Absolute Chaos Discussion Boards
Fic Talk => General Discussion => Topic started by: mare on August 15, 2011, 04:59:04 PM
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I know it's not a genre but since this month is a collab challenge, I thought this would be a good topic to start.
What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
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As the resident Collab Whore, I feel the need to reply first LOL.
What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
As a Collab Whore, I love them. With the right person, they can really bring you to places writing wise you may not be able to reach alone. I've got a long list of collaborations, longer list of people I've collaborated with. Especially if you count the Round Robins! LOL.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
I do, cause sometimes the story comes out even better than it would have if the author tried it alone. It's been awhile since I've been sucked into a really good collab. But two that come to mind immediately are 5 Backstreet Boys In Search of a Plot, and Just One Kiss. Both were pretty funny.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
Um...I have a new rule now LOL. Never more than two people writing a story. (Unless it's a RR, that's the exception). Every time there's been more than two of us, it never works out. Or there's major delays, or something. I adore 00Carter, but with the amount of people, organizing and getting everyone to be somewhat timely is a major bitch LOL. With two, everything seems to run smooth.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
Already found her! Julie, who I first offered myself up when she needed cowriters for "Code Blue". We bonded more on here, and it grew from there :). We have the same line of thinking in terms of stories. As a team, I feel like we're fantastic, not to sound braggy. I just mean that some of the stuff we not only come up with, but pull off, is stuff I don't know if we could do alone. And we've definitely rubbed off on each other, she's gotten me to be a LOT more anal about researching for example LOL, and I've gotten her to write more "out there" stuff.
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What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
I am in one right now, but I would be open for more. I don't have a lot people banging down my door to collaborate with them though.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
I don't really pay attention to multiple authors. If they are written well I like them as much as any other story.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
How many people did we start with on 00Carter? Though I like having multiple people to toss ideas around with, the delays are killer when there are many people. I've not ever just worked with one other person and had it really go anywhere.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
Uh.... Carter-Orange.... I love her stuff. It would be awesome to see if we connected as writers.
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What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
I enjoy collaborating! Which is weird, because I always hated group projects and working together when I was in school. I was the type of kid who would rather work alone, because it went faster that way and because sometimes I just knew I'd do a better job on my own. :P (Elitist snob, I know.) But most of my experiences writing fanfics with other people have been good. It just depends on who your cowriters are. Like Rose said, you just have to find the right person to collab with.
What I like about collaborating is that it gives me more confidence to tackle bigger ideas that I probably wouldn't try to write on my own, and it's easy to stay inspired when you have someone with whom to bounce ideas around and share in the writing.
What I don't like about collaborating is flaky co-authors who don't write their share. That's why finding the right person to write with is so important to the success of the collab.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
When I think of collaborations that I've read, the ones that come to mind have been really good - "Come Together" by Izzy and Cecilia, "Survivor" by Cecilia and Janie, the "Swollen Issues" series by Jenna and Swenglish, the "Nick and Lizz" series by Jenna and Auctor, the "Backstreet General" series by Kat and Amy. So I guess, yes, I do enjoy reading them, although to be honest, it's not something I really even pay much attention to. Of the stories I listed, the only one where I could really tell the difference between the two authors' writing was Swollen Issues, and only because Swenglish isn't a native English speaker, and it showed sometimes in her parts. But I was completely addicted to that series as it was being written, so it wasn't something that took away from my enjoyment of it at all.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
If everyone's on the same page and equally committed to the project... the more, the merrier! Realistically, though... three's a crowd, and with more than three, it's tough to keep everyone on the same page. Two is the ideal. The only collaborated stories I've finished have been with just one co-writer. The biggest collaboration failures have been with two co-writers (so three people writing together). The BIG collabs, with lots of co-writers, tend to work out for awhile, at first, when everyone's excited, and then fizzle out.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
Rose! Rose is the best co-writer I've ever had, for these reasons:
1) She can write, and her writing meshes well with mine.
2) She's not self-absorbed - she doesn't want to take control of everything, she doesn't have to be right all the time, and she doesn't only want to write self-inserts.
3) She also doesn't let or make me control everything and make all the decisions. We share that part.
4) She is usually on the same page as me, idea-wise, but even when we disagree, we always come to a compromise or agreement quickly and civilly.
5) She doesn't flake out on her commitments. When she says she's going to write something, she follows through.
This is why I still like collaborating, even though most collaborations I start don't get finished. :P
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How many people did we start with on 00Carter?
11... though, oddly enough, we churned out parts faster with 11 than we do now with 6! That's why commitment means more to me than numbers.
