Your opinion on the story forum

[Prince Imdol]

In this thread, we should discuss the story forum, the people, and how we can get it popular. I think the story forum is..... dead. Save a few posts once every month.
Anthony has stopped posting Ikros, the story contest is over, and we rarely see any posts. (We did see the comic post by Ottoatm). Does anybody have any ideas at all that could make this forum come alive?

I suggest people who usually don't post in this forum, try to read some castle stories, like these....
http://www.ikros.net
http://www.freewebs.com/graynar/index.htm
http://www.ozbricks.net/andrastravia
http://www.freewebs.com/rohanador (I am so modest)

Read these and maybe try a story for yourself.

P.I

[Lamanda2]

The Story Forum is a great part of Classic-Castle, and I always enjoy checking in when there is a new story or comic to read.

I really enjoyed the Story Contest last year, and hope that it runs again this year.
I believe that would inspire some great minds around here to write something up.

"I think the story forum is..... dead."
It is a pretty inactive section of the site, but I think that's just because it takes time to write stories, and since most of us here are students, have jobs, families, ect. We just don't have that extra time to spend writing stories.

And without many stories posted, there isn't likely to be a whole lot of activity as far as commenting goes.

I've been wanting to do some more story work myself, and to come up with a new installment of my comic from last year. Just working on it very little by little, between building and customizing.

~Amanda

[Maedhros]

I think the story forum is..... dead.

And ironically enough there were new posts in four different topics when I logged on today, but yea, I quite agree with you.

The Story Contest was a great idea to promote some Story writing, but in some ways I think it's also sad that we have to have a contest to get working...

Oh, and if you want some stories to read there is quite a good list here.

[ottoatm]

I think you do have a point, PI. I guess a lot of it has to do with the time and effort required to 1st write the story, 2nd build the MOC, 3rd take the pics, and 4th do the photo editing.

In the beginning, I only saw Tony's great story and Kevin Hall's amazing photo work to go on, and I had no idea how much work they had done.

When I first started making Legelot, I found out quick!

Anyway, I think another reason the other forums are more active here is because CC has some of the most amazing builders of things LEGO that exist - certainly in the western hemisphere. People here tend to be lovers of the brick, and can build well with it!

Still, I was happy to see your story, and others pop up from time to time in the forums. Being a world away from my LEGO collection, I have to depend on you guys for some good LEGO story reading.

[TheBrickster]

As someone who sometimes enjoys writing about various Lego themes, I think it's really neat to see a forum/section dedicated to stories. Much of what I write about is my Ghost Town theme called Grave Stone, but I have done some other stuff.

What I think really adds to a story are some good pictures of your MOCs/sets. A picture does say a 1,000 words, but when combined with a strong story, a legend is created.

Perhaps I'll be contributing something soon. I unfortunately just shared a brief story about the Yellow Castle in the General forum. It probably would have been better posted here.

As far as a recommendation, a few of us were talking about a mystery. This might be a good place to share it.

[Tower of Iron Will]

As someone who sometimes enjoys writing about various Lego themes, I think it's really neat to see a forum/section dedicated to stories.

What I think really adds to a story are some good pictures of your MOCs/sets. A picture does say a 1,000 words, but when combined with a strong story, a legend is created.

I agree. I am in the process of starting a short story myself which is part of a larger story. I gain confidence but realize this kind of project can take a long time when doing it for the first time.
-Tower

[Maedhros]

As someone who sometimes enjoys writing about various Lego themes, I think it's really neat to see a forum/section dedicated to stories.

What I think really adds to a story are some good pictures of your MOCs/sets. A picture does say a 1,000 words, but when combined with a strong story, a legend is created.

I agree. I am in the process of starting a short story myself which is part of a larger story. I gain confidence but realize this kind of project can take a long time when doing it for the first time.

It will... whether it's the first time or not

[Prince Imdol]

Starting my took a heck of a long time. First I had to find time to type of the text which is the most important and time consuming part. Then, I had to get the scenes and vigs ready. Then I had to take pictures and upload them into the computer. It took a long time editing and uploading the page to freewebs.


