Story Writing: Keeping Track of Your Story Ideas

1. Introduction: In a perfect world, we'd get a complete idea about what we needed to be about when we needed it. But unfortunately, that's not how the world really works. Instead we get an idea when we're working on something else, or just a tiny little inkling of something that's not enough to do anything with. In that case, it makes sense to have some idea storage system. You can put those ideas away for later for when you can actually use them. My name is Kate Campbell. I'm a hybrid author, which means I'm both traditional and Indie published. Aside from that, I'm an editor, book formatter, cover designer, and I'm the manager of Indie Co Op Turtle Deck Press. This class is part of the writers motivation series, which is designed to help authors find the processes that will work best for them. To help them write as much as they can, as efficiently as they can, and to reach their writing goals. This class is for all level writers who want more organization for their story ideas. For anyone who is sick and tired of having idea and writing it down somewhere, then not being able to find it again when they need it. There's two main goals for having an idea storage system in place. The first is it helps you organize your story ideas so that you can find what you need when you need it. The second is, if you're working on something bigger, like a novel or a series, it helps you have everything in one place so that you can find it. By the end of the class, we'll have talked about why you want an idea storage system, different ways you can set up an idea storage system using both analog and digital methods. Then we will talk about how you can set up your own idea storage system. That's going to work for you. Let's go. 2. Why Keep Track of Story Ideas?: All right, let's talk about why we want to keep track of our story ideas. First of all, what is a story idea? In this case, we're using the term broadly. And using it for any story related idea that seems like it might be usable in the present or the future. In general, story ideas fall into two categories. Ideas you can use for new stories and ideas you can use for existing stories can be literally anything. But for a new story, it might be a character, a plot line, a scene, a setting for an existing story. It might be a subplot, a plot twist, or some backstory for your characters or your world. If you would like to learn more about story ideas in general, please check out my premise versus plot course. Story ideas are great, but the fact of the matter is that you rarely get them fully formed where you can start writing immediately and have everything you need. Instead, you tend to get them in bits and pieces, or have to work with your initial idea to expand it enough to be able to use it for an actual story. Having a way to keep track of story ideas accomplishes two main things. First, it keeps ideas where you can find them. Again, I don't know about you, but I've certainly lost ideas over the years. I might plan something out in my head only to find the specifics or the whole thing has disappeared by the time I sit down to write it. Or you might write something down someplace random, like in the margin of a notebook or on a spare piece of paper, and then lose that piece of paper by the time it comes to use it. Secondly, keeping track of your ideas gives you a warehouse of ideas to search through when you need inspiration. This warehouse has a number of different names. A Little Darling's Cafe, a concept file, I just call mine random ideas. Pure and simple. Basically, anytime anything catches your fancy, an idea, a name, a concept, you write it down. Then if and when you need a story for a specific purpose or to round out a story that already exists, you can go back through your warehouse and see if there's anything in there that will work for your current needs. Now we know why we want to keep track of our ideas, let's talk about different ways to do so. 3. Idea Storage: In this video, we'll discuss the topic of ideas storage. Story ideas typically come in two different forms. As we discussed last video, you may have noticed things that you find interesting but have no immediate use for. Such as theoretical concepts, Lines of dialogue, character ideas, hypothetical situations, et cetera. These would be stored in the idea warehouse we talked about or whatever you choose to call yours. The other idea is a more complete idea that you may or may not be intending to work on in the near future. These are ideas that are either more complete or have had some work done on them to make them potentially viable stories. This type of idea often contains aspects such as characters, setting plot points, and even specific scenes or dialogue. When you're organizing your ideas, you should make sure to use a system that's going to be useful to you in the future. Well, it is usually helpful to keep all your random ideas in one place and then move them. If you find a story they're going to work for Each more developed idea should have its own place so that you can make sure that all the information relating to that specific story is easily found and accessible. This can be a section within a larger storage place which can be helpful for related stories or series, or in its own document. In the next video will briefly cover the idea of a story Bible. 4. Story Bibles: Story Bibles are a type of idea storage that can be useful for novels and series. A Story Bible is specifically a place to store all information related to a longer work, such as a novel or a series, to maintain continuity and make sure that all necessary information is easily accessible to the author. This is an excellent way to keep track of important data or even unimportant data to make sure everything stays straight across a longer work. So you can avoid embarrassing mistakes like having a character's eye color change in the middle of the book, or even worse, their name. So easily find information like what hotel characters stayed at in chapter three without having to try and send information in the depths of the manuscript, which can be a waste of time and energy. How do you make a story Bible? In the following videos, we're going to discuss a number of different ways to organize and keep track of your ideas. Many of these can be expanded for a bigger idea, like a story Bible idea, organization tends to be rather personal. You may need to try out a couple of different methods and see what works best for you. In the next video, we'll explore ways to use analog storage systems to organize your story ideas. 