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Awwww look at the love :)
Yeah when we disagree it doesn't take long to find a middle ground lol. And seriously you're one of the only cowriters who hasn't flaked out on me. So finding one who can really commit is a challenge too. But I've never been this much on the same page with any of my previous partners.
11... though, oddly enough, we churned out parts faster with 11 than we do now with 6! That's why commitment means more to me than numbers.
I think it was 13, and then two dropped before we even wrote anything lmao. And I agree, commitment is more important. I've just never seen it work (steadily) with more than one person. Sadness.
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Awwww look at the love :)
Yeah when we disagree it doesn't take long to find a middle ground lol. And seriously you're one of the only cowriters who hasn't flaked out on me. So finding one who can really commit is a challenge too. But I've never been this much on the same page with any of my previous partners.
I think it was 13, and then two dropped before we even wrote anything lmao. And I agree, commitment is more important. I've just never seen it work (steadily) with more than one person. Sadness.
Yeah, I was just counting the ones we actually wrote with, even if it just for an episode.
Commitment is key!! I'm usually in it for the long haul, so it's nice to have found someone who can handle sticking with a story for more than a few months without flaking out.
I love the remaining 00Carter crew, but it is like pulling teeth sometimes to get parts written on that story.
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Yeah, I was just counting the ones we actually wrote with, even if it just for an episode.
Commitment is key!! I'm usually in it for the long haul, so it's nice to have found someone who can handle sticking with a story for more than a few months without flaking out.
I love the remaining 00Carter crew, but it is like pulling teeth sometimes to get parts written on that story.
Ditto lol. I love everyone involved, though sometimes they drive me crazy (okay, crazier) when all the delays pop up lol. Talented writers? Definitely. Awesome people? Of course. Flaky? YES lmao. But I say that with love.
Collaborating can be epic and frustrating.
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Ditto lol. I love everyone involved, though sometimes they drive me crazy (okay, crazier) when all the delays pop up lol. Talented writers? Definitely. Awesome people? Of course. Flaky? YES lmao. But I say that with love.
Collaborating can be epic and frustrating.
Did I just get called Flaky? LOL.
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Listen you two, I have been a member of the 00Carter crew for a year (maybe more) and have yet to write anything and it's not because I'm flaky :P
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How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
If everyone's on the same page and equally committed to the project... the more, the merrier! Realistically, though... three's a crowd, and with more than three, it's tough to keep everyone on the same page. Two is the ideal. The only collaborated stories I've finished have been with just one co-writer. The biggest collaboration failures have been with two co-writers (so three people writing together). The BIG collabs, with lots of co-writers, tend to work out for awhile, at first, when everyone's excited, and then fizzle out.
Actually we did finish Phantasm and we had a lot of people involved in that. I was in charge of that one so we were going to finish if I had to choke people to death to get their chapters from them lmao
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Did I just get called Flaky? LOL.
Listen you two, I have been a member of the 00Carter crew for a year (maybe more) and have yet to write anything and it's not because I'm flaky :P
LOL You guys know who the flaky ones are/were. If you write your parts (not that you've had the opportunity yet, Sarah) without needing to nagged, you're not who we're talking about.
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Actually we did finish Phantasm and we had a lot of people involved in that. I was in charge of that one so we were going to finish if I had to choke people to death to get their chapters from them lmao
True, I forgot about Phantasm, I guess because it was a round robin. Still a collaboration, but round robins are a little different because it's not the same group of people planning and writing the whole thing together. I'm glad we did finish that one, though, and it turned out good! Lots of twists and turns.
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Listen you two, I have been a member of the 00Carter crew for a year (maybe more) and have yet to write anything and it's not because I'm flaky :P
I didn't mean you! LOL
Did I just get called Flaky? LOL.
Or you! :P
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I know I had my issues just recently but I hope I made up for it! :-D
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I never looked at it like a round robin because it was planned out who was doing which chapter by invitation only. A lot of time was spent organizing that one long before it was easy to just add on a chapter whenever you felt like it on AC. LOL
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Yeah, I guess it was like a cross between AC-style round robins, where anyone can post, and traditional collabs where the co-authors plan together and take turns writing. That was a fun challenge!
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And there was a challenge where you had to continue the plot of the person who wrote before you. I gave each person 2 weeks to write their part I think, which most people did and every once in a while there was a WTF just happened moment. It was a long time ago so I can understand why people would forget it wasn't a red robin but more like a collaboration. Just an old school one. LOL
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I remember Eboni and I working on the very last chapter together trying to tie it all up nicely and having a really hard time. LOL Those were the days. Back when I had AIM without my computer freezing on me every ten seconds.
