10369 réponses à ce sujet

[Corker]

Sialater wrote...

You're actually supposed to put a foreign language in italics, grammatically speaking. It's a rule.

I suspect Creature1 is talking about a piece that used, say, italics for French, boldface for telepathic cat-people, underscore for hyper-spatial androids from Centarus, and all caps for the ship's AI.  All in the same fic.  In the same scene.  That would be...wearying.

I have noticed some comic strip artists who get away with a (small) variety of fonts for different races, but that's a whole different kettle of fish.

[Creature 1]

Corker wrote...

Sialater wrote...

You're actually supposed to put a foreign language in italics, grammatically speaking. It's a rule.

I suspect Creature1 is talking about a piece that used, say, italics for French, boldface for telepathic cat-people, underscore for hyper-spatial androids from Centarus, and all caps for the ship's AI.  All in the same fic.  In the same scene.  That would be...wearying.

I have noticed some comic strip artists who get away with a (small) variety of fonts for different races, but that's a whole different kettle of fish.

Oh, you read that one too? 

Yes, if I were writing a story I would either say they said it in Elvish or just italicize. 

[LupusYondergirl]

@Sia: I know you use italics when using a non-English word in an English bit of writing (IE "Heidigger's concepts of dasein and das Man made for a painfully boring final paper.") - I had to look it up when I wrote said boring paper.

What about when you say the character is speaking a foreign language but you actually write out the dialogue in English, though? I use italics for that as well, but I've never been entirely sure if that's correct and haven't seen anything in any of the style guides I've got lying around.

[Mahkara]

LupusYondergirl wrote...

I don't know... This may not be a popular opinion since I know people really like using the languages in their fics, but as a reader I wouldn't want to have to stop, scroll to the bottom for a translation, scroll back up and hunt for my place before going on just to understand what was going on. It's not like an actual book where you can put your thumb on your spot and just look at the bottom of the page. (and I'm not even fond of that, really... I feel like having to stop to read a translation midway through really breaks the immersion in the story)

I'm with you on this one. Unless it's something you can either figure out by context OR it's unimportant, I'm all for avoiding the foreign languages.  It just makes the fic hard to read, and I'm lazy.  

The only time to me that it makes sense to use significant amounts of a foreign language in a story is if you're pretty sure that your readers know the language (Tolstoy's use of French and English seems equivalent to this).  But otherwise, it's pretty annoying to have to translate.

...and don't even get me started on those who use the foreign language they've added in incorrectly!

[Glorfindel709]

Kind of an off topic question...I'm currently in the midst of trying to start my own DN Origin and I was hoping to get some tips for writing a fanfic..



A large bulk for the beginning of my story is going to involve the Legion of the Dead. Ive looked over the codex entry, the dragon age wiki, etc and there doesnt seem to be a lot of canon subject matter given. Is there some sort of faux pas of building up the already existing Legion into my own creation with traditions, mottos, ranks, etc etc or is it fine?



Do any of you have any knowledge of a sort of "guide to writing fight scenes" anywhere that I could peruse? I dont have any experience writing combat so Im kind of leery of trying to tackle it without possibly looking at some sort of example guide thingy merbobber so I can avoid the dumb mistakes and not make it look like a terrible action sequence

[Sarah1281]

Xandurpein has a helpful guide here.

[Sialater]

Corker wrote...

Sialater wrote...

You're actually supposed to put a foreign language in italics, grammatically speaking. It's a rule.

I suspect Creature1 is talking about a piece that used, say, italics for French, boldface for telepathic cat-people, underscore for hyper-spatial androids from Centarus, and all caps for the ship's AI.  All in the same fic.  In the same scene.  That would be...wearying.

I have noticed some comic strip artists who get away with a (small) variety of fonts for different races, but that's a whole different kettle of fish.

Oh.  My.  God.

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

Corker wrote...

I suspect Creature1 is talking about a piece that used, say, italics for French, boldface for telepathic cat-people, underscore for hyper-spatial androids from Centarus, and all caps for the ship's AI.  All in the same fic.  In the same scene.  That would be...wearying.

Not to mention distracting (as a reader). Considering bold and ALLCAPS are supposed to draw the eye, there's only so many times I can accidentally read a sentence further down the page that's in a distinctive font type before I get frustrated and either give up, or copy/paste into Word and remove all formatting.

[Creature 1]

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote...

Not to mention distracting (as a reader). Considering bold and ALLCAPS are supposed to draw the eye, there's only so many times I can accidentally read a sentence further down the page that's in a distinctive font type before I get frustrated and either give up, or copy/paste into Word and remove all formatting.

Unfortunately that won't help for the ~'s and **'s used as quotation marks. 

"Your hair looks stupid like that," he said.

**Your face looks stupid like that!,** she thought, but only said mind-to-mind to Third Person ~He is insufferable!~ 

They were interrupted by Fourth Person, who said in Exotic Foreign Language, //Please go do something useful for once.// 

Then God spake from heaven, "I HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF THIS NONSENSE," and smote them with lightning.  The end. 

