ever met in real life. And there were several direct messages via Twitter which made me feel valued and noticed.

Social networking is one of those odd things. Many people use it to extend their professional networks, promote products, or even to promote their blog posts. I feed my own blog posts through to Twitter, for instance. But others use it purely from a personal basis (like my kiwi friend and that of my boss – both of whom post personal photographs up there, and gather real-life friends onto the same system).

But we all know just how distracting those regular updates from such social networking services can be to the normal day to day work required in our [writing] lives. And in a bid to remove myself from the need to keep browsing back to those websites for updates, I’ve looked at the various utilities available to keep me informed – as I go about my everyday work.

AlertThingy 2

Introduction

Previously I’ve used various tools to help me keep up to date with notifications from some of the services I belong to. Twitter, in particular, is important to me, because many ideas and links come through which I may benefit from. I have several different utilities installed, both on the desktop and as a browser plugin, which lets me keep updated with new Tweets as those I follow create and publish them. And I can also tweet my own thoughts through on those same applications.

One of those tools – Twhirl, also lets me keep abreast of another service – FriendFeed – FriendFeed aggregates many of your social network services into the one feed. But I mostly use Twhirl, an Adobe Air app, for it’s excellent Twitter facilities. AlertThingy still provides a FriendFeed edition for those who aggregate their social services on FriendFeed’s online networks, but for those who want to aggregate down to a desktop, there is the latest AlertThingy 2 which I am now using.

Now I’ve found AlertThingy, which has additional features to Twhirl. Like Twhirl, AlertThingy 2 is an Adobe Air application, and it’s available free. If you don’t already have Adobe Air installed, you can install it from the same page as the download for AlertThingy is found. Then install AlertThingy, and go to the settings to setup your services.

AlertThingy can bring in alerts for updates on the following social network services -

• Digg
• Facebook
• Flickr
• Jaiku
• Tumblr
• Twitter
• BoxedUp
• Yammer
• TinyUrl

Settings

Setting up is easy. You need to have an account with the services, and enter in your various user ids and passwords. With Facebook, you will need to go off to Facebook and go through an authorisation process to allow AlertThingy to access your Facebook profile, and vice-versa when using the update status functions within AlertThingy.

TinyUrl is simply the URL shortening service used within AlertThingy. You can use this to convert long URLs to shortened URLs to paste into your updates for Twitter or Facebook.

Now that it’s setup, you will see the latest Tweets and Facebook updates come through from your  friends / followed via the AlertThingy application stream. If this isn’t on top of your other open software, an alert will popup from your status bar notifiying you of the latest update. You can set these alert options in the settings / options side of AlertThingy also. Options include being able to stop the alert popups and the popup noise also – which I find I need to do during dedicated work time.

Posting and Updates

Via AlertThingy, and your Twitter service you can post Tweets, or Facebook updates from your desktop, retweet other’s twitter messages, post to Tumblr, and upload photos to Flickr. Via the TinyURL facility, you can add shortened URLs to these posts. What AlertThingy is missing when compared to something like Twhirl, which is dedicated to one or two particular services, is a link in to search facilities on Twitter, or elsewhere.

However, AlertThingy also have a couple of other top-notch features which make it a fantastic overall aggregator and updater for the social networking aspects of your life.

Contacts

AlertThingy provides an overall aggregation of your contacts from all the services you have setup within it. Avatars and the services used by each are listed against their online id names. If you’re particularly interested in the updates from certain people then within AlertThingy you have a filter option to mark that person’s alerts as more interesting (the default is interesting) or less interesting. Very Interesting posters will have their alert updates made more visually obvious in the stream which you will find in AlertThingy.

NewsFeeds

Aside from the social network services listed above, AlertThingy let’s you add newsfeeds. It comes prepopulated with the normal news feeds such as those from the NY Times, or BBC, so you can have the latest news alerted through on your stream also. Plus you can add your own, using a feed URL, and be alerted of the lastest blog posts as they are published.

How I Use AlertThingy

As I wrote this post, using a client utility, Windows Live Writer, I had AlertThingy working in the background. As people internationally posted their latest onto their blogs or Twitter or Facebook, I allowed myself to be notified of those by the popup from my status bar. I would glance quickly to see if the item was worth reading, else let it disappear.

