What is the use of information technology in the creative process? Why would an author need software to manage characters, locations, plot coherence? For a true writer, an Olivetti Lettera 22, a pot of coffee and inspiration should be enough.
Many are fascinated by this mythical-romantic imagery, where the artist is an artist in any situation; indeed, the more independent he is from any technology, the better. Typically they are people who have never written a book and who express these beliefs on Facebook, or on another famous social network of your choice.
The smell of paper, my lord, the smell of paper!
Information Technology that helps
Irony aside, I have always loved the conveniences of good technology and I’m not ashamed to admit it.
In 1991 I was invited to hold the inaugural concert at the Fancon (National Gathering of Science Fiction and Fantasy) in Courmayeur, which that year was celebrating the centenary of J.R.R. Tolkien.
Having composed an entire musical suite inspired by the Lord of the Rings and since my music is rich in instruments and therefore a little complex to perform with the piano alone, I prepared the orchestral parts to be performed by my Amiga 500 which commanded via MIDI protocol a Yamaha musical keyboard. I think it was one of the first “multimedia concerts” in Italy, and it was very popular both for the music and the method.
Overcoming prejudices
I’m reporting this example both because I think it’s useful and interesting – and then I like to be full of myself – and to make you understand that technology can be an excellent means of enriching an artistic experience, from the user’s side but also from the creative side. In that case, IT allowed me to present my pieces, despite not having an orchestra at my disposal.
Most likely J.R.R.Tolkien himself, known for his extreme messiness in organizing notes and stories, would have eventually appreciated the use of the computer to keep them organized, despite his legendary aversion to several aspects of technology.
But intelligent people, eventually, overcome any prejudice.
A few months with Storymill
Storymill was (its development was discontinued in 2011, just a year after I purchased it) a program developed by the American computer company Mariner Software. Conceived to help writers of novels and short stories to effectively manage characters, places and plot development, it was nevertheless very useful for me, to lay the foundations of what would later become my personal software to help me write The Montecristo Project: Saga.
Let me start by saying that I am not a real developer, I consider myself rather an averagely advanced user. Saga is actually a “solution” of Filemaker, which in turn was born as a program to manage databases way back in April 1985 and which over time has become a real development platform for… a bit of everything. All you need is data to manage and relate to each other or to the outside world, and Filemaker will allow you to do this very easily, once you understand the mechanism.
Information Technology and freedom
At this point someone will ask themselves “but why complicate your life? What was missing from StoryMill?”.
The answer is simple: freedom.
StoryMill was born as a specialist program for professional authors. But I was an “anomalous” case from the beginning. Just as in my musical works I like to insert different voices in counterpoint to each other, which enrich the melodic-harmonic plot, so in my writing I like to follow different sub-plots and characters from multiple points of view. StoryMill would have been more than sufficient for story setting work: but at a certain point the need for a future Wikipedia (Wikinet) for scientific terms arose.
My goal was certainly not to complicate my life. This is why I have always tried to use Information Technology: simplification and automation. A good friend of mine once said: If you’re doing a job on the computer that the computer would do better on its own, you’re wasting your time.
Subsequent stratifications
At a later stage, Glyphs were added to the internal Wikipedia, symbols that exist at two levels of the narrative: both internally, as structures that accommodate the Nanoquasic Circuits (if you want to know what CNQs are: here is the relevant Wikinet entry) , both at a meta-narrative level, as introductory emblems of each individual scene, linked to it by iconic and semantic links: they are further interpretation keys, which readers can discover – perhaps with a little help.
So the layers had already become three and StoryMill, alas, did not provide any other functions other than those shown in its interface. It didn’t allow any customization.
Instead, with FileMaker each new layer, each new function can be added as the need arises. Because Filemaker, as a development Information Technology platform for relational databases, is, let’s say… multidimensional. Power of Information Technology.
A work continually in progress
And so, gradually, adding tables, relationships, interfaces and refining its functions along the way, I developed Saga as it appears now. Totally focused on my specific needs, of course; organizes the scenes in a hierarchical structure by chapters, chapters by work, works by sagas (precisely).
For each scene it allows me to manage characters and locations (like other software) but also additional texts, organized by type, such as entries from the internal Wikinet, previous versions of the scene, notes and notes. And it also allows me to manage computer code, such as that relating to the digital version in ePub, and any attachments, such as illustrations, Glyphs, QR Codes, audio and video, PDF of the layout. Also web viewers to showcase everything, both offline and online, keeping track of all the links connected to the scene on the wiki site and bonus content.
I can build all the interfaces I want, customize them for any new needs that arise during construction, or more simply integrate the interfaces I have already created.
In short, Information Technology applied in a creative and intelligent way, through Saga, allows me to manage the project of an extremely complex, intricate and varied story, keeping its internal coherence under control and allowing me a result (at least I hope, but so far I have had many confirmations), apparently simple and linear for the reader.
This is no small power.
Some tastes from "Awakening"
