So, it's been about eight years since I first took the concept, and it's evolved to massive proportions since then. Gone obviously is the teenage cyborg deal ... mostly. But the part that's left is downplayed, takes very little time, and is only set-up and plot motivator for the later stuff, which jumps around between the early twenties and the late forties of the character (who is no longer myself). I've also created an earlier timeline that explores the character's lineage and cultural history, and a third based on a contingency from between the second and first, an accident that ends up involving Earth for setting.
But to come to my point at last, all of my sketches are handwritten. I have a three-inch notebook filled with papers of scenes, beginnings, data, thoughts, and musings. Anything I write seriously I write in pencil.
It was recently I started composing material on the computer. Right now it is mainly for the various RPs I am in; I'll compose upwards of 1600 words regularly to move the story forward, and all my posts are essentially first drafts.
But my question, for those of you who write also, is this:
How do you go about writing? What medium do you use? Do you spend time preparing for it? Do you write as quickly as possible, or take your time? How extensively do you plan out what you want to write? Can you sit down and begin immediately, or do you need stare into space for many minutes first?
Myself, I cannot write anything quickly. It is probably due to the extensive amount of mental editing I do while writing; I'm constantly rehashing what I've written, looking for awkward wording or places that need synonyms or better ways to bring ideas across. My papers are invariably riddled with scratches and edit notation by the time I'm a page and a half away. Once I even told myself to reword an entire paragraph because nothing worked consistently, while also telling myself to change the surrounding three paragraphs to past perfect.
I also use music to get my head loose from reality. I do heavy visualizing to songs, and I could name you the tracks I see combat or emotional angst or just pretty colors flying about one's vision and so on.
And once I get inspired by a scene, it takes about a good thirty minutes to figure out what the first sentence is, meaning that the first word usually stays off the paper until that point. And even then the beginning point may not be anywhere near the initially seen scene. (That was amusing, there. =P) I once wrote seventeen pages, front and back, college rule, before getting to what I'd even seen to begin with.
I also have a really bad tendency to SOC with this thing. Hunh.
So I'll stop now, and await whatever answers are thrown my way. (^_^)