5. Analog Storage: In this video, we'll look at analog storage methods. Analog in this case means not digital. I not having to do anything with a computer, a phone, or the cloud. Analog in most cases means notebooks. There's a number of reasons you might consider using a notebook for your idea storage system. The first being that there's some things you can do easier in a notebook than you can on the computer, such as draw important plot stuff or maps, or work on something that has multiple iterations like naming or making up a language. Secondly, notebooks require no electricity, no internet. If you're going someplace where you know those are going to be scarce, you can still bring a notebook if you want to work on planning story ideas or expanding other story ideas that you already have. Third notebooks are easy to carry around. In some cases they're going to be more acceptable to use in various situations where pulling out a laptop might be inadvisable. Lastly, some people prefer using something. They can touch over something that's digital. There's multiple ways you can use a notebook for your idea storage system. You can do different notebooks for different stories. You can get a big notebook with multiple sections and use each section for something different. Or you can use one notebook as a free for all and just write down whatever you have a page for, A new story idea, page to expand a previous story idea. Or maybe jot down a scene or something. Although the problem with that is then it's going to be harder later to find information for particular stories. Choosing the right notebook can be an important step of this. If you are anything like me, if you buy fancy notebooks, you will not use them here. Two notebooks from my notebooks. They're very pretty. I have never, ever used them. I find that the problem with fancy notebooks is that there comes this feeling of obligation that you need to use it for something important. Nothing ever goes into them, because not necessarily feels important enough. If you are at all like me, do not spend $20 on a fancy notebook that you are not going to use. Most of the notebooks I use are just your plain old notebooks that you can get anywhere. This one, I think, was actually a notebook from when I was a kid, where I was copying hairstyles out of a book that got converted to a writing a book later on in life. Don't waste your money if that's not going to work for you. Another thing to consider is size. If you want something that you can always have with you, you're going to want something tiny probably that can fit in a pocket or a purse or bigger bag if you happen to have it with you. But if you don't feel like you need that, you can go as big as you want. I like the big ones personally, because there's so much more space for expanding things. Depending on what part of the story I'm working on, that is something to consider. We talked about how to choose your notebook. Now let's talk about what goes into your notebook. Yes, my favorite color is green. If you just want to notebook to write down story ideas, as you think of them, you can just jot them down, then look back through them later on as you need them. I tend to use the same notebook for ideas and for short stories. For a short story, I would just outline it on a single page if you're working on a novel. The nice thing about a notebook is that you can basically put everything in the same spot. I like to do stuff that's a little harder to do on the computer, like work through con, linging or coming up with names, drawing maps, working through themes and characterization. It depends on what you need in order to start writing. Everybody's different on that. Some people need a lot of information and some people don't need very much. The nice thing about notebook is that you can work through your thoughts as they come to you. And then organize them when you back them up. So that you can use them in a manner that is more efficient. If you are someone who likes to draw things for your stories, then a notebook is definitely very helpful. Unless you are a digital artist and can draw on the computer, I'm not terribly good at drawing on the computer. I prefer notebook. You can use like an actual drawing book for this too, like maps did that so I could find my place maps or research. This is for a story I'm about to write where most of the story takes place on a boat, on a sailing ship. Here. Then I can see what I'm doing and it's all in place. That's how I use mine. Of course, you would want to do what works for you. If you have a different organizational system in mind, go for it. What's important is that the system works for you and that you can find the ideas when you need them for your actual writing. If you are going to use a notebook for your idea storage system, it is very important that you keep track of where it is. I had a notebook book just like this one. I wrote down an entire story in it. I plotted it all out, and it was ready to go. And then that notebook disappeared, and I have not seen it to this day, 15 years later. One thing to do, you can back up your notebook information online. You can type in your text, you can scan your pictures, you can scan the whole pages. And then you don't have to worry about typing. But a way to either keep track of them or back them up is necessary. Now you don't have to use a notebook or an analog system. There are other things you can do. Some people like to use note cards. The appeal of note cards is that they're module, they're easy to move around. That's especially useful if you're working on expanding an idea into a novel. Because you can write different things on different cards and then move them around to see how the story works in different orders. Same thing with note cards. You've got to back them up. Either do that on the computer or have a system where you know you're not going to lose them. I know some people punch holes in the corners of the cards and then put them on a ring so that they're all in one place and they can't wander off. Some people get one of those index card boxes and use the organization there to keep their cards straight. But you do need to have a system in place where you're not going to be losing things. Aside from note cards and notebooks. You can also use whiteboards or chalkboards, although you're going to want to back those up more often, obviously because they're easily erasable. In our next video, we are going to talk about digital storage systems. 