During this posting, I’ve tweeted twice, via AlertThingy, and been updated with two British contacts on Twitter, both of whom are awaiting the snow promised us this weekend, so I know I’m not the only one who is let down by the non-appearance. The BBC newsfeed has updated me with the latest international goings on, and I’ve not as yet been anywhere near a browser.

When I am more intensely into work, I turn off the alerts entirely, leaving the AlertThingy application underneath my word processor or whatever I’m writing into. An occasional hourly or half-hourly stop will see me quickly browsing over the updates, and perhaps finding some new ideas or thoughts shared with me over the internet. During even more intense writing times, I simply exit the application entirely, and return to it as a reward once finished my day’s work.

AlertThingy has allowed me to remain informed as I work, and during the time it has taken to draft up this post, I have not had cause to use my browser at all. This application provides a worthy addition to my own desktop, and actually makes me feel more productive in both my own writing and social networking time. AlertThingy has taken me from social notworking to social networking with one quick and free download.

LinkMe : AlertThingy

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Michael’s two mindmaps, which he shares in MindManager format, are called -

1. Mind Sweep – a mindmap designed to basically brain-dump everything going through his mind, and -
2. Weekly Review – a mindmap developed for that weekly review.

Those who own Mindjet’s MindManager software can download copies of both of Michael’s maps to play with. Those who don’t can still follow a link in the Mindjet Blog article which will take you to the same article within the article base at Mindjet itself. There, the mindmap is available as a Mindjet Player file – this is a mindmap that you can open up and close down just like having the software itself. It will open into Adobe Reader for you.

Michael has pre-populated the two mindmaps with some basic categories that most of us find we think about or need to think about over the course of a working week. As a MindManager user, you are of course free to customise those maps to enter more categories for your own life. Getting ‘rid’ of those little niggling worries that we all hold onto – and into the one document, seems a great way to release ourselves to move on with our own writing.

The Mind Sweep map itself also has some affiliation with that initial planning stage I find myself in, when first coming up with an idea for a story – or indeed, a non-fiction work. I’ll take a look at that at a later date.

LinkMe : Making it All Work with MindManager (Mindjet Blog Post)

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

I made mention of my iPhone 3G, and here you will find how I use it for note-taking (with two options).

Online Notebooks and iPhone 3Gs

Normally for general note-taking and planning I use Microsoft’s OneNote which comes with Office. As it came free, I use it, and I actually like many of the features found within. However, OneNote is a desktop client app with no ability to store notes or note databases elsewhere, either online, or via the iPhone.

However, for the sake of compatibility between a mobile device for note-taking, and a database, nothing can beat Online or Cloud storage. The iPhone, as much as it is fantastic, still does not have a blue-tooth keyboard, so I can not suggest that writing more than a few sentences at a time is feasible on the touch-screen keyboard supplied. However, when I’m in town shopping, or out on the local dog field running my dog, and an inspiring idea emerges, I can cope with thumbing this into the phone knowing I can access these notes later on from online.

1. Evernote and the iPhone 3G

With EverNote’s latest version, users have access to a website  database of their notes, a desktop version (both Mac and Windows) and the iPhone app. All three synchronise quickly between them.

Evernote as a desktop version, has been around for a few years now, and the ribbon of notes searchable by keywords and dates are relatively well-known. With the new Evernote Plus, accessing and storing your notes just got even easier, and more mobile. With your notes stored in a cloud online, you can access these from any PC out there, should you not be at home or work. And with the iPhone, you can create new notes and edit these also.

The free version (create an account at Evernote online) provides 40MB upload allowance with some limitations on file types for synchronisation but access to all three versions to download or setup (web, desktop and iPhone). If you require more storage or allowances, the Premium account ($5 per month / $45 per year) will provide this.

Evernote notes can take the form of text notes, web clippings (using browser plugins for Internet Explorer or Firefox browsers), Audio notes, High Resolution photos or mobile snapshots.

On the iPhone, the ability to take photographs as a note is excellent, perhaps beaten only by the voice recording aspect. This is particularly good when some inspiration hits you while you’re out and about and you need to note it down quickly into a notebook or somehow.

Notes can be encrypted for security off the cloud base (or website where everything is stored). Inside of the webside, you can send individual notes via email, or attach files to these. With the geocoding side of the iPhone, notes can be mapped through Google Maps with location of where they were created.

