10 Creative Block Breakers That Actually Work Doesn't matter what you call it: writer's block or creative block or simply "Where is my inspiration when I need it?!" All creative individuals find their work coming less easily at some times than others. That's when you need strategies, and plenty of them. There are at least 90 such tips, tools, and techniques in , edited by Alex Cornell, with a foreword by Erik Spiekermann. is a fresh compilation of practical, real world solutions offered by a range of creative individuals, including graphic designers, artists, writers, and photographers. These are people who are employed in jobs where they are required to be creative, regularly (brief bios are in the back of the book). The insights in this perkily designed, light-hearted, and useful little volume are sometimes amusing, often unexpected. to find it more compelling. Place an ink-stained handprint on its blankness so you have something to fix. You can't criticize the results. in your episodes of creative block. , not just one. Blocked?
Creative Writing Prompts Write a scene that includes a character speaking a different language, speaking in a thick accent, or otherwise speaking in a way that is unintelligibe to the other characters. (Note: You don't necessarily need to know the language the character is speaking—be creative with it!) Describe a character's reaction to something without explaining what it is. See if your fellow prompt responders can guess what it is. Write a story or a scene about one character playing a prank on another. Describe the scene from both characters' points of view. Writing Prompt: Write a story that involves confusion over homonyms (words that have the same spelling but different meanings) or homophones (words that sound the same but are spelled differently). For World Storytelling Day, share the best story you've ever heard or told by word of mouth, or have a fictional character recount their favorite story. You're making your way down a cobbled street when a stocky, red-bearded man beckons you into an alley.
The Ultimate Guide to Writing Better Than You Normally Do. Writing is a muscle. Smaller than a hamstring and slightly bigger than a bicep, and it needs to be exercised to get stronger. Think of your words as reps, your paragraphs as sets, your pages as daily workouts. Think of your laptop as a machine like the one at the gym where you open and close your inner thighs in front of everyone, exposing both your insecurities and your genitals. Because that is what writing is all about. Procrastination is an alluring siren taunting you to google the country where Balki from Perfect Strangers was from, and to arrange sticky notes on your dog in the shape of hilarious dog shorts. The blank white page. Mark Twain once said, “Show, don’t tell.” Finding a really good muse these days isn’t easy, so plan on going through quite a few before landing on a winner. There are two things more difficult than writing. It’s no secret that great writers are great readers, and that if you can’t read, your writing will often suffer.
Writing Exercises and Prompts for Journaling, Prose, Poetry and Memoirs These Writing Exercises are a collection of prompts originally published in The Journal Newsletter. The prompts include journaling prompts, prose prompts, poetry prompts, free writing prompts, and memoir prompts. Jump to the exercises you would like to see: Prompts Copyright © by Susan Michael and David Michael. Journaling Prompts Journaling Prompt - Imagine yourself in a place you like to be (not necessarily someplace you like to *go*). Journaling Prompt - Pretend that you see yourself walking into a room. Journaling Prompt - Create a list of images that symbolize the following: toughness, cruelty toughness, strength Journaling Prompt - Close your eyes for a minute and imagine you are skydiving. Journaling Prompt - Sit yourself in a favorite spot, or imagine an ideal place and describe it as an expanding bubble or sphere. Journaling Prompt - Hold your hands out in front of you, palms down. Journaling Prompt - By what do you measure your value as a person? Free Writing Prompts Poetry Prompts
Thirteen Writing Prompts. [Originally published May 4, 2006.] Write a scene showing a man and a woman arguing over the man’s friendship with a former girlfriend. Do not mention the girlfriend, the man, the woman, or the argument. Write a short scene set at a lake, with trees and shit. Choose your favorite historical figure and imagine if he/she had been led to greatness by the promptings of an invisible imp living behind his or her right ear. Write a story that ends with the following sentence: Debra brushed the sand from her blouse, took a last, wistful look at the now putrefying horse, and stepped into the hot-air balloon. A wasp called the tarantula hawk reproduces by paralyzing tarantulas and laying its eggs into their bodies. Imagine if your favorite character from 19th-century fiction had been born without thumbs. Write a story that begins with a man throwing handfuls of $100 bills from a speeding car, and ends with a young girl urinating into a tin bucket.
Where to Find Ideas for Writing a Story Ideas for writing a story It always seem like there are too many writing ideas or not enough. When you don’t have time to write, ideas come hurtling out of nowhere. Sometimes, they come so fast, you can’t even write them all down. Chances are, you’re not really out of ideas; you’re just not in the mood to write. Luckily, ideas for writing a story are all around you. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. What kind of stories do you write? About Melissa DonovanMelissa Donovan is a website designer and copywriter. Writing Fiction: How to Structure a Killer Novel Ending There are more than a few writers and teachers out there, many of them orders of magnitude more famous than I am (not hard to do), who don’t like to compartmentalize or even attempt to define the sequential parts and essential milestones of a story’s plot structure. Too formulaic, they say. Takes the fun and creativity out of it, they claim. When they do talk about how to write a book and, more specifically, story structure, they tend to dress it up with descriptions that are less engineering-speak in nature—“the hero’s journey” … “the inciting incident” … “the turn”—and are more appropriate to a lit class at Oxford. What’s interesting is that the stories these writers create, especially if they’re published, and especially the stories they use as examples in their teaching, follow pretty much the same structural paradigm. None of how story structure is labeled out there in workshop land is inherently wrong, nor does it really matter. Thank God for screenwriters. Not remotely easy.
How To Make An Animated GIF In Photoshop - 2014 Style Hello There! Angie here from Angie Makes. With the New Year right around the corner I thought it would be fun to go over how to make some festive Happy New Years- 2014 animated GIF images. Here's the end product we'll be making. These GIFs are fun, can liven up your blog posts, and are pretty easy to make with Photoshop's animation panel and a few handy Creative Market resources. Let's dive in. 1. 2. And then I needed the perfect girly font to match (also just $5. And because who doesn't love a paintely texture? 3. 5. Now here's the thing about the animation panel. Now. 6. 7. Here's to wishing everyone a very happy 2014!