P.I

[ZIGGY!]

Because this forum is for viewing and discussing stories, it needs stories. And because stories are very hard too make few are around. Perhaps we should also encourage short stories which instead of a book are only the length of a chapter or two. I wrote a pretty good story for an assignment last year, maybe I'll illustreate and post it. It needs a lot of MOCing though so maybe I'll make a new story with less variety in setting...

~Ziggy

[venvorskar]

I was (and still am) trying to write a Lego illustrated epic, but there have been several complications:

1. In early 2005, I had a complete story worked out for the first book, but realized that there was a big problem with it...It wasn't very interesting, and I myself probably wouldn't buy it if I saw it in a bookstore. So now I am trying to rewrite it to come up with a better story, but although I have some good parts, the story still isn't finished, and I just have to keep thinking about it until I get an idea.

2. This story is very epic, and would require some huge sets to be built if it were to look realistic. However, I don't have enough parts to build them, and not enough money to buy all the parts needed.

I might just post the story as text only when it's finished, and add pictures later. Even that could take a while...

[ottoatm]

I think some interesting points have been brought up about the troubles with story writing, photo-editing, etc. I just wanted to point out a few things about making LEGO stories.

1 - From listening to published authors and editors that work for publishing companies, I've heard that for almost any published authors (whether it be book or magazine article), the first, second and even third works they write are rarely published. Many famous authors have old books in their home that they wrote and never were able to get published.

>>The Point: Don't stress out too much about how good or bad your story is. Just enjoy writing and sharing your LEGO story. It's gonna take a long time to get your work to the level where masses of people will love it no matter what class you take or how many times your rewrite. Sometimes, one of the best ways to improve your work is to share it and get feedback.

2 - Working with LEGO takes time. The MOCs take time to build, and the photo editing process is long and each photo takes time to work on. And what's worse, after all the time you spend on it, it still won't look anything like what you want it to look like.

>> The Point: Try not to stress out about it. Do your best and publish it with pride.

The biggest problem is that if you have a story that is too long and epic, or your standards for the writing and/or photos is too high, you'll never have anything but a website or less. I know of people who have been talking about their "story" for over 5 years and have published nothing yet. That really doesn't add much to the community (IMHO).

It's better to actually make something you can share with others to enrich the community and share your LEGO Castle ideas.

Just my 2 cents.

Now get publishing!

[venvorskar]

>>The Point: Don't stress out too much about how good or bad your story is. Just enjoy writing and sharing your LEGO story. It's gonna take a long time to get your work to the level where masses of people will love it no matter what class you take or how many times your rewrite. Sometimes, one of the best ways to improve your work is to share it and get feedback.

I know, but I have some events in the story that I really do like, but they are scattered throughout the entire thing. I still need to find a way to connect everything together.

The old story was not very original, because it had a lot of things that are in many other fantasy stories. I want to write something new that hasn't been used before.

The sets don't have to be perfect, but I want them to be complete. An inn still has to be finished, and I need a castle. I also need a lot more trees, since this story takes place mostly in a forest. BTW, its called the Black Forest.

[Tower of Iron Will]

I know, but I have some events in the story that I really do like, but they are scattered throughout the entire thing. I still need to find a way to connect everything together.

The old story was not very original, because it had a lot of things that are in many other fantasy stories. I want to write something new that hasn't been used before.

That's easier said than done. I would only worry about obvious copying of some of the more known classics like LOTR, Narnia, Excalibur, Conan. If you are having trouble tying things together try looking at the motif of your story, like Star Wars(young boy finds old sage, discovers a princess in distress, rescues her and saves the day by destroying the evil Dragon(Death Star)). Maybe if the parts don't fit together into a common story line they could be split up into different stories.
-Tower

[The_Vanquished]

I haven't been reading much here, but wanting to start my own story, Maybe I will come to this Section more often.

[ZIGGY!]

You can always try to modify your ideas and have them split to smaller stories.

~Ziggy