The Desktop Client is where you have copious searching and sorting abilities. Printed and handwritten text within images can be found using recognition technology also.

The iPhone application has an additional favourites function, allowing you to save some of your notes, for offline access. Whilst offline, or away from your connection, you can create new notes, and these go into a Pending area until synchonised across the cloud. Once you’ve signed onto Evernote the first time using your account userid, the iPhone remembers these details, meaning you can create a new note very quickly – as soon as you hit the elephant icon.

On the iPhone, Evernote gives you the expected way of getting your notes off the phone – via email.

LinkMe : Evernote Website for Signup and Details

2. SpringNote and the iPhone 3G

SpringNote is a completely free online Notebook application based on wiki principles. For a Review of this, please see the article here.

Along with free multiple online Notebooks, there is a SpringNote iPhone application. Currently this only integrates with your first personal notebook setup online at SpringNote, but there are plans for a new version coming out this year, which will allow you to integrate with your multiple notebooks.

Notes (pages) in SpringNote are text-based only, due to the wiki format online. Signon uses an OpenID and I found the signon via the iPhone application particularly difficult. Refer the full SpringNote review for this.

However, once setup, and signed in, creating a new page or note on the iPhone is very easy, both while you are near a wireless wifi connection and offline. You can also use some markup language for some simple text formatting functions.

The iPhone system also caches all your notebook pages for you when connected, synchonising any changes between your web-pages and the iPhone, including new pages from both sides, when you can. If offline you can access and edit these pages, create a new page / note and then upload or synchronise these to your website once connected.

Once the multiple notebook feature is added to the iPhone application, using SpringNote to add writing notes to a Writing Group or shared SpringNote you maintain will be a very creditable service for consideration as a mobile / web-based notebook application. At the moment, however, the inability to export out to rich text or similar, makes getting at your notes away from online or the phone difficult.

LinkMe: SpringNotes website for signup and details

Other iPhone Applications

1. TextGuru

TextGuru is another option for iPhone 3G owners. Not really a notebook application, TextGuru is more a feature-rich word processor, which has copy/paste functions (rare on the iPhone) and saves files in several formats. And TextGuru allows you to upload or download your files from or to your computer when synching up your iPhone.

For those who like to have access to a fully featured word processor with built in synching to the desktop.

LinkMe:  Available through your local iTunes Store.

2. Notes

Notes comes as a standard application pre-installed onto all new iPhones. It’s a sim

ple text note-taker, but with the addition of a Send function, you can use your iPhone’s email ability to send as an attachment to your own email address. From your computer you can then access emails, download the attached text file, and do with it what you wish.

LinkMe:  Available pre-installed on your iPhone

3. Jott for iPhone (U.S.)

The Jott iPhone application records your voice notes and transcribes them into text for you. The voice recordings are transmitted up to the Jott server where the transcription takes place. Then the text notes are sent back to your iPhone. You can also get these notes off the Jott website.

The process takes a few minutes, and is not error-less, but it’s a great way to utilise those voice recordings. The Jott service is available for the U.S. and it has been suggested by users that Jott iPhone works well with the Evernote voice recorded notes also.

LinkMe:  Available through your local iTunes Store.

Writing a Novel on the iPhone 3G

The interface for the iPhone 3G is wonderful – for games, actual phonecalls, text messages, even a quick Twitter or Facebook update. But thumbing my way through the touch-screen keyboard is not one of the ways I want to approach my own novel writing projects. For me, the iPhone makes an excellent writer’s notebook for quick thoughts, and notes. But not for writing a novel in it’s entirety or even partially.

However, take a look at The Writer’s Technology Companion website where writer Dustin Wax was contacted by published author, Cheryl Kaye Tardif, who told Dustin that she had started off her latest novel on an iPhone, and was continuing to do so, given the amount of publicity she’s received in doing so.

In Cheryl’s communication, she makes a good case as to the iPhone being an appropriate media in the context of her diary-like story. Others have used the latest technology to both create and publish entire novels from – the many Twitter novels are one case in point, and so is the Japanese hobby of mobile-novelling, where entire novels have been written on mobile phones, and later successfully published as best-sellers.

Lastly, scroll down and read the comments on The Writer’s Technology Companion’s post. There you can find an author who has published her latest novel as an ebook – and it’s available for not only the expected Sony Reader, Amazon Kindle formats, but for both the Blackberry and iPhone.

