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EXPERT SERIES
by Rachel Ballon, Ph. D. Our Price: In Breathing Life Into Your Characters, writing consultant and professional psychotherapist Rachel Ballon, Ph.D., shows you how to get in touch with the thoughts and feelings necessary to truly understand your characters- no matter what their background or life experiences. The following adapted excerpt is one of many favorite segments of this truly inspired book. -- Place Your Order Here >>
by Rachel Ballon, Ph.D. “Only connect the prose and the passion,and both will be exalted.” - E. M. Forster Emotions are the lifeblood of characters and of stories. Without emotional characters, you are just writing events, but you’re not drawing your audience into your story. To be a successful writer, you want to create emotional characters so your audience will become emotionally involved with them. It’s important for readers and viewers to become completely engrossed in the emotional world of your characters. As a script consultant and writers’ psychotherapist, I’ve analyzed thousands of scripts during the past 20 years where so much attention has been given to structure, plot points, turning points, and the climax. These are an integral part of writing a good script. However, I’ve discovered that unless you are able to inject your characters with emotions, your script will be boring, your characters dull and your story won’t work, even if the structure does. There is no life living without emotions. There is no heart in any type of art without emotions. Famous plays, films, novels, and poetry always evoke emotional reactions from viewers and readers. The word emotion derives from the Latin emovere, which translates as: to excite, to move, to stir or to agitate. Emotions are what motivate your characters’ actions in all stories, with the most basic emotions being the desire for security or self-preservation. Motivation always springs from some emotional need, such as the need for love, revenge, power, or the desire for control, fame, respect, or recognition. As a modern writer, you must have a deep understanding of the emotional and psychological world of your characters if you want to be taken seriously. Your awareness of these worlds enables others to be sensitive to the unseen motivations of your characters and the multiple layers of their personality. When you create emotional characters, you always need to start with yourself because the characters in your stories are all part of you. There are riches within that many of you never access because of fear of revealing the true you and of being too exposed. By going behind the façade of your characters, you’ll write ones with real meaning and purpose. Submerged feelings, once emerged will enrich your life as a writer and give your characters an emotional reality. You’ll need to answer questions about your characters’ emotional life such as: Is your character depressed? How does your main character emotionally relate to other characters? What is the emotional make-up of your main character and your major characters? As you better understand the importance of knowing how to inject emotions into your characters, you’ll be able to answer these questions for all of your characters in any story. Emotions are energy and when you write emotional characters you are giving them energy and momentum to take action and to overcome obstacles, especially emotional conflicts. Writing stories gives you the opportunity to create characters with strong feelings and layers of emotional depth, because such stories come from a place of deep emotional truths inside of you. -- Continue Reading This Article >> About the Author: Hailed "Doc Hollywood" by the "Los Angeles Times," Dr. Rachel Ballon is a licensed psychotherapist who works with both creative and business writers to help them achieve personal success. The author of "Breathing Life Into Your Characters" and "Blueprint for Writing: A Writer's Guide to Creativity" has worked as script consultant in the US and Europe, and as a screenwriter with the major networks and studios. She has taught at the USC School of Cinema and Television and led workshops worldwide. Contact her at RachWrite@AOL.COM.
