Your Weak and Strong Points

[Sq]

What are YOUR weak and strong points in writing, or if you're an artist, drawing? We all have something we're good at, and something we could use a little work on.

As for me... I think I'm pretty good at pouring emotions into my writing. I'm also good with character vs. character conflict, and internal conflict.

Buuut... I'm horrible at plotting. I couldn't put a good, adventurous storyline together to save my life. If I do write an adventure story it always has a bajillion obvious plot holes. And is lame. XD So usually I stick with the kind of stories where the character faces some sort of problem with themself, instead of going off and solvng a mystery or saving the day.

Also, my vocabulary is horrible. XD; I know what a lot of words mean, I just don't know how to use them properly.


So, what about you?

[PFA]

Hmm... it's hard to say what I'm good at. I guess I'm pretty good at coming up with cool plot points.

What I'm bad at is actually writing the plot points. ; They always come out kinda... lame. Also, the stuff inbetween the plot points usually gets me stuck.

Oh, and I'm also really bad at writing fight scenes. >_>; Most of the time the characters will end up using really boring and plain fighting moves. It doesn't... flow. Actually, when I was younger, I don't remember having any real troubles writing fight scenes. Then all of the sudden, they just kinda... died.

So... yeah.

[Vyt: Down, but Not Out]

Strong points:

• I'm quite good at maintaining the personalities and attitudes of my characters. Save for some minor slip-outs, I'm able to apply carefully how my characters act and react.
  
• I'm an impromptu artist. For little planning and plotting, I can squeeze out a relatively large story out of them. For example, my first NTWF story, But This Isn't Big Enough For Us, actually started from only a small introduction about Subila.

Weak Points:

• I'm not very good at portraying actions. Mostly, I'd use very simple verbs and adjectives. Though I usually cover this up by adding more descriptive words, I cannot help but pity myself for trying.
  
• I tend to put a little bit too much information. The second NTWF story I'm working on had its second chapter changed due to a certain scene that would've spoiled the whole plot and may even destroy the mystery behind it.

[Celestial]

Strong points:
1. I am a very good MS painter and can squeeze some good art of the most basic tools.
2. The ideas i usually come up with are original and come very easily (maybe sometimes too easliy)

Weak points:
1. When it comes to putting a story on paper i have trouble connecting my ideas together.
2. I can't hold my character's pesonality for a long time easily so i keep having to remind myself what they are like every now and then by building a profile of them in my head.

[Tam]

Arts: I think I'm pretty decent at squeezing expression and character into my drawings. The downside is that I get bored with things that aren't necessarily grinning or glowering or weilding a sword in rage -- things like trees, or buildings or, um, swords. Bored equals lazy which in turn equals the occasionally sloppy job.

Writings: Again, my characters are the strongest part of my writing. I love dialogue, and different personalities come so easily to me -- it's like the actress I've never been. Unfortunately, when I have a great plot in my head and complicated scenes spilling out of my brain, I tend to overload my writing. This results in long, awkward sentences, confusing scenes that can be irrelevant to the actual plot I have in mind, and a lot of frustration for the readers who have to untangle those strings of abstraction.

[Deleted]

I like the style I write in, and I think I have nice ideas. But whenever I write, I usually rush near the end. =| And I screw up a lot with present and past tenses. Plus I need a LOT of practice writing in third person.

[Ginz ❤]

I like to think ideas are my strong point for both art and writing. My mind is full of them and they just keep coming. ^^ My weak point also for both is actually working on them. XD;;

And more specifically...

I think I have more weak than strong points in writing. XD; I think I'm good at characters, as long as I take the time to develop them before I start. I'm good at character driven plots. I'm not so good at action. Sometimes I ramble too much; sometimes I describe too little. But I should really try writing more, since the feedback I've been getting for my story is this week's time has been rather reassuring and motivating for me.

As for art... I'd say coloring is my strongest point. I never like my pics so much when it's just the lineart, but color gives them so much life! I also like to think I have a personal style which makes my art different from everyone else's, and that's a good thing.

My weak points are poses and movement (my characters tend to look kinda stiff), character interaction (when there are two characters or more), and most of all backgrounds. Backgrounds kill me. x__x

[Stephanie (swordlilly)]

Hmm...

I think I have a unique writing style, but I'm not sure. Sometimes flashes of humour appear in my work because I'm in a good mood. Other times I churn out really meditative, gloomy stories. And so my characters can be endearing to readers or completely unlikeable, depending on what mood I'm in.

In art, I'm good at playing with flamboyant colour and imaginative, semi-abstract backgrounds. I also have a tender way of drawing the characters' features. I think I need to work more on perspective though... my artwork sometimes appears too two-dimensional.

