I’ve been a little quiet the past couple weeks, but that just means I’ve been busy writing. Quick recap of what I’ve worked on the past couple weeks: producing 50 pages of tech documentation, getting ahead on Brat-halla to get through the busy convention season, competing in the first round of the Screenwriter’s Challenge 2007 (I was in heat 11, genre: horror, category: prison… I’ll post it up for everyone to read once I get confirmation to do so from the contest), writing up a new “Creative Adviser” article, working on some screenwriting drills (details below on what I’m doing), revising plots/scripts of an existing property of mine for a different format for online use (more on that later), outlining a book (yes, one of those non-comic, non-screenplay thingies), moving the last of my “Breaking Out! articles over to the new site, and researching a few proposals/projects in various stages of approval/development. Not too bad for a part-time writer.

Misc. ramblings…

• 8 Emmy nominations for Heroes. Congratulations to the team putting that show together… very well-deserved.

• For those that enjoy a little mythological fiction (not that we’d have anyone like that around these parts): Coyote Road: Trickster Tales.

• Farscape! I miss that show… but not for long. The SciFi series is getting some new life as a series of online short films as part of the online programming for SciFi.com’s Pulse.

• “When you are not practicing, remember, someone somewhere is practicing, and when you meet him, he will win.” –Ed Macauley

I’m that guy. I’m practicing, and I’ve been finding some fun ways to do it. My current workout routine is for getting more comfortable with screenwriting (I still have a habit of throwing some of my comic book writing tendencies into my screenplays, so I’m focusing on fixing that), and I thought I’d share the current exercises I’m doing.

First, I grab an existing movie script (they’re easy to find) and a DVD of the movie its for. Second, I grab a decent-sized scene, and I write the scene out based on what I see and hear in the movie. Third, I jot down notes on how this scene impacts the movie and note the changes occurring on an emotional and character level during that scene. Fourth, I compare the script I wrote for the scene with the original script and see my work up against professional/sold material.

Sure, it doesn’t always work out because of the changes a script goes through during the development of a film (sticky fingers leave fingerprints all over the story), but it at least gives me a short-term goal for use in a regular practice routine and a means of analyzing my progress. Up-and-coming writers, give it a try… you’ll be surprised what you find.

• San Diego Comic-Con approaches. I’ll be in the belly of this beast of a convention having fun, meeting lots of new people, and probably walking away with a few new friends. If you’re there, I’ll be helping out at the Shadowline table over by the Image Central booth off-and-on, so feel free to stop by and say, “hello”. Fair warning, blogging might be light during the convention because I won’t have my laptop with me, but I’ll see what I can do. I think I can post from my cell phone, so I’ll have to test that out.

• Weight loss goal for 2007: 50 lbs. Weight loss achieved (as of this morning): 41 lbs.