almost sounds dangerously like a plan

Looks like upgrading to 10.4.5 broke my copy of Logic, which is two minor versions out-of-date... [looks like it broke Net News Wire too and hey the Finder just crashed... this was a bad upgrade] so I'm going to have to settle for paying $80 for the upgrade... sigh. I was hoping to work on my current track, instead I have to listen to it making mental notes of what I want to do. Its getting there... needs some work on the structure...

At least lack of music-writing access is motivating me to do some writing, of which this blog entry kind of qualifies. [I just hope I didn't loose the momentum on the music writing, cause this track has just made huge leaps in two weeks]

Its March, which means its two months since Stupid Writing Man (remember him?) polished off the draft of My Baby (which I'll just call by its working name, Shunted [suggestions for a title are appreciated]). Deadline for strand 1A development money is June. That's 3 months to prepare my application which, thankfully, isn't another draft - rather its a concrete plan for the next draft. The funding is to assist you in writing the next draft. Genius.

The problem is I'm also Momentum Man. When I have momentum on a project, I'm fucking unstoppable - it consumes me... and that's the place I love being - creativity becomes the inspiration itself for continuing. [whistful] I'll keep on rolling and snowball until I hit the wall. When I stop that very inertia makes it difficult to start again as I get caught up in other things, like the Sith Lords or getting drunk or writing music.

So here I am, I'm motivated to get rolling on Shunted again to build the momentum. That's why I'm writing this entry, so I can get a feel for the shape of the next three months.

Here's what I know --

I need to spend a good month on the application. That's all of May. The application is a critique of the current draft focusing on proposed solutions to identified story problems. e.g. 'The third act isn't working, I'm thinking its because of X and Y, so I'm going to do A and B to fix them'.

That means for the two months before, I need to be working out what the problems are and the proposed solutions.

This is my current plan of attack (its going to be a BrainDump™ so bare with me):

Spend the next week collecting, watching, and reading reference & inspirational material. Current thoughts of things to revisit are: The Real Thing by Tom Stoppard (its a play), Wong Kar Wai's In the Mood for Love, some Brecht and Chekov plays (unsure which), watch Solaris, finish watching Love My Wa, revist key episodes of Six Feet Under, and perhaps re-read some sections of Vale's technique..

Most importantly, collect a whole bunch of still image references. Locations, people, interiors, etc. Anything visual related to the story somehow... categorise it too (to help the brain categorise it). This will be ongoing throughout the process The idea is to get my brain processing all these places/things/people while I work through the next stage... I need to push certain visual aspects of the story (I already know that)

I'm going to read over the script again, making notes of things I feel can be developed or changed... Then I'm going to re-read all the feedback I've collected.... The idea is my brain is going to be chewing over what needs to be done.

Once that's done, I'm going to just BrainJam™ ideas... scenes, character backgrounds, etc. Just want to 'break my eye open'. for e.g. I plan to run The Analyst with my characters... just totally looking for possibilities.

I'll probably let those ideas sit for a while and get a stew going...

Then I'll try and shape them into something cohesive... Just 'this works, not this, maybe this... perhaps this here'... Start formulating some new direction for the story.

Perhaps I'll even start doing a new outline or a beat sheet (possibly a beat sheet). It doesn't have to be anything concrete, that's the brilliant thing...

At this point, I'll be ready to work on the application. The application itself becomes the instrument to focusing my ideas, because that's exactly what I have to do with it. All the work before hand is to assist me in finding new ways to approach the problems rather than actual concrete solution. I want to give the AFC a feel for where I want to head, but i want to save the real work of rebreaking the story / outlining / beat sheeting / writing to the actual part after they give me the money.

Almost sounds dangerously like a plan. Its a bit rambly, cause its me just dumping out on a blog entry what I nee to do. I think the next few days will be spent refining this approach, as its the first stage of building momentum. Wish me luck :)