Some of that's ok (if you're Death in Discworld, you have The Voice) but it needs to be judiciously applied. 

[inquartata02]

Creature 1 wrote...
 ok (if you're Death in Discworld, you have The Voice) but it needs to be judiciously applied.  

Ah, that brings back fond, hysterical memories of reading Good Omens. 

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

@Creature, o_O My...my eyes!

[soignee]

I have no problems with different fonts used occasionally. Discworld books are a great example- Terry Pratchett uses it not just for Death, and has used an arabic-looking font in one book (Jingo) to show the reader the joke of The Stereotypical Idiot Englishman Abroad that the "foreign" can understand him and speak Morporkia- uh, I mean, English at the same time. In another book he's done it for the voice of a God (Wintersmith) and even a cute little handwriting illustration ("I an't ded") to show handwriting.

It wasn't distracting. But what Corker described would probably be a chore for me to read, if only for the lulzy set up. (Lol cat people, lol...)

Modifié par soignee, 23 décembre 2010 - 03:41 .

[Maria Caliban]

I just want to finish one story by the end of the year.

Just one story.

Just ONE story.

JUST ONE STORY.

[Maria13]

Well, you have six days left. I promise to read it if you do.

[Raonar]

Maria Caliban wrote...

I just want to finish one story by the end of the year.

Just one story.

Just ONE story.

JUST ONE STORY.

What's stopping you?

And coincidentaly, the chapter I am currently working on has its action happening on the first day of the first month of 9:31, Dragon.

[inquartata02]

Maria Caliban wrote...

I just want to finish one story by the end of the year.

Just one story.

Just ONE story.

JUST ONE STORY.

That post is... strangely hypnotic.

Either that or I haven't gotten enough sleep. Either or.

[Maria Caliban]

Maria13 wrote...

Well, you have six days left. I promise to read it if you do.

That's sweet of you!

Raonar wrote...

What's stopping you?

I wrote the first draft and it sucked so I trashed it. I wrote a second first draft and it was better, but still not what I wanted, so I trashed it. Last night, I got an idea for a third first draft, and will hopefully write it tomorrow, which gives me five days for a second and then final draft.

I also had a request for a story-as-Christmas present but haven't even done brainstorming for that. There are also two more stories I want to do.

[jackkel dragon]

Something tells me my bonus Chirstmas chapter (meaning an update within the same month as another update, gasp!) is going to be delayed a day. It's the 26th already here, and I'm sleepy with a rough draft. It'll be up by 2011, I hope.



...and now I'm comment-starved. This may become my third update without comments/reviews. "Write for myeself" is so much easier if someone else is reading it... (I mean, I *could* have just kept the file on my computer only...)



Yeah, I'm sleepy and posting on the forums. No wonder I'm cranky. G'night.

[LupusYondergirl]

Jakkel: I find that I get more reviews when I'm on a frequent update streak, and most of the stories I read and continue to follow rarely update less than once a week or so. Have you thought about doing shorter, but more frequent, chapters? When I'm reading something if a month passes between updates I may forget that was a story I was following when I see it on the front page, or forget what had happened in the last chapter.

I'm thinking I may get another chapter out sooner than I expected. I posted a new AOA on the 24th and a new Blue Skies yesterday, the first of either in weeks because of finals, but it seems I'm stuck out of town for another day. My flight home was canceled because of the blizzard on the east cost of the US and the earliest one I could get rebooked on was tomorrow morning.

I suspect there will be a lot of time to kill before I actually make it home.

[Corker]

jackkel dragon wrote...

...and now I'm comment-starved. This may become my third update without comments/reviews. "Write for myeself" is so much easier if someone else is reading it... (I mean, I *could* have just kept the file on my computer only...)

Can you see pageviews?  I've had one comment on 'Dragon's Claw' in seven installments, but each chapter's been getting about 60 pageviews.  (Possibly... possibly... regular readers?!)  Maybe I have lowered expectations, but that's still enough to give me a warm fuzzy.

(ETA: I mean, on the forums here.  The draft chapers in my blog do typically get a few comments from my f-list.)

Modifié par Corker, 26 décembre 2010 - 04:25 .

[Maria Caliban]

jackkel dragon wrote...


...and now I'm comment-starved.

It's a horrible feeling. Hope you get some comments to nom on soon.

[inquartata02]

Is it 'man parts' or 'manparts' ?

[Sialater]

man parts

[Maria Caliban]

Good morning my fellow fan-ficers. *tosses out warm muffins and danish*

It's about 4:50 am here and I feel great. Just wish it wasn't still dark out.

Hope everyone is doing well with their work!

[Maria13]

Thanks for the muffins... Fellow Maria



Glad you feel well. I'm happy too, on hols in Spain sun shining and the fic is progressing nicely.