Day 94: Blocking before writing
As I mentioned yesterday, I decided to spend some time blocking my scenes before writing them. I’d been lazy/impatient and just dove into writing the scenes without doing much blocking, and my writing speed was a little slow the past few days.
(I mentioned this before, but for me, “blocking” is like blocking in a live play. It’s writing a step-by-step description of what happens in a scene to make it easier for me to write the rough draft. The concept is the same as the “beats” described in Write Better, Faster: How To Triple Your Writing Speed and Write More Every Day, but I call it blocking because “beats” is sometimes used to refer to high-level outlining. Blocking is also mentioned (although she doesn’t call it “blocking”) in 2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love). I also described where exactly blocking falls in my book creation process.
I spent 1 hour, 59 minutes blocking and Snowflake step 8 (scene spreadsheet) for the next few scenes, then spent 35 minutes writing. I blocked 3 scenes, but I only wrote part of one, so I can’t really compare how many words I wrote with how long it took me to both block and write the scene.
When writing for those 35 minutes, my writing rate was 1667 words per hour, which is a little bit faster than yesterday’s average of 1396 words per hour. Also, the writing noticeably flowed better since I’d done the blocking.
Also, I ended up doing the blocking in 4thewords.com. I copied my Snowflake step 6 (expanded synopsis) into a file in 4thewords (it didn’t count the pasted words as words written) and then started a monster and started blocking. I did 5 monsters for a total of about 2400 words, although I didn’t count that toward my writing totals today. It was really fun because I got the blocking done and I also defeated some monsters, which pleased my game-loving heart.
I did some errands in addition to my dentist appointment today, so I didn’t have as much work time as I normally would. I would have liked to spend more time writing if I’d had the time.
Time spent writing: 2 hours, 34 minutes
Total number of words: 917 words
Average writing speed: 1667 words per hour
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 20 minutes
My takeaway for today: Blocking made the writing feel smoother, but I’d like to compare how many words per hour I write when I combine both the blocking time and the writing time.
(I mentioned this before, but for me, “blocking” is like blocking in a live play. It’s writing a step-by-step description of what happens in a scene to make it easier for me to write the rough draft. The concept is the same as the “beats” described in Write Better, Faster: How To Triple Your Writing Speed and Write More Every Day, but I call it blocking because “beats” is sometimes used to refer to high-level outlining. Blocking is also mentioned (although she doesn’t call it “blocking”) in 2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love). I also described where exactly blocking falls in my book creation process.
I spent 1 hour, 59 minutes blocking and Snowflake step 8 (scene spreadsheet) for the next few scenes, then spent 35 minutes writing. I blocked 3 scenes, but I only wrote part of one, so I can’t really compare how many words I wrote with how long it took me to both block and write the scene.
When writing for those 35 minutes, my writing rate was 1667 words per hour, which is a little bit faster than yesterday’s average of 1396 words per hour. Also, the writing noticeably flowed better since I’d done the blocking.
Also, I ended up doing the blocking in 4thewords.com. I copied my Snowflake step 6 (expanded synopsis) into a file in 4thewords (it didn’t count the pasted words as words written) and then started a monster and started blocking. I did 5 monsters for a total of about 2400 words, although I didn’t count that toward my writing totals today. It was really fun because I got the blocking done and I also defeated some monsters, which pleased my game-loving heart.
I did some errands in addition to my dentist appointment today, so I didn’t have as much work time as I normally would. I would have liked to spend more time writing if I’d had the time.
Time spent writing: 2 hours, 34 minutes
Total number of words: 917 words
Average writing speed: 1667 words per hour
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 20 minutes
My takeaway for today: Blocking made the writing feel smoother, but I’d like to compare how many words per hour I write when I combine both the blocking time and the writing time.
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