What I Use

Currently I use a double approach to capturing notes on my iPhone. I use both the SpringNote application and Evernote. As a long-term Evernote user, I like gathering notes in this way, especially with the new web-cloud storage and synchronisation through to both the desktop and web database.EverNote will be my first recommendation, and choice.

SpringNotes (see the review elsewhere) is less quick to get into, needing me to signon to the application via a browser and OpenID signon. This means quick note-taking is difficult unless I’ve already prepared myself for this early on in the day. I’m also not convinced about SpringNotes as a research or knowledgebase online for myself unless looking at administering a group resource.

I particularly like the voice recording ability within Evernote, on my iPhone. This makes quick thoughts and ideas incredibly easy to manage, although I then have to transfer these to text or somewhere else manually at a later time. Perhaps if I lived in the U.S. with the Jott iPhone application also, then the combination would be even more powerful.

Related posts:

1. World Building Resources for the Writer Unbelievably (considering I am 1. On holiday and 2. About...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Here below is a detailed look into my own writing notebooks and the systems I use for a productive and disciplined approach to something which is, actually quite fun – keeping a writer’s notebook.

1. Between a Journal and a Notebook, a Creative Journal and a Diary

Firstly, it took me some time to work out the differences between various notebooks and books, and understanding my own needs. But my biggest goals of 2009 are towards becoming more productive and disciplined in my writing, and yet with a converse value of simplifying any systems to make them more workable – and importantly, fun – for me.

Being somebody who loves the “ideal of organisation“, but is reasonably bad at maintaining that concept past the first rush of good intentions (ie. past a week or more), I knew I had a need for some kind of reminder / appointment / task management system, some kind of daily writing practice or journaling system, and something else…

A Writing Notebook is NOT a Journal

For sometime I’ve struggled with the whole writing a journal thing – although I do maintain a journal electronically – it is very occasional. I have spoken in the past about my need to take weekends off from writing, and large sections of weeks between novel writing expeditions. And I’ve also found that writing regular journal entries – with actual dates, can become highly emotional and very self-possessed. Me, Myself and my feelings…sometimes putting those down onto paper has not been particularly helpful.

As far as I’m concerned (based on my own limited experience in writing, admittedly), writing a novel requires very different disciplines to writing brief snippets of either creative writing or journal writing. The two certainly didn’t appear to work for me. My novels needed concentration, determination, the ability to strategise and have an overall view of the entire thing – from characters, motivation, cause and resulting effect, timelines and plots (and subplots). Both of my novels written so far run over the 300 page mark. Managing those storylines and plot-points, conflict and resolution were a very different thing than writing about my observations and feelings in the “real world”. Journal writing was a view of a day, a brief summation of something which was rarely linked with the next entry. Novel writing is building entire new worlds and ruling over them.

No, if there was one thing I was sure of a few months ago, it was that my Writing Notebook would never be used as a diary or journal – it might include excerpts of my impressions or reactions to something, but those would be used to create fictional work from – or as practice to develop my writing skills. Secondly, it might well include some pysche-searching work or exercises, but not in a day-to-day approach.

As it is, my journey into a writing notebook, as against a journaling system went swimmingly well once I had grasped this concept within me. Other writers may well use their notebooks / journals in an entirely different way, including daily dairy entries and the like, and I have no concerns over this.

But defining what your objectives are in holding and maintaining a writing notebook is vitally important to any writer’s success in using them.

The Journey to a Writing Notebook (or two or three)

I have lost count of the amount of times that newbie writers like myself are told to keep a notebook with us at all times – even when asleep; even on the toilet. Outside, inside, ever-ready for that eureka moment or to simply write into.

Capture that idea, story, dream, word, plot, character, setting, plan…carry a notebook at all times. Write them down – or else you will forget!

Yes, those words of advice sounded admirable. I agreed with them whole-heartedly. I’ve lost many wonderful ideas to time and distance simply by not having the gumption or ability or lust to write them down.

But I am a woman who doesn’t carry a handbag or purse around with her unless she really needs to – and that’s more to do with the rest of the family making use of my carry-all abilities for wallets, mobile phones etc, than my general desire to haul something around outside of my clothing.

