Hypercompendia

Chris Klimas at gimcrack’d has a wonderful new story called Remembered  available to read on his site.  It takes nice advantage of the ability of hypertext to draw one so completely into someone else’s world that one willingly follows textlinks to check out the sidestreets and get a better idea of the lay of the land. 

I work so much better with deadlines–except for paper submissions (not classroom stuff) which sees another deadline go by tomorrow as the lit journals cut off reading for the summer.  The last time I’ve submitted any short stories was a couple of years ago and I was determined never to bother doing so again but…you know, you just have to because what are you going to do with these things otherwise?  My heirs will likely toss them into the hole after me, just as I’d so often threatened my mother to do with her recipe collections.

But now I’m getting nervous because I’m in love with Keynote and have been fiddling with that so much that I’m not doing other stuff.  Like editing Paths which needs it so very badly.  Or working on one of the other hypertexts that would likely be in much better shape except that it has no ending yet.  Then again, it’s hypertext; I can let people go around in circles and loops forever if I just do some fancy maneuvering with the links…

This adjective, highly overused on the TV reality series, The Bachelor(ette–it doesn’t matter which gender is plowing their way through a stack of 25 eligibles), DOES apply to Keynote.

If I didn’t come off sounding like a refugee from Oz, I could record voiceover on the slides (maybe Audacity can add some bass to my voice). The transitioning effects are awesome and I’ve edited to ensure that I only use a couple or maybe a few and vary them a bit.  In glancing through the online tutorials, I found how easy and well the comment feature works for a presentation so I might try that. 

So while I may not be an "amazing" woman, I do think I’m getting together a very nice slideshow.

P.S. The best part:  In commenting, I can note the time and boy do I need this!

Realized as I was working on this that Keynote can be a hypertext piece in that a click on a box (if that’s how progression is made) brings in a new box that continues the story.  Here’s an uncut view of the work in Lightbox mode:

Obviously it’s too long a slideshow for the time allotted, so more work is being done to either delete or “skip” by slides, but the point is clear that for now, it’s a strictly linear line of “story.”  This can change if I wanted to jump around within the framework by marking certain slides to go elsewhere from the trail.  I can–and have–some real hyperlinks in there as well. Those noted are all in the credits slide, but it would have been possible to jump out from the slideshow itself onto the web at any point.

Now to the hard work of editing.

I forgot all about transitions! Here I am, putting together a slideshow on transitions of writing and writers and hypertext story and all that good stuff, and I forgot to even think about transitions between slides!  And Keynote has a load of good ‘uns.

This won’t be a timed slideshow–though an audience might prefer it that way and I will check out that possibility–but even in manual progression you can transition via some neat effects.

Needless to say, between 50 slides I have just about every transition available used but it’s just the awe syndrome at work here.  I’ll get down to a reasonable three or four effects at most, likely following the same systematic approach I’m trying to use for organization. 

But for now, it’s enough to blow your mind!  (and eyes!)

Kind of interesting, but funny too, as I prepare a topic and realize that in the research and initial outlay of information I am wandering off into other areas. 

It’s so, so hypertext, ya know?

In trying to focus a visual paper (Keynote) on the single topic of changes that both writer and writing undergo in the transition to hypertext form, I’ve gotten down to fifty pages of posts from this weblog that made me smile or appeared relevant.  From those fifty pages I’ve copied into ten pages certain phrases and sometimes whole posts to melt down into clarification when the fat rises to the top and can be skimmed off.

From there, I’ve copied certain of the best (either because they make good points or because I can’t get over my own eloquence sometimes) and have granted them a slide in the show.  Mostly these are taken in time sequence, but I’m trying to keep them in the flow of certain issues I want to cover in the presentation. 

Likely will finish up the rough first draft of the Keynote slide show today or tomorrow, putting everything in place and then figuring what can be removed or compressed.  I think that the idea of a slideshow, for me, is an accompaniment to a talk, and whether I read off the slide and add a bit to it, or use it just as an outline, it needs to be organized and timed. 

Also, it needs to be self-contained.  If I faint dead away then someone will be able to click through it and frankly, the audience would probably prefer it that way.

I’m up to about 27 slides in Keynote so far, mostly images of Storyspace maps, some text boxes, a couple Hyptertextopia slides, and a lot of either quotes from Hypercompendia postings on working with hypertext or some targeted slides with the whole bulleted thing; these latter two are really to mark my place in speaking and jog my memory as to what I am speaking about.

There are a lot of slides to add in yet–but there are many that can be taken out.  I started with the visuals because they show the work in progress and yes, because they’re pretty. If I’m a complete failure as a speaker (that’s why I’m a writer, duh!) then at least there’ll be something nice to look at  on the screen. As a last resort, I’ll do my Buster Brown ad.  Poll Parrot too, if there’s time.  And even Robert Hall for Tunxis’ sake.

Actually I’m very excited about this–scared out of my wits, but excited.  There are some pretty solid hot shots in the hypertext field to stand alongside here, as well as another concurrently running workshop with which to share the available audience.

Please, come early to the Pittsburgh conference and come to our workshop; it’ll be exciting and fun!

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t go about writing story with a plot in mind.  The only time I’ve done that was when I wrote a novel ten years ago and believe me, though I’m down to just a copy on the hard drive and one hardcopy (lotsa good scrap paper here), I’m to the point of really being willing to delete it forever from existence.

Storyspace does allow for a super duper plotting system, what with it’s views of Tree, Map, Chart, and Outline.  It does not, however, encourage one such as I to conform to a layout that requires preplanning of narrative.

I like that.  A lot.

What Storyspace does encourage is a form of going with the flow, allowing the paths to wander yet be connected by threads, titles, and color coding.  I am directionally dysfunctional in my real life and that, complete to the point of fear of getting lost, was the biggest stumbling block in reading hypertext for me.  With Storyspace, particularly in Map View, I don’t get that ‘lost’ feeling; I feel like a god overlooking the planet. And, I can drill down into the minutest writing space in an hierarchy to still make a guy trip over a curb and spill his coffee.

Fun stuff.