by Rachel Friedman Ballon Our Price: More than a comprehensive workbook on structure and development for screenplays and novels, this book is a source of inspiration, a philosophy-based directive to make every word sing on the page. -- Place Your Order Here >> [ back to top ] YOU ASKED FOR IT
Our Price: You’ve rewritten, revised, and polished your script to perfection. Now it’s time to find the right buyer and sell your script! This package offers you all the tools you need to save you time and money on this time-intensive task. -- Place Your Order Here >> [ back to top ] SUBSCRIPTIONS UPDATE If you'd like to change your subscription email address, receive text emails instead of HTML, sign up for our Specials Bulletin or delete your name from the list, go to the bottom of this email and click on Update Your Profile. [ back to top ] HOLLYWOOD GATEWAY CONTEST Hollywood Gateway Screenwriting Contest Gears Up Okay, so you needed a little more time in 2003 to polish your script before entering it into a screenwriting competition - let me say this here and now: You only have 146 days left starting today to enter the Third Annual Hollywood Gateway Screenwriting Contest. Deadline to enter is May 30th, 2004. This contest is sponsored by the Writers Store, Final Draft and Scr(i)pt Magazine. The winning prize is a $5,000 check against a possible $100,000 purchase price, plus professional coaching on pitching and presentation, a copy of Final Draft, a subscription to Scr(i)pt Magazine, and a bunch of other goodies. If you enter just one contest this year, make it the Hollywood Gateway International Screenwriting Contest. Make this Your Year to Win! For more information, or to enter your script today, [ visit HollywoodGateway.com ] [ back to top ] FEATURED PRODUCTS Sell Your Story to Hollywood Buyers by Hollywood Network, Inc. Our Price: This two-day intensive networking event guides you from how to pitch your story to how to sell to Hollywood, and gives you the opportunity to pitch 1-on-1 to Hollywood buyers. Hosts include Michael Hauge, David S. Freeman, and Donie Nelson -- Place Your Order Here >>
by ScriptPerfection Enterprises, Inc. Our Price: Power Structure is outlining software with a story development heart. If you are a writer who’s learned your craft you want software that will learn YOUR system, YOUR terminology, YOUR dramatic sense. Power Structure’s fully customizable interface is designed to create the writing environment that totally works for you. -- Place Your Order Here >>
by LifeJournal, Inc Our Price: Password secure LifeJournal is a personal journal software program filled with innovative features to promote creative self-discovery. -- Place Your Order Here >> [ back to top ] SEMINARS - WORKSHOPS - CONFERENCES
by Melanie Anne Phillips Our Price: $199.00 Burbank, CA February 7-8, 2004 Join Melanie Anne Phillips, creator of StoryWeaver and co-creator of Dramatica, for this 2-Day weekend workshop, and discover a painless, passionate way to write. This step-by-step approach turns traditional story development on its ear and opens the floodgates of creativity! -- Place Your Order Here >>
by David Freeman Our Price: $350.00 New York, NY March 5-7, 2004 Los Angeles, CA March 13-14, 2004 One of the most popular, bi-coastal writing workshops in screenwriting and fiction techniques with the last seven workshops sold out. No fluff. No abstract theory! Just 200 proven techniques to create stunning characters, dialogue, plots and scenes and a money back guaranty. -- Place Your Order Here >>
by Pilar Alessandra Our Price: $350.00 With the beginning writer in mind, each week in this six-week course covers a new “step” in the writing process: brainstorming, pitching, outlining, formatting, scene writing, and polishing. Practical exercises, film examples, and individual attention help writers get their ideas out of their heads and “On The Page.” -- Place Your Order Here >> Gotham On-line Courses The Gotham Writers' Workshop offers an extensive variety of on-line courses for diverse interests - including all levels and genres of Screenwriting, Children's Books, Romance Novels, Mystery Tales and much more. What's so good about on-line courses? · Learn Anywhere: Students on all continents, submarines, aircraft carriers, RVs and space stations can attend. · You're Free to Roam: Classes are easily transportable, whether you're working inside or outside your home. · Learn At Any Age: Whether you're 91 or 19, just get yourself to the computer and you can become a better writer. · Choose From Many Specialties: Select the genre and level which best suits your talent and ideas, and get ready for spring. · Save Money: While you're working on your class assignments you're not shopping or dining out. For more information on the wide selection of Gotham courses, click here. [ back to top ] GATEKEEPER Q&A
by Howard M. Gluss Our Price: $24.95 Creating real characters can be a difficult process. This how-to guide examines various film characters and the traits that define them. Learn how to write more believeable, consistent personalities that will stand out on the page. -- Place Your Order Here >>
