Advice — pamela jaye smith

There’s MAGIC in the air, whether from Harry Potter’s wands or the wizards of Lord of the Rings. Ancient MYTHS come to life in modern forms from the Mayan calendar and Roland Emmerich’s 2012 to Slumdog Millionaire’s version of Orpheus and Eurydice.The principles of METAPHYSICS are all the rage in our personal lives from those Laws of Attraction promoted in The Secret to secrets of the gods and the afterlife as explored in Battlestar Gallactica. These three categories overlap, and each is a rich source of story material because they are some of the most enduring and popular ways we...

Film, TV, games, YouTube, graphic novels, manga, comic books, murals ... it's all visual art and depends on engaging the eyes in order to engage the hearts and minds of your audience, as well as their loyalty and their purchasing power. In this article, we'll look at a specific type of story, theme, subplot, scene, incident, attitude, and inference—those involving sex, love, and/or romance. The conscious use of specific symbols, imagery, colors, and shapes can heighten the impact and influence of your ideas, characters, and story.In order to better use this cinematic tool, we'll first briefly explore some of the...

Read the rest of the series: Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5. A lot of people believe that "Art" just comes into being full blown and word perfect straight from the cosmos, the collective conscious or unconscious, spirit guides, ascended masters, muses, angels, or aliens. Would that it were so. But then think how many development execs, story editors, writing teachers, and consultants would be out of work. Now some of you may say, "But my story came straight from a flash of inspiration down into my computer. I barely thought about it, I just wrote...

Read the rest of the series: Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 6 Some historians and anthropologists believe that the earliest art was created while under the influence of mind-altering substances. Well, duh. Artists, by their very nature, are a breed apart and have access to brilliant worlds but dimly perceived by what Hogwarts-trained magicians would call 'muggles.' Art, by its very nature, is the translation and transmission to others of perceptions of those numinous worlds through various media - petroglyphs, music, dance, drama, novels, movies, games, etc. Yet how can you the artist possibly transmit the...

Read the rest of the series: Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 5; Part 6 Archetypes are very in, very cool, very now. That's great. There are lots of fine books, seminars, and consultants to help you understand the various and sundry archetypes. That's great, too. But now, are you and your characters ready for the next step up? Are you ready for the ArchePaths? You may now be saying, "Good grief! I just want to write my stories, I don't want to have to deal with all this theory and patterns and craft stuff." Ah, but that's where...