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And there was a challenge where you had to continue the plot of the person who wrote before you. I gave each person 2 weeks to write their part I think, which most people did and every once in a while there was a WTF just happened moment. It was a long time ago so I can understand why people would forget it wasn't a red robin but more like a collaboration. Just an old school one. LOL
Yeah, that's why it was such a challenge, because you had no idea what was going to happen before it was your turn. But that's what a round robin is, one person picking up where the last one left off. It's just one specific type of collaboration. Really, Phantasm was more of a traditional round robin than the 1000 Ways stories are now, because they don't really follow one continuous storyline. Rose just used that feature to make it open for anyone to contribute a death to them.
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But the Nick's Revenge story is trying to stick to a common thread more than the 1000 Ways one is. Some of the stories even work together really well (like Rose getting killed before me was included in the chapter where I was killed lol). Plus, having the last line of each story be in line with the ones before it by giving each death a number keeps it a bit more organized than the 1000 Ways one :)
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But the Nick's Revenge story is trying to stick to a common thread more than the 1000 Ways one is. Some of the stories even work together really well (like Rose getting killed before me was included in the chapter where I was killed lol). Plus, having the last line of each story be in line with the ones before it by giving each death a number keeps it a bit more organized than the 1000 Ways one :)
That's true. And either way works; there's no one right or wrong way to do a collab/round robin. They're just more episodic than a traditional novel.
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Yeah, Nick's Revenge ties together a lot better, which is probably why that one goes slower. There was one today that even mentioned how it's all my fault lmao.
Though I love 1000 Ways for it's utter randomness lmao.
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What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
I really am not a collaborating type person. I was very similar to Julie in school lol I never wanted to work with anyone because I usually ended up having to do all the work myself. I'm a little too, let's just say regimented, to work with people on stories. Kudos to those who can do it though. It's just not something I do often or willingly. LOL
I have only really worked on two collabs. Phantasm which had a lot of people involved and the 5 BSBs in Search of a Plot which was three of us.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
Truthfully, I tend to not enjoy stories that are collaborations with the exception of Swollen Issues. I just usually feel like they are too disjointed and not updated enough for the most part, but if I found one that seemed like something i'd be interested in reading i'd give it a try. I do tend to stay away from stories that have more than three people working on it.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
I think when you try more than two you run into trouble.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
I don't think i'd ever do one again but if I did, Mersey would be the ideal person because we work so well together.
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Aww, Mersey! Where is she? How is she? What is she up to, Mare? I miss her and her stories!
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She has a new job that makes her work insane hours. She doesn't have a computer at home anymore and has to steal her brother's on occasion and she doesn't write anymore :( I miss her too but she is on twitter. You should follow her.
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I wish she still wrote. :(
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Me too! Tell her that!! I'm hoping the more people who tell her the more willing she'll be to try. It worked with Maria, somewhat lol
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I have! LOL
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She has a new job that makes her work insane hours. She doesn't have a computer at home anymore and has to steal her brother's on occasion and she doesn't write anymore :( I miss her too but she is on twitter. You should follow her.
Aww, bummer! I see her on Twitter, but it'd be cool if she came back to fanfic land too.
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I would only answer the first two questions since I haven't collaborated with someone yet.
What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
I would like to try to see if it will work for me. I usually want to work alone but sometimes having another person full of ideas might be good, and might make the story better.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
Yes. I love the stories where one author would write from one character's POV, and the the another author writes another character's POV. I enjoyed reading what Pengi and evergreenwrite r did. Because sometimes if someone write too many characters, there is no distinction among them. It was like they were thinking alike.
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Oh, you saying that made me remember the one story I love by Kat and Amy Can You Keep a Secret. How could
I forget that, it's only one of my all time favorites? LMAO I suck at these threads but like you said Ritz, I think I enjoyed that one so much because when they wrote they tended to do it in the POVs which they felt comfortable with. Back and forth between Brian and Nick. (even though Amy was a Kevin girl lol)
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^I'm glad I made you remembered one of your all time favorites ;)
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What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
This month is the first time I've ever attempted a collaboration. Like Julie and Mare have said, when I was in school I never worked with anyone and hated the thought of someone having a say in what I did. I guess I was a bit of a control freak and wanted my work to be mine. I suppose deep down it was because I knew I could rely on myself to get it done. I was a bit of a perfectionist back then and wouldn't have wanted anyone messing up my grade A, lol, that and I've always been a bit of a loner. It's been a long time since I left school though!
