I seem to remember that 2000AD had three cardinal sins when submitting stories: "It was only a dream," "It was Hitler all along," and "They were Adam and Eve all along."
I remember seeing this awful Nicholas Cage sci-fi movie that violated that last one.
I recall the Oxford comma when Brandon Seifert (that guy we used to know before he got famous & rich) posted that same illustrated example on Facebook.
When I interned at CBG, and also Scrye and Toybox, all in the same building, the first two used the Oxford comma and the last one didn't. I was confused as hell!
Strunk and AP Style occasionally conflict. I follow AP in all cases, both in journalism and comics. Plus it's what my English teachers taught me, way back when.
I seem to remember that 2000AD had three cardinal sins when submitting stories: "It was only a dream," "It was Hitler all along," and "They were Adam and Eve all along."
I remember seeing this awful Nicholas Cage sci-fi movie that violated that last one.
This seems like as good a time as any to drop in the good old Turkey City Lexicon:
@JustinJordan - after reading through that entire list it would seem nearly impossible to craft a SF story that didn't fall into at least a couple of those categories.
"It was all a dream" is only acceptable if it's a Biggie reference.
(That said, actual dream sequences, if you can pull them off? Beautiful. Not a whole lot of people can pull off dream logic, though. I don't think I could, without biting hard from Lynch or John From Cincinnati.)
Also, the trick to writing good sci-fi (or horror) short stories is to just never ever read EC Comics. You're going to rip them off anyway, but at least you'll come by it accidentally, and thus honestly.
(I have no idea if any of these commas are correct.)
The Just-Like Fallacy was the reason I stopped watching Firefly after a couple episodes. I went back and watched it after it was cancelled and there was great wailing among fandom, and I came to appreciate it, but the just-like-the-wild-west trappings were still a weakness for me.
The first episode of Firefly I saw was "The Train Job". (Aired first, I think.) First scene is Captain Reynolds starting a bar fight. Someone even gets thrown through the holographic window. I loved that episode. But the "space western" thing really wore on me as the series went on as it became more and more forced.
I say this while making notes on a comic that is basically "Treasure of the Sierra Madre meets Storm Chasers... in space" with some pretty stock characters. We'll see what happens.
A fair few of those quotes deal with overwriting (Twain's is my favorite), which is something I caught myself doing yesterday, actually.
Do you guys tend towards more towards the Alan Moore school (long ass panel descriptions), or the John Wagner school (DREDD ON BIKE aka the best panel description ever)?
I tend to aim more towards Wagner unless I need to really get across an effect.
This was me yesterday, choking on my own hot air, then taking another pass at it an hour or two later:
OLD:
Panel 1. Wide. MARK, glowing white eyes, stalking through the streets, blasting a windblast that sends a handful of people hurtling towards the reader/into the air (think Kirby style, Cap blasting a shitload of Hydra agents into the air after they dogpile him, sort of thing, but with civillians). In his wake, cars and buildings are on fire. This isn’t a mature book, we’re not doing any Kid Miracleman bodies-in-the-street shit here, but MARK’S clearly bringing the robot ruckus.
NEW:
Panel 1. Wide. MARK walks towards us. White eyes, hand outstretched, people flying like ten-pins in front of him (at us, at everything) from a street-wide windblast. In his wake, the city's burning, people are screaming and running.
Like, that first panel description? Shit. "Blasting a windblast", the referencing-other-sources-for-an-effect stuff that drives at least one collaborator absolutely nuts, etc.
The second one? DREDD ON BIKE; just the facts, plus a little flourish ("at us, at everything") to get some atmosphere.
Steve Niles tweeted that his latest script was the most succinct yet at 1.5 pages of script per page of art. I suggested that maybe he was using the wrong word.
Yeah, I've always gone 1 for 1, unless a page has, like, 8 or 9 panels.
Multiple character introductions could also drive me to a second page for a single page, since I usually throw chracter design notes in italics under a panel description the first time a character appears.
From there I add or cut what I want for each panel, page, layout, character dialog, et.
This forces me to at least write *something* for each panel -- even if it's just a few words.
But often I will write a short paragraph, unless it's pretty obvious.
I always start with "Camera shows" because I want to know the layout of each panel.
So it would be, "Camera shows a worm's eye view of Enrique holding the pencil behind his back."
If I just left it open for *any* description then I would reinvent the wheel for every panel I write -- often dictated by whatever whim of an idea is floating through my head. This way I always come back to the visual angle first, then the details later. There's no sense writing about the pencil behind his back before knowing how the reader will see it, thus I always start with the "Camera".
I discipline myself by using a single page of script for each page of art. If it doesn't fit, I'm trying to cram too much "info" (dialog+art) onto the page.
I have a tendency to write rather briefly for myself (my most consistent collaborator), then when I discover that someone else will be illustrating it, I go back to it and add some of the "flavor" and "detail" that was obvious to me.
Comments
The flag was red, white and blue.
Also:
He was honest and energetic but also headstrong. Or:
He was honest and energetic, but he also was headstrong.
I can't tell you why these are correct, but after 25 years as a working writer it's second nature.
http://www.sfwa.org/2009/06/turkey-city-lexicon-a-primer-for-sf-workshops/
"It was all a dream" is only acceptable if it's a Biggie reference.
(That said, actual dream sequences, if you can pull them off? Beautiful. Not a whole lot of people can pull off dream logic, though. I don't think I could, without biting hard from Lynch or John From Cincinnati.)
Also, the trick to writing good sci-fi (or horror) short stories is to just never ever read EC Comics. You're going to rip them off anyway, but at least you'll come by it accidentally, and thus honestly.
(I have no idea if any of these commas are correct.)
Quest's Equivocation: Unless your client/employer uses a style guide that says otherwise.
Out of sheer perversity, I am now tempted to write a story in which the twist ending is that it was all a dream about Hitler and Eve.
(Although that comes from 20 years of experience as a writer and editor and probably came naturally only after making a lot of mistakes.)
A fair few of those quotes deal with overwriting (Twain's is my favorite), which is something I caught myself doing yesterday, actually.
Do you guys tend towards more towards the Alan Moore school (long ass panel descriptions), or the John Wagner school (DREDD ON BIKE aka the best panel description ever)?
I tend to aim more towards Wagner unless I need to really get across an effect.
This was me yesterday, choking on my own hot air, then taking another pass at it an hour or two later:
OLD:
NEW:
Like, that first panel description? Shit. "Blasting a windblast", the referencing-other-sources-for-an-effect stuff that drives at least one collaborator absolutely nuts, etc. The second one? DREDD ON BIKE; just the facts, plus a little flourish ("at us, at everything") to get some atmosphere.Yeah, I've always gone 1 for 1, unless a page has, like, 8 or 9 panels.
Multiple character introductions could also drive me to a second page for a single page, since I usually throw chracter design notes in italics under a panel description the first time a character appears.
I have a tendency to write rather briefly for myself (my most consistent collaborator), then when I discover that someone else will be illustrating it, I go back to it and add some of the "flavor" and "detail" that was obvious to me.