Developing New Worlds and News

Developing New Worlds has been my absolute favorite class, and now that I'm officially done with the class I wanted to write about everything I learned in class. The teacher was very cool and understanding. In my first week of the class I made a HUGE mistake, one that the teacher had never seen before. Instead of filling out the research sheet I was supposed to I wrote a research paper. The teacher could have given me a zero, but instead he saw that I had learned something throughout the week, so he gave me points for the assignment anyway. 
Throughout the class we were working on one story world of ours that meant a lot to us. The class had notes that would help us with research, discussions about some of our characters, and research "papers". We would discuss characters and how the location and the time period of the story shaped our characters. We also got a free for all week as well where we got to talk about special details about the story. For the last week we had to create a story bible. The assignment was open all month, so I pretty much worked on it all month. 
I talked about Cassandra Atwater, Celeste Baker, and Aria Kuester this month. I spoke about Cassandra and how the location affected her, how Celeste was affected by the time period the story takes place in, and I wrote about what Aria thinks of the world she is. 
These were the questions we were told to consider...
Questions To Consider:
  • What are the defining characteristics of your character’s physical appearance?
  • What apparel and ornamentation (make up, tattoos, jewelry, hair style, etc.) does the character have?
  • How does the character’s appearance indicate their place in the community, if at all?
  • How does the character’s appearance reflect location?
  • What questions do you have about your character? What do you need to research?
Questions to Consider:
  • How does the time period influence your character’s physical appearance? If not, why?
  • How does the time period affect your character's behavior, thoughts, or decisions?
  • Does the time period influence any restrictions or role definitions for your character? (These include ethnic, faith, gender roles, etc.) Please explain.
  • How is your character influenced (internally or externally) by the time period of your story (the moment in time in which the story takes place)?
  • Genre writers -- what time period does your imaginary or speculative world most closely resemble? Or, what elements draw upon historical reference of some kind?
  • Technology is often a great indicator of time period. If your character uses technology in any way, what time period does it best represent?
  • What questions do you have regarding the time period of your story? What do you need to research?
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
  • How does your world setting influence your character’s personality or behavior? If not, why?
  • How does place in society (think location or time period) influence your character’s personality or behavior?  
  • What other backstory influences of the setting impact your character’s behavior and personality? Consider ethnic, faith or gender roles.
  • How does the character’s personality and behavior impact the story?
  • What Hero’s Journey character archetype does your character most resemble?
  • What questions do you still have about your character’s personality?
I don't remember if I said this, but since I haven't blogged in a while but Cassandra is a music nymph, Celeste is a weretiger, and Aria is a witch. One of the comments on my discussions was "I've often said that if I was an alien, I would steer clear of planet Earth. Humans are not nice and should we ever encounter alien life, I hope it happens long after we have gotten rid of our bad habits!" when I was talking about a part coming up in Fight for Equality. The comment was made by the instructor. 
The whole class was fun, and my classmates were amazing. 
The big assignment, the Story Bible, asked for details I've never thought of like historical background information, locations and details about them, and additional world information like species in the world, story synopsis for both Head Hunters and Fight for Equality, and a reference list from everything I used in the class. The story bible also wanted premise, information on main and supporting characters, story synopsis (for both), and excerpts. 
One of the things I love about being a student at Full Sail is that you get to work on characters that you love and get to work on this universe you're passionate about. I can use notes from this class for Fight for Equality and my website. 


I also redesigned my website with a new host, so if you want to check it out Kaylyn's World in Words. I'll be updating it more tomorrow, and if you want to write a testimonial of my writing that you read or you have any questions you can email me at kaylchels@kaylynsworldinwords.com

You can learn more about me FAQ or here
I hope everyone has been doing well. 


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