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Workshop Notes (cont.)
Host: Lizzie Gudkov
Location: Milk Wood
Date: November 5 2015
Let’s dig deeper into the story writing itself.
Expectations are very high during NaNoWriMo and
it’s easy to feel discouraged if, for some reason, you get stuck or your
writing pace slows down.
Procrastination is tempting and, when you least
expect it, you feel you have lost too much time and you realize you’re falling
behind on your daily word count.
You hit a wall. Some people would call it
writer’s block, but I prefer to say that you’ve reached a hurdle you need to
overcome.
To overcome this hurdle, you can research for
ideas online, you can collect bits and pieces of information here and there,
newspaper clippings, brochures, maps, etc.
The problem with this method of collecting
material for the story without relying on a virtual world is that it can be extremely
time-consuming.
Second Life offers a very interesting solution
– Immersion – make use of the fact that you are immersed in a virtual
world that is extremely rich and creative.
How can you make use of Virtual Reality to
prompt you to get back on track with our story?
– Use the Destination Guide – it’s
not updated as regularly as it should be, but it’s still an interesting
resource.
– Do a targeted search in the
Destination Guide –When you go to website, you’ll see a list of different
categories that you could use as a reference. Use these categories as a first
step in your search.
– Check Second Life travel blogs – a
number of them are updated daily. They have great pictures that allow you to get
an idea of what that location looks like so you can decide very quickly if
that’s the type of sim you need for your story.
– Rely on suggestions made by
friends and fellow writers. Word of mouth is one of the best ways to find what
you are looking for. Ask your friends and your fellow writers for suggestions.
But… Be selective. During NaNoWriMo,
time is a precious commodity!
– These are usually very well done
and creative.
– Role players take great pride in
being truthful to what they are recreating.
3.2. Arriving
– When you teleport to a sim, wait for
things to rez completely. This seems a rather unnecessary observation,
nevertheless it’s very important.
– You don’t need the extra stress of
lagging like crazy because you are pushing your system to the limit.
– You don’t need the frustration of
seeing everything gray or totally distorted.
These are the type of things that often make
people give up on using Second Life as a resource for their writing. So, that’s
why I’m drawing your attention to them.
– Turn your volume up and allow the
viewer to display the Windlights chosen by the creators of the sim.
– If you come to the conclusion that
these Windlights don’t work, you can always change them to something that fits
your story.
– A word of caution. Beware of the
fact that photos in blogs, and in the Destination Guide as well, have often
been changed in image editing software, sometimes they have been dramatically
changed. Don’t feel discouraged if you arrive at a sim, having a certain
expectation, only to find a place that doesn’t work for your story at all!
– So, if you arrive at a sim and you realize
that the Windlights create the wrong mood and you cannot draw inspiration from
it for your story, don’t discard that location immediately. Choosing the right
Windlights would make it a usable resource nevertheless.
– Wear a tag that identifies you as
a writer.
– Everyone knows this, but we tend
to forget when we try to be friendly and polite – at a role-play sim, don’t
talk to people unless they talk to you. You’re a visitor, so it’s important not
to interfere with those who might be role-playing. We don’t want to disturb
them.
This was a piece of advice someone gave me a
long time ago and it has proven to be extremely useful, because by wearing a
writer’s tag and not interfering, role-players quickly understand that I’m
probably looking for ideas for new stories and they become interested.
They tend to come to me and welcome me to the
sim and tell me that I’m free to walk around. Sometimes they make me aware of
the fact that there are residential areas, but that otherwise I can walk about
as much as I want. So, they basically open the doors to their sim.
Curiously enough, they also take the time to
ask questions about my writing, about my stories and how I would use their sim
as inspiration.
This interaction has provided me with very
interesting information and ideas for my storylines, characters and settings.
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