Stamping Out Badfic: The Fanfiction Workshop

[caejones]

I kinda think how you handle anything depends largely on what you're hoping to accomplish.
Fights... what's the fight do for the story? What sort of perspective are we going for?
I pulled a hipocracy and only read about half of Xyex's example ( Now I'm going to have to read the whole thing so I don't feel like a sibling of Shuu...), but it seemed that pacing and characterization were handled pretty well.
(Also, the Goku/Vegeta fight early in Kaboom's GT Revised. XD ).

Something I did a few months ago was to take a fanfic I wrote a few years ago and write a script for it (with actionfigure movie in mind, though that has yet to happen. ). Since most of it is likely to be still shots (Which... kinda makes the Yoda Vs Buu fight difficult to figure out. ), there's a lot of... adapting? That goes into it.

(I wonder, could blur or transparency effects help make a single comic panel imply more than a few blows? Sparking / Legends - style fighting in particular, where things can be monotonous for a bit... it'd be better to show how the fight progresses rather than every blow, but if more can be ipmlied in a single image...* ).


* Yeah, um, I have no idea how comics handle this. :'(.

[JulieYBM]

Might be best to first write the actions taken than go back and spruce up the choreography so it sounds better in word.

[Rocketman]

I got a question for this ol' thread.

How do you do sight gags in fics?

[caejones]

What kinda sight-gags we talking about?
Though, something I've seen that kinda works well in some fics is setting up scenes in such a way that it's kind of easy to invision camera angles and such... if things can be framed like that it might Help?
(... more than my this post, I'd imagine. . )


(And it's kinda late, but the "plan for page limitations" comic adaptation thing is an interesting writing exercise... granted, I was working with "cram all of this text into this much space", but yeah, fun.)

[Dayspring]

Here are three rules every DB fanfiction writer should always apply to their story, regardless of how far from canon they wish to diverge:

1) If your hero or villain has a plan. It MUST fail somehow. This goes for any form of fiction; show, don't tell. Either the reader will not be privvy to the plan until they read it being carried out, or the plan will go horribly awry. For the most part, Toriyama chose the horribly awry route.

2) Left field is just as important, if not more-so, than right field. This means that impossibly unforseen (even random) events take priority over the plot. Example: the androids are incredibly powerful. Insert amazingly complex plot which will lead to their defeat. Have Cell come out of nowhere and completely dominate the plot as of his arrival. Another example would be Boo becoming Kid instead of Skinny.

3) There is always a means of becoming stronger. New training method (gravity, ROSAT), power up, transformation. Never limit your characters unless they are secondary ones.