Plotboard on an electronic notebook

Sunday, February 13, 2011

I'm a pantzer rather than a plotter, but I have set up an electronic plot board as a guide of where I should be in the book. Obvious benefit of an electronic plotboard is the portability. You can add information as you go along and make changes. Use different colors, fonts, etc. to help highlight turing points and POV's. 

I haven't experiented with it yet, but since a page length is unlimited in electronic notebooks, for the next book, I may try fewer columns for extra width and go with more rows. 

:) Carol

World building using OneNote

Sunday, February 6, 2011

One workshop at last week's Southwest Florida Romance Writers' conference was on world builing. The speaker was paranormal, urban fantasy author Kristen Painter. http://kristenpainter.com/

This seminar came at the most opportune time as I reworking a proposal and need to strengthen the world building aspect. Of course I immediately set up a OneNote electronic notebook when I got home.  I've set up the main tabbed sections as history, time, geography, location, culture, religion, characters, language, names, magic, rules, research and notes.

Then I've set up the subsections. For example, the subsections for culture are who's in charge, how government works, how money works, who has wealth and who doesn't, and class system.  Under location I'll rough up sketches using the drawing tools and also paste photos.  For notes I've already posted feedback from my critique group.

Instead of paper folders crammed with documents, I'll be able to search for certain information by simply entering a world or phrase. As this notebook grows, that is going to be a handy feature.

If anyone has tips on using OneNote for world building or any other organizational tips, I'd love to hear them.

:) Carol