by Dr. Howard Gluss Lynn, a Writer/Producer from Palm Springs, CA Asks: In your book REEL PEOPLE you talk a lot about characters that seem to be quite disturbed. Can the theories of personality types apply to characters that are just quirky or eccentric rather than mentally ill? And are there specific personality types that are just plain funny? Dr. Howard Gluss Responds: Yes, Lynn, it is very valuable to note that the human psyche has many facets and a writer may not always be creating psychopathological characters. Not every movie has a knife-wielding mass murderer or egomaniac tyrant. As with most things in life, there is a continuum at play. It is best not to think of the personality disorders as described in REEL PEOPLE as disorders, but rather as personality orders - a series of recognizable and correlating behaviors. A diagnosis of mental illness depends on whether or not an individual meets a specific set of symptoms and the severity of those symptoms. Someone may win at everything for attention, whereas another may fail at everything for that same attention. -- Continue Reading This Article >> About Dr. Gluss: With a background in both the arts and psychology, Dr.Howard M. Gluss, author of "Reel People: Finding Ourselves in the Movies," is considered invaluable on matters of not only story and character, but the very nature of the creative process. He is called upon regularly by directors, writers, actors and producers to assist in bringing to life their most inspired creations. [ back to top ] DRAWINGS AND WINNERS Winner of the James Bonnet Storymaking Master Class Congratulations to our lucky winner, Chris Ellis of West Kingston, R.I., of our December drawing to James Bonnet's Storymaking Master Class, scheduled for Feb. 21 and 22 in Los Angeles, CA - a $300.00 value. It pays to read the Writers Store eZine! [ For more information on Bonnet's Master Class, click here. ] Drawing for Free Admission to Syd Field Seminar Don't miss our drawing to win FREE ENTRY to the Syd Field Matrix of Character Preference Seminar on April 2-4, 2004 in Santa Monica, CA - a $395 value! To enter, just send us an email to Workshop@WritersStore.com with your name, mailing address, phone number [required] with Drawing in the subject line. Entries must be received in our mailbox no later than Saturday, January 31, 2004 at 11:59PM. The lucky entry will be drawn and the winner will be notified by Monday, February 1, 2004. Sorry - but no prize substitutions can be made. Good luck!! [ For Information on the Syd Field Seminar, click here ] [ back to top ] NEWS YOU CAN USE One Entry, Two Festivals, One Low Price! Telluride IndieFest and Key West IndieFest 2004 are offering a Dual-Festival Entry Special! For complete information - and online entry forms - please go to: http://keywestindiefest.com or [ Telluride IndieFest 2004 ] Phoenix AZ Film Project Phoenix Film Project, whose major annual event is the Phoenix Film Festival, is now sponsoring an On-Line Arizona Production Listing, as part of its newly re-designed website, www.phoenixfilmproject.com. Producers shooting in Arizona can register their film and video projects to inform the production community and generate cast and crew resumes. Actors and below-the-liners will have contact information on up-coming productions. Phoenix Film Project sponsors industry-related activities year-round, including the Phoenix Film Festival, which is accepting entries of low-budget feature and short films until December 31st. The four-day Festival will be held April 1-4, 2004. In conjunction with the Arizona Screenwriters Association, Phoenix Film Fest is also sponsoring the 2004 Screenplay Search, a competition for film scripts that have not been produced and are not optioned. Winning scriptwriters will gain prizes and publicity. Dealine for the script competition is March 1, 2004. [ Visit Phoenix Film Project Website for details ] [ back to top ] Quote Character in decay is the theme of the great bulk of superior fiction. -- H. L. Mencken (1880 - 1956) US editor, satirist
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| All special pricing contained in this eZine will expire Tuesday, January 20, 2004. Please forward this eZine to your friends and colleagues. No permission required if forwarded intact. The Writers Store eZine may not be reproduced in whole or in part in print or posted on the Web or used in any other fashion without written permission from the Writers Store(R). To speak directly with one of our knowledgeable product consultants please phone toll free 1-800-272-8927 from US or Canada. International callers dial 01-310-441-5151 Ext. 2. Store Hours: Mon-Fri 10am-6pm Sat 10am-5pm The opinions expressed in this eZine are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Writers Store(R). The Writers Store eZine may not be reproduced in whole or in part in print or posted on the Web or used in any other fashion without written permission from the Writers Store(R). --- Address Changes and Removals, HTML or Text Format: Visit the Update Your Profile link below. E-mail about unresolved problems can be sent to eZine Editor! Please visit other sites by The Writers Store: HollywoodGateway.com | Screenwriting.info | Playwriting101.com Copyright (c) 1996-2004 The Writers' Computer Store(r), LLC. All Rights Reserved. |
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