auroracloud: a stack of notebooks, one of them open and with pencil lying on top of it (writing: sketching/planning)
Aurora ([personal profile] auroracloud) wrote2019-06-13 12:12 am

Write Every Day: Day #12

(Uh, so it's technically the 13th here... I had this idea of going to bed early today, but guess that didn't happen.)

Does anyone know a good program or other resource for creating timelines? Specifically, something where you can create lots of different overlapping timelines... You know, such as you might need when you're planning to write a historical novel and need to keep track of what goes on in the world/nation/town/etc. as well as in your characters' lives, so you know what kind of events they might be affected by. I realized today when planning and plotting that I might need something more tailored for that purpose than just my Scrivener corkboards. I've so far been making do with timelines I've drawn on large sheets of paper, but the problem is, I still can't get all that detailed on them.

I looked at Aeon Timeline, which tentatively seemed like it might work, but while I'm sure 48 € is a fair price, I'm really low on spare money these days, so I'm open for other recommendations.

If I can't get anything that I like for a price I'm able to pay for such a thing, I guess I'll just stick lots of big sheets of paper together. (And trip over my timeline quite literally for the next few months. Hmm, this plan still needs some honing.)

Today's Writing

As can be inferred from the above, I did some planning and plotting and outlining for the novel today. Frankly, I'm getting a bit tired of planning, though - I want to get to writing! I just need to get some more things figured out with the research, and OMG get more names for people. And hopefully get more detailed timelines, yeah...

Tally

Day 1: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] falkner, [personal profile] luzclarita, [personal profile] shopfront, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] used_songs, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 2: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] falkner, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 3: [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] falkner, [personal profile] shopfront, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] used_songs, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 4: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] falkner, [personal profile] shopfront, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] tinx_r, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 5: [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] falkner, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] st_aurafina, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 6: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] ellieet, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme

Day 7: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] ellieet, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] st_aurafina, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] ysilme, [personal profile] yantantether (14 so far)

Day 8: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] ellieet, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme (14 so far)

Day 9: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] shopfront, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] st_aurafina, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme (15 so far)

Day 10: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] navaan, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] st_aurafina, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme (14 so far)

Day 11: [personal profile] alexcat, [personal profile] alexseanchai, [personal profile] auroracloud, [personal profile] carenejeans, [personal profile] cassini, [personal profile] china_shop, [personal profile] cornerofmadness, [personal profile] navaan, [personal profile] sierranovembr, [personal profile] silveradept, [personal profile] st_aurafina, [personal profile] sylvanwitch, [personal profile] talkingtothesky, [personal profile] yantantether, [personal profile] ysilme (15 so far)

Day 12: [personal profile] china_shop
hrj: (Default)

Q

[personal profile] hrj 2019-06-13 08:27 pm (UTC)(link)
I do tag my entries pretty consistently, I just don't know which of the 400 entries tagged "writing" it might be!

The specific timeline problem I was trying to solve was how to manage a complex, twisty, multi-character, broad-geographic-scope plot and still write in a fairly pantsy manner. The "dream timeline program" I envisioned was one where you'd have groups of entities (e.g., characters, locations)and those entities could have relationships (relative distances, things they knew or had experienced, etc.). The time-based relationships could either be anchored to specific points in a timeline (person A is in city B on date C) or could have > or < relationships (event X has to happen after event Y, and also after event Z, but events Y and Z have no specific relationship to each other). Or entities could have a relative relationship without being anchored (example: character D is pregnant, therefore a sequence of events is implied even if none of them are fixed in time yet).

The idea being that you could just start writing scenes, and filling in the essential timeline content of those scenes into the program as you go. The more detailed the timeline content, the more constrained your future plot choices get. (It takes a week to travel from point M to point N so event Q can't happen until a certain date.) And if you change any of the fixed timepoints, or you add in a new relationship that involves fixed timepoints or essential sequences, then it alerts you if you've created impossibilities.

You can layer in other relevant characteristics, such as seasons, etc. so that you're prompted to know information you might need in description. I write historic fantasy that's anchored in actual history, so I'd use it to keep track of real-time events that might be relevant to my characters, as well as things like astronomical data (is there a full moon?)or particularly important in my books, movable religious celebrations.

It was the sort of timeline concept that would be far too much work to create solely for the projects I'd use it on, but might be useful for other people if someone was inspired to create it.
hrj: (Default)

Re: Q

[personal profile] hrj 2019-06-14 02:43 pm (UTC)(link)
And an idly curious DW support person has managed to find the original entry. It has a more elaborate description of what I was trying to say above. Obviously, since the program doesn't exist except in my mind, it has no relevance to your original post, but I like closing the circle.

https://hrj.dreamwidth.org/286336.html