6. Digital Storage: In this video, we'll look at digital storage methods. Now we're talking methods that involve computers and the internet. There are a lot of benefits to storing your ideas digitally. For one, it's way easier to back something up. You can e mail a document to yourself or upload it to a cloud server and not have to worry about typing up your handnotes. First, you can search when you need something specific, whether it's a character's name or a specific scene, or even the document itself, to find where it is on your computer. Instead of digging through a stack of papers or notebooks, you can edit information with a few mouse clicks or key presses, you can copy and paste stuff between documents much, much easier. It's not all perfect. Of course, files can become corrupted or accidentally overridden by a new or different file. Servers can be hacked though, to be fair, unless you're Stephen King or JK rolling people are unlikely to be trying to steal your story files. You can get locked out of an account if you forget your password. But in general, digital storage methods are fairly efficient and safe. Let's talk about different apps and programs you can use for a digital storage system. First off, we have word processing software such as Microsoft Word or Open Office, or any of the other alternatives out there. There is something to be said for a good old fashioned word processor. Cloud specific programs like drive stocks can get bogged down if they get too large. With a word processor, you can keep multiple files in a folder on your computer or on the cloud so that everything is nicely organized and then easy to find. You can use programs like Ever Note or Google Keep, or Apple Notes. These are note programs that you can put on your phone and your computer and then can sync across devices. These are good for quick notes, although they're not great if you're going to try and write a story in them, they're a good way to jot something down to then move it someplace more permanent. When you get around to it then, you don't have to worry about your notes getting lost. In the meantime, you can also use apps like Pinterest or Spotify if you to something other than just text based storage. Pinterest, if you are unaware, is a social media platform for images and videos where you can organize them into however you want and you can do sub boards as well. Pinterest can be very helpful if you like visual prompts, you can do general ideas, you can have board specific for research, you can have story specific ones. I use Pinterest for a lot of my idea storage. If you are music oriented, you can use an app like Spotify or Youtube or really anything that allows you to organize music in some way. You can make playlists, you can make radio stations based on specific artists. Basically, when choosing a music service, make sure you're using one that allows you to find the type of music you need for specific songs when you need them. Scriptner is a jack of all trades. It can be used for organization, for actual writing, to store your notes. I don't personally use it because it's almost too much organization. But I know a lot of people swear by it. It keeps everything in one spot for you. So you don't have to ever go anywhere else for anything. You do have to pay for it though. It can also help to look at organization programs that are designed for keeping track of projects for work. I know writers who use an alternative called notion that does the same thing. The alternatives might be for you, they might be pay or they might have options that are pay. You just need to look at what you're getting and decide if it's what you need. Then we have Cloud programs such as Google Drive, Microsoft's One Drive, and Cloud which are like computer files that are on the clouds. You can access them from any device as long as you have the Internet. The nice thing about Google Drive over some of the other alternatives is that you can generate your own documents within Google Drive. With some of the other ones, you have to make the documents on your computer and then upload them. Whereas Drive, you can create documents and spreadsheets within Drive itself. In our next video, we'll talk about how to set up your own idea storage system. And we'll also go through the project for this class. 7. Wrap-Up and Project: Now that we've discussed various ways to set up your idea storage system, it's your turn to give it a try. Remember that you're going to want separate methods for your general ideas versus more complete ideas or specific projects. Feel free to try any of the methods we talked about or multiple methods. You can combine methods as well. As you saw in the previous videos, I use a combination of Notebooks, Pinterest and Google Drive for my storage system. That's what works for me. But you should see what works best for you. If you're going to try an analog system as part of your storage system, make sure you buy your supplies before you get started. You can buy notebooks, note cards, cork and whiteboards, pen and pencils at craft stores, office supply stores, and most general or department stores such as Target. Remember that there are different types of these types of supplies to make sure you're getting the ones that are going to work for what you want to try. If you want multiple things in the same notebook, get a multi subject one. If you want something you can take with you, get a tiny one. Things like that. If you're going to try digital, well, assume you have access to a phone or a computer and the Internet. Since you're taking this class, it may help to map out what you want your system to look like before you put it into place. Such as what files and folders you're going to use and where, that way you can have an idea of organization before you get going. But the nice thing about a digital system is that it's pretty easy to move things around and to rename things if you need to. Just make sure you're not deleting anything that you haven't backed up somewhere else. Can also be helpful to decide how you're going to back things up before you start using your system. That can be things like, are you going to type up your handwritten notes into a digital document or are you going to upload a new version of your file to Dropbox or your file server of choice every month. If you lose your idea warehouse, well that's not great, but it's not that big of a deal. You can have more ideas, but if you something big, like a series Bible, that's going to be really hard to replace. Once you have your system set up, you should move any ideas that you currently have into it, both to make sure that the system is going to work for you also, so everything is in one place and hence easy to fund. Feel free to tweak things until everything seems like it's right. I'd love to see the systems you put into place. So if you could upload a screenshot or a picture into the project gallery, that would be super awesome. That's the end of class. Thanks for watching along. I hope that you've found a storage system that's going to work for you and happy writing.