A few weeks ago, I saw a workshop on Savvy Authors Scrivener. It was a free workshop, so naturally I took advantage.
I had heard about it before and was interested, but it was only for Mac, which I don't have. Well, they recently came out with a Windows version, so I downloaded it and started playing around.
Holy Macrel!!!
I have always loved organization, but this is way beyond an organize freaks dream. The best thing is that it takes next to no time to organize things in it.
There are certain things every writer has to make sure is included in their story and other things to make sure remains consistent. I have always made notes of these things, character descriptions, traits, backgrounds. When writing scenes, I have to know my goals, and motivations, etc...
With scrivener, I can have all of this information right on the screen, or at the push of a button. If someone were to tell me this before I knew scrivener, I would think, "Yeah, sure and all the writing would be teeny tiny, too." But that isn't the case.
I admit, I've been thinking of getting a larger monitor since I started working with Scrivener, but the one I use is plenty big enough if I were to be honest with myself. I bought my 21 inch monitor before they started making all TVs and monitors widescreen, so it is square.
I used to sit down at a blank Word page and try to write. Now, I open Scrivener. I see the Binder on the left. It is a list of every document I have. It is in any order I want, and it can be color coded if I want. In the center is the Editor. That is the document I choose to work with.
On the right is the Inspector. That keeps all the information about a document. It can be removed from the screen, or I can keep it right there where I can refer to it anytime. What can I put there? Anything. I like to keep my goals, motivations, conflicts, and possible decisions my character needs to make. I can look at notes I made on the story in general, or notes on the scene or chapter.
I can also split the screen and have more than one document up at once. This is something I always wanted to do. Yeah, I can have more than one document open on Word, but I can't look at them side by side. Once when I went to the accountant, she had two monitors so she could see more than one window. I admit, I considered buying another monitor so I could do this.
There is also a corkboard screen. That is for those that like the 3x5 card method to look at information. I don't care for it all that much, but I do like that if I get to a point I'm not sure what should happen, I have information I can look at in more than one way to jog my brain.
Would I recommend Scrivener to a friend? Oh, yeah. I invite everyone to check it out.
What are the drawbacks? Before I send it out, I have to export it to Word. But, it takes seconds to do that. I have gotten used to using the comment section with Word. It is when I am doing a general read, and want to take notes for when I edit.The comments are there, but separated so the text remains the same. With Scrivener, I change the color and write within the body.
I admit, I am not familiar with everything, but I'm working on it. I'll give a Scrivener update should I come across something that is fabulous.
There are certain things every writer has to make sure is included in their story and other things to make sure remains consistent. I have always made notes of these things, character descriptions, traits, backgrounds. When writing scenes, I have to know my goals, and motivations, etc...
With scrivener, I can have all of this information right on the screen, or at the push of a button. If someone were to tell me this before I knew scrivener, I would think, "Yeah, sure and all the writing would be teeny tiny, too." But that isn't the case.
I admit, I've been thinking of getting a larger monitor since I started working with Scrivener, but the one I use is plenty big enough if I were to be honest with myself. I bought my 21 inch monitor before they started making all TVs and monitors widescreen, so it is square.
I used to sit down at a blank Word page and try to write. Now, I open Scrivener. I see the Binder on the left. It is a list of every document I have. It is in any order I want, and it can be color coded if I want. In the center is the Editor. That is the document I choose to work with.
On the right is the Inspector. That keeps all the information about a document. It can be removed from the screen, or I can keep it right there where I can refer to it anytime. What can I put there? Anything. I like to keep my goals, motivations, conflicts, and possible decisions my character needs to make. I can look at notes I made on the story in general, or notes on the scene or chapter.
I can also split the screen and have more than one document up at once. This is something I always wanted to do. Yeah, I can have more than one document open on Word, but I can't look at them side by side. Once when I went to the accountant, she had two monitors so she could see more than one window. I admit, I considered buying another monitor so I could do this.
There is also a corkboard screen. That is for those that like the 3x5 card method to look at information. I don't care for it all that much, but I do like that if I get to a point I'm not sure what should happen, I have information I can look at in more than one way to jog my brain.
Would I recommend Scrivener to a friend? Oh, yeah. I invite everyone to check it out.
What are the drawbacks? Before I send it out, I have to export it to Word. But, it takes seconds to do that. I have gotten used to using the comment section with Word. It is when I am doing a general read, and want to take notes for when I edit.The comments are there, but separated so the text remains the same. With Scrivener, I change the color and write within the body.
I admit, I am not familiar with everything, but I'm working on it. I'll give a Scrivener update should I come across something that is fabulous.
I'm a huge fan of Scrivener and have been using it for months now (Windows version), I love being able to drag pictures and web pages directly into the program instead of having to keep coming out when I need to look at something. The corkboard and outline tools are where my stories come to life, plotting as much or as little as I want and then I jump around the story as I write or drag entire scenes around. Great stuff :oD
ReplyDeleteI really need to check out Scrivener! It sounds like a great writing software. I just need to find the time to have a look and figure it all out. x
ReplyDeleteHi Faith,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you're liking the program! For commenting, Scrivener uses inline annotations, which appear in the text as a separate colour similar to what it sounds like you're doing, but they are specially formatted so they can be easily removed when you compile or can be compiled as comments--so when you open your compiled document in Word, you'll see them there as the margin comments you're used to. Formatting annotations is like working with bold or italic--it just toggles on and off, and you can turn it on and type or select text and turn it into an annotation. Format > Inline Annotation (Ctrl-Shift-A).
Thanks for blogging about Scrivener!
Best,
Jennifer
Literature & Latte