But I do like collabs if they are done right and am looking forward to seeing how it goes with Kristal. Having never had to consider anyone else before, I just hope I do it right. I know Kristal has done collabs before, so hopefully she can help me out :)
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
Depends on the story. Take for example my favourite collab, Song For The Undead. It's such a well written and fantastic story, but not only that, Julie and Rose work so well together that you don't notice who wrote which part. I think it's important when writing a story that it flows well, and this is a perfect example of that.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
Having not got much experience with collabs, I have no idea how to answer. I suppose it depends on the writers and if they are pulling their weight.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
Um...I don't know, maybe Lore as I like her stories and she mentioned me (thanks for the mention Lore :) ) I hate answering this kind of question, what if the person I suggested laughed and thought 'no way', lol.
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Thanks for the mention, Steph! That is nice to hear. One thing that has worked for us with Undead is doing what Ritz suggested and each of us sticking to certain characters. The difference is we started out with ten of them, instead of two LOL. But we split them up, so we each just had a few characters to focus on, and that helped them to be written and developed in a consistent way.
It helps that we've also always had the same vision for the story, and we've tried to make our writing styles mesh as well as any two different people's can. I'm glad you don't notice a difference when you read. That is definitely another advantage to just writing with one co-author; it's a lot easier to keep the story flowing because there's only two different styles merging together, instead of... many LOL. Even when we had three at the beginning of Undead, that was harder than it is now with just two of us.
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Oh, you saying that made me remember the one story I love by Kat and Amy Can You Keep a Secret. How could
I forget that, it's only one of my all time favorites? LMAO I suck at these threads but like you said Ritz, I think I enjoyed that one so much because when they wrote they tended to do it in the POVs which they felt comfortable with. Back and forth between Brian and Nick. (even though Amy was a Kevin girl lol)
Kat and Amy made a great collab team! LOL I was the same way; in my original post, I started to say that I couldn't remember reading many collabs, except Swollen Issues and their Backstreet General series, and then I started thinking of all these other favorites of mine that are collabs. I guess it's just something I don't pay much attention to.
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Thanks for the mention, Steph! That is nice to hear. One thing that has worked for us with Undead is doing what Ritz suggested and each of us sticking to certain characters. The difference is we started out with ten of them, instead of two LOL. But we split them up, so we each just had a few characters to focus on, and that helped them to be written and developed in a consistent way.
That was I really love about collaborations, because you guys give different personality to different characters but with almost identical writing styles. :)
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I love to read collabs. My favorites are Undead and 00Carter. I have never done a collaboration unless you count the two round robins I am participating in. I have tried to do collabs in the past but it doesn't seem to work out. I would love to try one though. I don't know who I would want to work with...but I know lore and I have talked about it.
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Thanks, Tracy!
It definitely takes commitment from both/all authors. It's hard when one person is way more into it than the co-author(s). That is why so many collabs fizzle out.
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Thanks!
And yes, commitment is key. Because if one is more into it than the other (or others), then it just leads to a lot of frustration and possibly arguments.
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BSB Fic Collaborations ...you know what I remember about them? Mare wanting to kill me every two weeks :-\ oh yes, those were the fun days :P
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Was it two weeks? It felt more like every two days or so lol You know I love you. Come here more often! :)
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Was it two weeks? It felt more like every two days or so lol You know I love you. Come here more often! :)
Tow days? :( Outch Hehe I don't know why you were so anal :crazy: if I was always on time, right? Just look at my own stories and how I never stop updating ;D
I'm kidding, and you know I love you too but your icon is making me nervous, poor doggy lol
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What are your thoughts on collaborations? Do you tend to take part in them?
I'd love the idea to work somebody else. Actually someone from Canada is currently trying to work with me on a Brian story at the moment. I offered to beta her personal solo story about him and I'm almost done doing that. Plus I have some of my other stories to get done first. But I love bouncing off new ideas with someone open-minded. Maybe try a genre I haven't tackled.
Do you enjoy reading them? Is is something you even notice when you are reading a story?
Eh, not always, I think I say that mainly because there's very few out there to begin with. I guess not enough variety too. I don't really read a lot of them so I can't say there's something in particular I notice.
How many people is too many when working in a collaboration?
If its a round robin, then its understandable . I actually don't have a problem with 5 or 8 people collabing on something new. As long as its interesting and draws me in with the first chapter, then yeah I'd say there shouldn't be a limit to the creative process.
Who would be your ideal collaborating partner?
I tend to work with people I personally talk to but I believe the main things I look for in a partner while writing is style, intelligence, humor and emotions. It helps to know the person is willing to go in any direction and bear their soul if need be. I honestly love to work with a horror writer or someone who deals in comedy. Don't write too many of those and it would be interesting to combine their insights with my own personal spin.