Outside of those family shopping or travel times, I walk around with all weaponry (ie. a mobile phone – if I remember it; a wallet of not-much-money – if I really need that also, and my car or door keys) in the pockets of my jeans. My wallet is small enough to fit, so is everything else – with a squeeze, and provided I don’t need to bend over too often.

There’s no room for a notebook, though. Not even a very tiny one. And forget about the pen.

I am also a light but poor sleeper. So if I do wake from a dream with some good ideas, I tend to prefer to not wake myself up drastically by putting the bedside light on, to write into a notebook. I would much better try to get back to sleep in peaceful drowsiness. Besides, all those excellent ideas at 2am in the morning never look quite so excellent in the sombreness of a workday morning after.

Still, heeding the good advice, I’ve peppered my house, and larger satchels, and handbags with many different sizes and kinds of notebooks, all for the specific usage of writing my writings into.  Until recently, they all remained virginal in their disuse.

I’ve always had a love of a good stationery store, second only to bookstores. I could – and have – spent hours wondering the aisles of stationery, choosing from various little tools, notebooks, ring-binders, files and post-its. My house probably contains many such purchases, simply because I love them.

In fact, journals, creative journals and the like have long been part of my own life. Being a paper-crafter of old, I’ve created or hand-made several little decorative journals myself to use. But for those, it was about the designing and decorative opportunities – not the actual writing inside. As far as I was concerned, a nice clean white page inside was a good indictment to the prettiness and art-i-ness found outside, which was the point entirely. Look and appreciate the covers and pretty bindings, never mind the contents.

So – notebooks aplenty there is around these parts, all crying out to be used.

Despite my obvious lifestyle reluctance, there came a time this New Years, to listen to the advising voices: Get a notebook…Use the force, Luke. Be a proper writer…

This came about (of course it would) by the loss of an excellent ground-breaking fortune-producing life-enhancing tear-producing idea I came up with one Autumn afternoon; and which I thought so stunning that I spent a good two hours musing over. I was too lazy (and smug) to write it down – not even on the laptop I was sitting next to – because I surely wouldn’t forget such a momentous eurekan idea as this one, would I?

You bet I did. It stayed with me for several days, dwindling in detail as I went about my daily chores. I was simply too lazy to write it down, but that was okay, as here I was, over the dishes, still remembering it, wasn’t I? Even if I couldn’t quite grasp that whole plot-line anymore. And about that character – what did she actually do? And what was the idea anyway?…

My lost idea was gone within a week of being born. It was a short life, and I wasn’t a very good parent to it. Perhaps I put myself through that loss just to show me that this indeed does happen. And that I can be stupidly lazy with my own muse at times.

Come the New Year, I began looking for the ultimate writer’s notebook, the Moleskine. Despite looking all over the county, I never found one. So, for my main notebook I’ve had to settle on a discounted winter sales special – a geniune patent leather notebook, in bright pink, from the M by Staples collection. It’s shiny and pink in its expectations, I must say.

That’s my main one, although there are, as I indicated above, others. Smaller siblings, one for my satchel, one for upstairs. Various calendars, electronic note-taking devices like my iPhone (which is great at doing quick note voice recordings also) and various scraps of paper located in a rush at work, and written on with stubbly colouring-in pencils. Now I have a good collection of notebooks and other tools, and some of them are filling up!

Time to now take a look at a system to organise (as least as possible) my scribblings, then?

2. What Goes into my Writer’s Notebook(s)?

Anything. Simple, huh?

