Soo story idea thingies.

[Windrave]

Looking for some feedback and thoughts. So I decided to cross post this with the journal entry on my deviant art page.

So unfortunately I've hit the wall where I feel like I'm just doing what someone else is doing and I need to write/draw something that is more 'my own.' Yeah yeah I know 'there are no original ideas on the internet.' blah blah blah. But I still.. /feel/ that way. So in the effort to come up with something that is more 'mine' and not some 'inspired' work I've come up with two ideas.

Idea the first!
Title: A Change in Princess.
Synopsis: In a kingdom somewhere, there was a fair king who was once married to a beautiful, but wicked woman. Who died when she gave birth to a daughter who was as wicked as her mother, with none of her beauty. Enter the protaganist a young boy who was raised as a servant in the castle, and the only child of similar age within its walls. When the princess turns to stone on the eve of her 16th birthday, due to a curse handed down from her mother, the boy is enlisted in covering up the truth until a cure could be found. It starts out as crossdressing, but as the days go by, changes begin to happen.... he becomes more feminine, and the truth of his parentage soon becomes a factor.
Status: Part of chapter 1 is written, stalled due to changing ideas and concerns about the handling of the 'evil' princess.

Idea the second!
Title: (wip) Elemental Academy
Synopsis: The protaganist was just accepted into a prestigous magical academy! All he has to do now is perform the 'awakening' ceremony to reveal his affinity and alter self! Imagine his shock to find his Elemental self is female! Worse yet, the awakening always triggers changes in his 'resting' state.. now SHE has a whole new set of problems to deal with on top of her studies, magical duels, mysterious happenings, and oh dear god.. shopping!
Status: Mostly just a thought chart right now.

I could write either of these.. but I'm also toying with drawing them.. I know my art style leaves much to be desired, but its still an option.

so thoughts? (also is this the right place to post this?)

[The Second]

Here's my two cents: Just write. It doesn't matter what. As you are developing your skill you will start to find that ideas come more easily and more naturally.

As for ideas, unless you have a great memory, carry a notepad with you. You never know when a great idea will pop into your head; it might be in the middle of class, or while you're eating a sandwich, or on the toilet. ideas are whimsical things that love to come around right when you least expect them, and never bother to show up when you really need them.

[Haruki-kun]

The Winged Mod: Moved to Arts and Crafts.

[Windrave]

danke.. I had a blonde moment..

[shawnhcorey]

Your plots remind me of The Bone Doll's Twin by Lynn Flewelling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bone_Doll%27s_Twin). :smallsmile:

I have two questions for you:

What is your protagonist's desire. What do the what more than anything? That they'll do anything to achieve?

What is the emotional barrier that stops them from achieving their desire? That is, if they haven't achieve their burning desire, what is preventing them from doing so?

[Windrave]

Those are.. very good questions. The second one isn't really fully developed to that point.. however the first one.. well.. to boil it down.. 'he' wants a simple life , not a life free of responsibility, but one where his decisions wont reflect upon or potentially harm others.

His initial hurdle is of course his sense of duty to his king, which develops further as his lineage becomes known. Its more of a story of 'this isn't what I wanted.' and how they come to terms and still manage to find happiness.

[SirKazum]

One thing I like to do is get together two (or more) characters that seem to have good chemistry together and give them a dialog scene. Just have them chat about what's going on in the story, hopefully progressing the plot and exposing information about your setting, characters and plot through dialog. But the thing is, just having characters spend some time talking to one another makes them come alive, gives them a personality of their own, a "voice", until it comes naturally and you just know what this or that character sounds like or how he or she is likely to react to any given situation.

I've just finished writing the first part of a story with a couple of teenage protagonists (well, they're the protagonists for now), and I've loved writing it, just for the sake of spending some time with those two rascals. Just loved their chemistry. (It's the latest entry in the fiction thread in my sig :smallbiggrin: )

So yeah, that's my suggestion... give your protagonists a good friend each, who they can just relax and be themselves with, but who serve as foils, with personality traits that contrast to the main character and provide a different vantage point to what's going on - for example, if the protagonist's shy, the foil's outgoing; if the protagonist's curious, the foil's really jaded; that sort of thing. Use that to provide a little tension and challenge the main character's ideals, concepts and desires, so they're pulled out into the open through the dialog.

And (in my personal experience, your mileage may vary) keeping it friendly and light-hearted (at least with one "buddy" character) helps the dialog flow more smoothly, until it's time to meet your antagonists and let things get more serious.