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Reply Subj: That's a tough one... Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2009 at 08:53:59 am EST (Viewed 393 times) | |||||||
Quote: ...because in my own personal experience, there's a huge rift between writing in freeform text and writing in visual format. It's why most books converted to movie need a screenwriter, someone experienced with a visual style.There's some technical stuff to master in screenwriting and one has to think visually as well as in dialogue but I'd generally prefer having someone who understands the character to someone who understands the medium. Movies are a more collective process than literary writing so it's far easier to have experts play catch up on the technial stuff than on the central vision. Quote: The advantages are it's easier to portray background idiosyncrasies, multiple people speaking at once with no real order to it (and leave the reader to figure out the order) and multiple events occurring at the same exact time.Yes. Although there's a series here in the UK "Spooks" ("MI5" in the US, I understand) that regularly uses split-screen to convey real-time simultaneous action. Quote: It's much more difficult to convey emotion in a visual format. Text allows you to spend more time on a particular feeling or event, visual formats demand you move on because it has a different sense of timing. But at the same time, comic format has a unique advantage shared with movies - you can use color and lighting to convey those same feelings without any words at all.I agree again. Comics other great trick is to be able to segue into flashback and expository information using visuals to help without it seeming such a big deal. Quote: That said, I actually believe Frank Herbert would be terrible in a visual format without some training. Or, for the most part, anyone who has a very technical, wordy style might have problems converting to the other style. The same with the classical Charles Dickenns, and probably Tolkien as well.Dickens could easily do dialogue. He translates to radio and TV pretty well. Tolkein needed some work but his movies turned out pretty good. Then again, Tolkein could really have used an editor who wasn't terrified of him anyhow. Quote: I believe the shining stars of comic/visual format out of your list would be: Edgar Allen Poe, who used words to paint visuals that I believe he would have physically painted if he had the chance (because of his repeated emphasis of certain themes about it); and not really surprisingly, William Shakespere, who originally wrote most of his works to be acted out on a stage - that format converts nicely to comic format.Good points all. | |||||||