• Story ideas – seeds of these, or entire planned plotlines (the former is much more common and recommended)
• Story sentences
• Story snippets
• Title ideas
• Planning for writing projects
• Plots
• Timelines
• Scene ideas
• The occasional haiku
• Lists of new words – some I’ve made up possibly
• Reminders for my current novel in progress. Tasks, ideas, new ideas…
• That eureka idea for a blog article – yes, I’m not precious about non versus fiction work – it all goes in.
• Character profiles
• Descriptions from my everyday life – people, places, events, feelings, senses invoked (smell being an important one for me, or touch) – these can be small details or a paragraph of description on feelings or physical descriptions
• Dreams – daydreams or night-time dream snippets if they resound with me. Normally written the morning after, not at 2am!
• Overheard conversations (happens particularly when commuting, I’ve found) or dialogue
• Doodle drawings
• MindMaps – lots of these. Either as brainstorms or for planning of projects.
• Diagrams, graphics, columns of facts and figures
• Arrows, icons, smiley faces, exclamation marks, linking arrows from one to the other.
• Reminders to do with writing project tasks
• Reminders to do with new tasks thought up.
• Phone numbers, dates and tasks if I’ve got nothing better to write on, when given me.
• Writing prompts – ones found elsewhere (billboards, magazines, television advertisements, the internet, books) or ones I’ve made up myself.
• Phrases or Quotes I read somewhere, anywhere, and like or find inspirational.
• Poems I find and love – with credits.
• Poems I write myself, or start off with in the notebook.
• New words and word definitions I’ve learnt
• Words I’ve made up – and their definitions (and pronunciation guide)
• General reactions and feelings – to experiences, readings, events, ideas, news…(see more on this in the section entitled YellowOrange Sweetspot Reactions below)
• Research – facts, figures, websites, lists
• Even more lists (I love lists) – favourite words, new words, shopping, favourite books, whatever.
• Attachments – yes, magazine clippings or business cards – these would normally go into an inspiration or research file, but some remain still in some of my writing notebooks.
• Did I mention the doodles?

3. What Do I Do With The Scribblings?

Q: All those notes, all over the place. How on earth do I find anything?

A: Actually, that depends on what kind of item inside that notebook are we talking about, so first I have to (mentally, if not physically) catergorise them. This is normally done right at the time I am writing them down. We are natural catergorisers, most of us, are we not? Knowing what to do with the scribbling is normally quite easy to work out, even as I write them.  However some of them are left to mature.

1. The ‘Down-and-Forget’ Notes / Reminders

Firstly, sometimes it’s not about finding them at all. A lot of the scribblings are almost valueless as soon as they’re out on the paper. That’s because my mind operates its own memory functions much better once I’ve written something down. For instance, if I suddenly have a new and valuable task come to mind for a current writing project, if I write it down the once, it will be retained much deeper into my memory, and there’s a very good chance that I will remember it long enough to deposit the task into my task management systems, or to even just do the task and complete it off.

2. Inspiring Ideas 1 – ‘The Inspiration Resource’

For much of the rest, the physical notebooks are basically a collection point close to the point-in-time of the ideas and clippings from my life.

Note that the notes are not guaranteed – because I still don’t walk around town lugging a notebook with me on too many occasions. My system is not weatherproof against the fact that I generally have many places in my day where no notebook is immediately available to me. But I have trained myself to think over the idea when it arises, and make a mental note to capture it as soon as possible. This generally works for the bulk of my ponderings.

Some scribblings are just random notes or haikus, lists of words etc, word-play, quotes, phrases, drawings which form a basic reference point of inspiration if I need to come back to them.

Rifling through a filled notebook like this is pure pleasure. I have an old notebook I’ve somehow retained from my childhood years – in it I wrote (and drew) my favourite poems and quotes of the time. Now, despite the childish writing, and sometimes questionable choice of poems and topics, reading that notebook is guaranteed to give me some thoughts towards another project I might like to do. Or it might just make me smile or laugh.

3. Inspiring Ideas 2 – ‘The Record-It-Better-Later’ Ideas

The others are either scribblings centred on my current writing projects – new plotlines, new characters, a timeline, history, research notes or new tasks; or they are brand new but seemingly good story / plot / character / setting / blog article ideas.

All of these inspiring ideas and scribblings have places to go – the ‘current project seeds’ go into my current project database (held electronically), the later ‘new ideas’ into other databases where I keep new ideas to muse over, when I’m ready. Normally you would see me transferring the former quite quickly onto my computer, but with the fresh ideas I possibly won’t want to pay too much attention to them once they’re into the writing notebook, for fear of interrupting my own focus on current projects. So I may let them sit in the notebook for a while stewing before transferring them onto a computer database or system. The coloured tabs indicate I’m yet to do something with them.

To allow me to find them all, then, through quite a few notebooks, or quite a few pages of both valuable and invaluable scribblings, I’ve developed a strange but simple system of bookmarking through my writing journals which I’ll detail for you below.

4. Finding That Great Fresh Income-Generating Novel Idea about Teenage Vampires on the Fens

Q: What’s my great but strange (not to mention simple) book-marking system, then?

