The Art of Sims Storytelling
Hi guys! @CathyTea and I were talking, and we thought we'd try making a thread that would be focused solely on writing, especially Sims story writing. The writers' lounge thread is great for being ...
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Yes @RipuAncestor I have a handful of wordless chapters in Dust to Dust. They are actually some of my favorite chapters (and tend to be some of my readers' favorites too)! Like you said, the pictures can often tell a story of their own! That's part of why, in my SimLit writing, I don't do as much detailed description of scenery or even body language/facial expression... The pictures really do tell a lot!
Which leads me to your question...
What kind of relationship (or whatever you want to call it) is there between the text and pictures in your Sims stories? And yes, you can answer this even if there is no text or no pics in your story as well. That's a relationship too.
Okay, I will answer with two takes on this :) The all-pictures and no text answer, and the "normal" chapter answer :lol:
When it comes to my wordless chapters, I use them for moments when I feel it's best to let my readers 'fill in the blanks' for themselves. I don't know if anyone reading this plans on reading Dust to Dust but hasn't yet, so I will keep this vague to avoid spoilers :tongue: But I generally use them for showing character backstories (through flashbacks) but I have also used them for a couple of emotional moments or dramatic moments too, where I feel like words would almost take away from what's happening. It's hard to judge! I only ended up with 6 wordless chapters in my story and part of me would love to have done more, but there are only certain times when I feel wordless is "right". It all has to do with the type of impact you want to have on your readers.
Most of my chapters (in both D2D and PNN) are fairly typical -- words and text! I generally use the pictures to enhance the story, by showing characters' facial expressions and body language. For most of my chapters, you can take away the pictures and the all-text chapters would still work on their own -- but I think they wouldn't be as good. With SimLit, the visual element is important for sure!
Sometimes though, even in my chapters with words, I let the pictures tell part of the story. For example, in (Para)Normal Neighborhood (I feel less bad about spoiling this story, since it's not quite as serious :lol:) there's a chapter where my main character is eating and drinking magical things that are changing her appearance. I never use words to say what effect the food had on her -- I use the words to say how strange she feels as the changes are happening (which she does not notice, by the way) but I use the pictures to SHOW what sort of changes the food has made to her appearance. There's the perfect example of how the words and the pictures are kind of working independently of one another, but still working together toward telling the story. I have more subtle moments like that in D2D, but there are a few like that as well. :)
Which leads me to your question...
What kind of relationship (or whatever you want to call it) is there between the text and pictures in your Sims stories? And yes, you can answer this even if there is no text or no pics in your story as well. That's a relationship too.
Okay, I will answer with two takes on this :) The all-pictures and no text answer, and the "normal" chapter answer :lol:
When it comes to my wordless chapters, I use them for moments when I feel it's best to let my readers 'fill in the blanks' for themselves. I don't know if anyone reading this plans on reading Dust to Dust but hasn't yet, so I will keep this vague to avoid spoilers :tongue: But I generally use them for showing character backstories (through flashbacks) but I have also used them for a couple of emotional moments or dramatic moments too, where I feel like words would almost take away from what's happening. It's hard to judge! I only ended up with 6 wordless chapters in my story and part of me would love to have done more, but there are only certain times when I feel wordless is "right". It all has to do with the type of impact you want to have on your readers.
Most of my chapters (in both D2D and PNN) are fairly typical -- words and text! I generally use the pictures to enhance the story, by showing characters' facial expressions and body language. For most of my chapters, you can take away the pictures and the all-text chapters would still work on their own -- but I think they wouldn't be as good. With SimLit, the visual element is important for sure!
Sometimes though, even in my chapters with words, I let the pictures tell part of the story. For example, in (Para)Normal Neighborhood (I feel less bad about spoiling this story, since it's not quite as serious :lol:) there's a chapter where my main character is eating and drinking magical things that are changing her appearance. I never use words to say what effect the food had on her -- I use the words to say how strange she feels as the changes are happening (which she does not notice, by the way) but I use the pictures to SHOW what sort of changes the food has made to her appearance. There's the perfect example of how the words and the pictures are kind of working independently of one another, but still working together toward telling the story. I have more subtle moments like that in D2D, but there are a few like that as well. :)
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