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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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act(s) = a series of sequences that peaks in a climactic scene which causes a major reversal in values, more powerful in its impact than any previous sequence or scene. the turning of a scene.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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principle(s) of antagonism(s) -- a protagonist and his/her story can only be as intellectually fascinating and emotionally compelling as the force(s) of antagonism(s) make them!
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at this moment in history, when social organization approaches the global level, and technologies of destruction reach commensurate scope, the arrow of history starts to quiver ...
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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beat(s) = an exchange of behavior in an action/reaction; beat by beat these changing behaviors shape the turning of a scene.
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... the fitfull but relentless tendency of invisible social brains to hook up which eachother, and eventually submerge themselves into a larger brain, is a central theme of history.
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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cause(s)/causality -- drives a story in which motivated actions cause effects that in turn become the causes of yet other effects, thereby interlinking the various levels of conflict in a chain reaction of episodes to the story climax, expressing the interconnectedness of reality.
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true character(s) -- is revealed in the choice(s) a human being makes under pressure -- the greater the pressure, the deeper the revelation, the truer the choice to the character's essential nature.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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formal choice(s) -- number of protagonists, rhythm of progressions, levels of conflict, temporal arrangements and the like -- play with and against substantive choices of content -- setting, character and idea -- until all elements meld in a unique (screen/game) play.
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climax -- a story is a series of acts that build to a last act climax or story climax which brings about absolute and irreversable change.
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innovation(s) / collaboration(s)
beginning(s) truth(s) order(s) technology history decision(s) interactive(s) pattern(s) style(s) speed(s) machine(s) end(s)
form(s) / future(s) / starwar(s) / display(s)
innovation(s) / collaboration(s)
the logic of non-zero-sumness is literally the reason that communication exists
... and the profuseness of non-zero-sumness is the reason that communication so pervades life.
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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conflict(s) -- a story event creates meaningful change in the life situation of a character that is expressed and experienced in terms of value and achieved through conflict(s).
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crisis -- the dilemma(s) confronts the protagonist who, when face to face with the most powerful and focused force(s) of antagonism(s) in his/her life, must make a decision to take on action or another in a last effort to achieve the object of desire.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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classical design(s) -- means a story built around an active protagonist who struggles against primary external forces of antagonism to pursue his or her desire, through continuous time, within a consistent and causally connected fictional reality, to a closed ending of absolute irreversible change /\ .
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... this factor -- the economics of a given medium, not its purported temperature -- is the key to its social effects, and thus key to history's basic direction.
experiment knowledge illusion scratch engine craft maze run ar x
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cf. cool & hot media -- Marshall McLuhan
... the evolutionary epic serves as the binding myth in our scientific age
a myth not in the sense of an untruth but in the sense of a story that explains our existence and helps us orient to the world.
... every epic needs a hero -- the mind will do ...
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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story event(s) -- creates meaningful change in the life situation of a character that is expressed and experienced in terms of value(s)
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... technologies that facilitate or encourage non-zero-sumness interaction -- is a reliable feature of cultural evolution everywhere
... people by their nature come together to constitute a social information system and thus reap positive sums.
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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structure setting character genre event value scene beat sequence act climax plot design
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love story modern epic maturation plot comedy social drama fantasy historical drama biography science fiction animation artfilm adventure
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story gift(s) = the opportunity to live lives beyond our own, to desire and struggle in a myriad of world(s) and time(s), at all the various depths of our beings.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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writer(s) as guide(s) -- this is why we go to the storyteller(s), the guide(s) who takes us beyond what seems to be what is.
... we rarely know where we are going, writing is discovery
the art of story is the dominant cultural force in the world, and the art of film is the dominant medium of this enterprise.
vision(s)
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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idea(s) -- storytelling is the creative demonstration of truth. A story is a living proof of an idea, the conversion of idea to action. A story's event structure is the means by which you first express, then prove your idea ... without explanation.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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image system(s) = a strategy of motif(s), a category of imagery embedded in the film that repeats in sight and sound from the beginning to end with persistence and great variations, but with equally great subtlety, as a subliminal communication to increase the depth and complexity of aesthetic emotion.
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inciting incident(s) -- radically upsets the balance of force(s) in the protagonist's life.
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... the bent for innovation is so deeply human that progress does not depend on anyone in particular ...
the history of life on earth is too good a story not to have been written ...
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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story limit(s) -- a story that progresses to the limit of human experience in depth and breadth of conflict must move through a pattern that includes the contrary, the contradictory and the negation of the negation.
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metaphor(s) / travel(s) / a (mathematical) love story
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... our menu of options is rich, ranging from self-annihilation to graceful adaptation, and empatically including the middle prospect of a long and turbulent adjustment, full of strife and suffering.
... each story has a beginning, middle and end, but not necessarily in that order
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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plot(s) -- means to navigate through the dangerous terrain of a story and when confronted by a dozen branching possibilities to choose the correct path;
... plot is the writer's choice of events and their design in time.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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Point Of View(s) -- the more time spent with a character, the more opportunity to witness his/her choice(s); the result is more emotional involvement between audience and character.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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quest(s) -- an event throws a character's life out of balance, arousing in him/her the conscious and/or unconscious desire for that which he feels will restore balance, launching him on a quest for his object of desire against force(s) of antagonism(s) (inner, personal, extra-personal); s/he may or may not achieve it ...
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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risk(s) -- the measure of the value of a character's desire is in direct proportion to the risk s/he's willing to take to achieve it; the greater the value the greater the risk.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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scene(s) = an action through conflict in more or less continuous time and space that turns the value-charged condition of a character's life on at least one value with a degree of perceptible significance. Ideally, every scene is a story event.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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sequence(s) = a series of scenes -- generally two to five -- that culminates with greater impact than any previous scene.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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serious / scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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sign(s) -- Humanity isn't an end, it's a fork in the road, and you have two options: "Animal" and "Superman". For some reason, people keep going left, the easy way, the way back to where we came from. Fuck 'em. Other people just stand there, staring at the signpost(s), as if they're going to come alive and tell them what to do or something. Dude, the sign says fucking "SUPERMAN". -- thus spoke zarathustra
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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structure(s) = a selection of events from the characters' life stories that is composed into a strategic sequence to arouse specific emotions and to express a specific view on life.
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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story time(s) -- a story that either skips helter-skelter through time or so blurs temporal continuity that the audience cannot sort out what happens before and after what is told is non-linear time.
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pirate(s) / skin(s) / science(s) / color(s) / vision(s)
scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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scenario(s) / storytelling in the digital age
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story value(s) = the universal qualities of human experience that may shift from positive to negative, or negative to positive, from one moment to the next.
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