A: Post-it notes or tabs. Tiny ones.

I use five different coloured tabs, and stick them out from the pages once I’ve written a “scribbling” (scribbling is my term for anything written or drawn into my writing notebooks – it harkens back perhaps to my graphical and handcraft hobbies and drawing abilities).  I guess there could be more – or less – colours. But five is enough for me. Besides, that’s all the shop sold.

Each notebook has a set of these post-it tabs inserted into the front cover where possible. For my main notebook, I also keep a pen attached.

Although tiny, I can write a brief title or description onto them, allowing me to locate that awesome (and original, lol) vampire idea I know I wrote down circa June last year into some notebook. The title on that one would be “Teenage Fenland Vampires” and it would be on a pink tab sticking out from one of my notebooks.

Here is my personal colour-scheme of tabs -

Green - Story / Plot ideas or Seeds- generally thought-out to some degree. I may have even worked on this with diagrams and text within the notebook for a few pages. I like the idea of these being seeds for further work, so green seems fitting.

Purple – Current work in progress (WIP) ideas – normally these would be transferred over to my project folders quite quickly.

Blue – Excerpts / Descriptions – for all those short descriptions of everyday people / events / places / feelings / dialogues overheard. These may well be of use to bring my stories to life with characters or descriptions.

Red - Misc – everyone needs a miscellaneous category, especially when in a hurry. It’s the title or description that’s important anyway. Used for valuable quotes, research (if not for the current projects) and important lists for example.

Yellow/Orange - Sweet Spots – the work or writings towards my own psyche as a writer. Further explanation is found below.

An Opinion on New Story Ideas or Seeds (and their impact on a novel writer).

I prefer not to over-process these. I am not, at this point, a short story creative writer, and I have little need for lots of story ideas – in fact too many can be more of a burden than a quiet period allowing me to concentrate on writing an actual book.

The purpose of my writing notebooks in this respect are to get the darned new ideas out of my over-extended head, onto paper, and therefore more easily forgotten – for a time.

Therefore I tend to use the writing notebooks to document these as quickly as possible, transfer them into a database, and get on with the actual act of writing my current projects – novels.

This refers to my creative writing side. Any ideas for non-fiction (blog articles, ideas for ebooks or reports etc) are fostered, adopted and planned as much as possible through the notebooks and elsewhere. These, I hope for -  as many as possible. Heck, I hope for a huge warehouse of non-fiction ideas so that I don’t have to spend too much time tugging at my muse for these.

A Second Opinion on Fiction or Creative Writing Snippets

Although I acknowledge the many benefits gleaned in writing fictional snippets – character profiles, story or plot ideas, descriptions of characters or settings etc into a writing notebook, as a novel writer I must admit that I would not tend to use these, no matter how well organised and accessible – in my current writing projects.

Even if I do remember that two years beforehand I actually wrote a paragraph of wonderful text describing a vampiric love-scene between two characters, and I’ve just arrived at exactly that scene in my wonderful novel – well…I’m not one to suddenly move out of the flow of writing and look up that older scribbling to see if I can use it. I think of these descriptions and fictional / creative writing snippets as fodder for inspiring further ideas, or as general writing practice. You never know – from one of these may well come that best-seller novel at a later date.

Yellow/Orange Sweet Spot Reactions

There are some types of entries – normally written during very hormonal or quiet times, that aren’t really a quote or poem, or other inspiration resource, aren’t descriptions of things which I have witnessed or overheard, and aren’t story ideas or seeds – but they are a certain depth of investigation into my own mind, personality and psychological workings. These are the excerpts where I’ve written my reaction to something – things that bring fear or love, surprise or wonder to me, events or places that bring out certain values within me.

Ralph Fletcher, in his book, “A Writer’s Notebook, Unlocking the Writer  Within You” suggests that writers react, and in a writer’s notebook they create a place to record those reactions.

Holly Lisle, in her excellent online writing course, How to Think Sideways, puts new course attendees through an exercise called Your Sweet Spot Map. In this, the writer is asked to create mindmaps or cluster diagrams of reactions to phrases such as “I fear…” or “I shiver…”. From this exercise a sweet spot map is developed – those things which mean a lot to a writer, those things that perhaps should be turning up in their writing.

I would suggest that over time -

• some of those reactions would stay the same – my fear of spiders is never going to go away, for instance (and there’s a good chance I’ll use that gut-wrenching panic at arachnoids within a story or two of mine) – and -
• new ones will form over time with new experiences. As these develop, I as a writer, record these into a writing notebook, along with my thoughts and feelings.

My writing notebooks therefore not only capture outright story development ideas, but the basic values and passions (both positive and negative) sitting behind in my own psyche which allow me to write passionately.

I colour-code these Reaction / Sweet Spot musings with a yellow/orange post-it tab and label them appropriately. Over time I will return to reassess these values – the fears and loves, feelings and opinions formed over my own life time, and how these work through my own writing. What better place to do that than in one of my own writing notebooks?

Products and Links:

1. Journals in M by Staples range (U.S. link, although these are also available through Staples U.K.)
2. A Writer’s Notebook, Unlocking the Writer Within You by Ralph Fletcher (U.K. amazon link, click on the icon to open up U.S. details and links).
3. How to Think Sideways writing course by Holly Lisle. (affiliate link).
4. The top picture shows a pink moleskine – I can’t find any, but it’s worth covetting for the future.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Zaid Ali Alsagoff has published this ebook via the Open Source Books section of the Internet Archive, where you can view the PDF online, or download it. This is a 46MB ebook, full of graphics, so pay attention to your timing on this one, as I struck peak hours on the internet and had a very slow download.

The eBook has also been published via a Slideshare version, and SlideBoom version. The Boom version is available to view onsite at Zaidlearn.

The 60 Page “Amazing Free e-Learning eBooks Collection” features one page per book, with a brief description of the contents of the ebook, a link and covershot”. Zaid has amalgamated an absolutely awesome collection of ebooks which are free to download, and provide a lot of information about e-learning, appropriate to not only educators but anyone interested in providing e-courses and e-content to a virtual audience.

The last twenty pages of this directory does not provide more links to actual ebook downloads, but helpful tips on methods to find our own resources (the first being the expected google search) and links to searchable sites. Zaid also advertises his free ebook inside, which features 69 Learning Adventures in 6 Galaxies. He also have two other learning ebooks coming out soon.

Zaid also provides all of the ebooks and links as a quick link list on his blog, giving readers permission to replicate this list here. As a wonderful marketing device, I would suggest that you do go and get this ebook from Zaid’s site itself (the links are below) to share in the fun cartoons and graphics, and details towards what each ebook contains before you select from the many available. Go and get it (or watch it onsite) at ZaidLearn now.

Links :

• Zaidlearn – Amazing Free e-Learning eBooks
• Ebook Download

Zaid’s Quick Links List:

1. LEARNING 2.0
   
2. Educating the Net Generation
3. Learning Spaces
4. Theory and Practice of Online Learning
5. Open Educational Resources Handbooks: One, Two, Three
6. The Insider’s Guide To Becoming a Rapid E-Learning Pro
7. Top 100 Tools for Learning
8. MASIE’s Free eContent!
9. FREE eBooks from The eLearning Guild
10. e-LearningGuru’s 5-Minute Summaries
11. ICT in Schools: A Handbook for Teachers
12. E-Learning Concepts and Techniques
13. Coming of Age: An Introduction to the New WWW
14. Knowing Knowledge
15. Moodle E-Learning Course Development
16. Using Moodle
17. FREE Guide to Online Education
18. Informal Learning
19. Engaging Interactions For eLearning
20. The Cluetrain Manifesto
21. Stephen Downes Papers, Presentations and Books
22. KINEO Magic!
23. Learning Technologies (250+ Articles!)
24. Horizon Reports
25. Clive’s 33 Columns
26. Creating Learning Communities
27. Digital Education
28. Web-Teaching
29. Brandon Hall Free Resources
30. elearningeuropa Papers
31. Learning Circuits Field Guides
32. eLearn Magazine Articles Archive
33. EDUCAUSE Books
34. Google Book Search
35. Project Gutenberg
36. Scribd
37. LearnOutLoud.com
38. LibriVox
39. Great Books Index
40. CIA World Factbook
41. FreeBookSpot
42. FreeTechBooks.com
43. OnlineComputerBooks
44. Free-eBooks
45. ManyBooks
46. Globusz
47. BookYards
48. The Online Books Page
49. Wikibooks
50. Free eBooks

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.