[Deleted]

Meh. I'm going to start with my weak points because they are the ones I notice the most. XD Welll.... First of all, I have a terrible problem with my characters. Once I have made a personality for a character, I tend to use that same character over and over again. This not only ends up making them Mary Sues, but also inhibits character growth for other characters. I won't go into detail about that because that is another of my weaknesses (or so some have said); I go into a great deal of detail. For me, this makes the story alive, but some people have short attention spans. Another problem I have when writing is that my pace is generally very uneven in the story. During the writing itself, I have inspiration blocks and the occasional inspiration surge. After an inspiration surge, which occurs randomly, (but more often with a certain King around. ) it takes a LONG time to get out of the following writer's block and into an inspiration block( like a block of time, not like an obstacle) again. I also tend to use the same verbs over and over and over again. One weakness that I have noticed is that if a story survives the first night but is not up to my standards, I don't find out until I have finished half of the story. -___-; Notice how I go on and on here- I tend to do that in my stories as well.

Onto my few strengths in writing... I am told that I write very descriptively and creatively. D: *Ducks the objects being thrown* Sorry, but I don't have anything else to say! People say that I am an excellent writer, but when I ask them for details, I have a VERY hard time getting them. -___- Oh well.

[Huntress]

Art-wise, my strongest point seems to be perfectionism xD I can always find something worth improving, and so I'm in a constant and pretty fast process of improving. And I'm good at creating whole pieces, as in pictures where foreground and background complement each other and form one single picture. Didn't learn that until pretty recently, so yay.

Weak points... where to start x3 Dynamics, mainly. Complicated poses, angles and expressions, movement, stuff like that. But they're fun to practise, so it's good to have them on my weak-points-list.

Writing-wise, I'm not sure what exactly it is that fascinates my readers, because they seem to like my stories more than I do. Must be that artist-side kicking in; I'm able to write so that it's easy for readers to imagine exactly what's going on.

The main weakness in writing is the inability to build a plot. The usual scenario is getting started with something and letting it flow by itself, and then somewhere halfway through the story I get enough ideas/inspiration to actually start working towards the culmination. Makes final editing a royal pain.

[Dream]

As far as strong points go, I've been told I have a certain flow to my writing that makes what I'm working on, even an essay, draw in the reader. I don't quite know how that works, though. I am quite particular about language, and won't leave something be if I think there's a word that could express it better.

I'm good at having random moments of inspiration from tiny things in whatever fandom it happens to be. Something fairly insignificant can turn into a long story.

Weak points; huh, where do I begin? *has stuff thrown at her* OK, OK. To start with, I'm a horrible procrastinator. I can start a promising story and leave it unfinished for years, keeping thinking I'll get round to it.

I don't even attempt fight scenes, normally. I just have no idea how they'd work. Also, I don't have a very good sense of humour, so the idea of a purely comic story makes me anxious, even though other people seem to find them so easy. Even my NTWF stories end up oddly emotional and stressful for the characters.

Also, if I don't watch myself carefully, all my characters end up talking like me.

[Sammeh]

Weak Points:

• Description of actions (my vocabulary and ability lacks at times)
  
• Creating intriguing plots to both me and the reader
  
• Horrible at fighting sequences and the like
  
• Grammar issues (I always need someone to help me catch it)
  

Strong Points:

• My mom says I have a way with words, but then again she's my mother. xD I don't know, I like my style with writing (which has improved as the years go on.)
  
• Developing my characters. I use to be terrible at it, but now I think I'm very good at it now. Especially when the character's personality is that of someone I know or even bits of my own.
  
• Creating Leads. I remember in 7th grade we had to write leads for class, and we played a game with them. Surprisingly majority of the people in my class thought my lead was professionally written. But I wasn't ever really able to put it a story to it. I think I limited myself with that one. Other than that, I'm fairly good at writing them, and intriguing the reader as long as I have a clear idea on what happens.
  

[Shrimpy]

Strong points? I have absolutely no idea whatsoever. Vocabulary, maybe? I usually wait for others to tell me, which no one has yet. x3

Weak points? Definitely my villians. I'm a bit of a goody-two-shoes in real-life, and I've noticed that at least one of my own atributes spills out onto each of my characters. And because of that, I often have trouble showing my antagonists as truely a threat, really evil. I have difficulties playing the role of the bad guy and holding that characteristic throughout the story or role-play or whatever it is that I'm writing. I'm currently working on practicing that out.

[Kat]

[shadow=purple,left,300]Hmmm...

Strong Points:

• My descriptions. Usually, when people review my work (and not only for the Times), they always comment on my descriptions, which are neither too much nor too little. I use the odd figure of speech and comparison every now and then, but I try not to depend on them too much.
  
• It took quite a bit of practice, but I've gotten better at building character personalities. When I was like, in fourth grade, I made Mary Sues that just popped into stories out of the blue and totally stole the show from the canon characters. >_>;;; But now I've learned how to add flaws and imperfections to characters, knowing that they're usually the things that endear them to readers.
  
• Emotions. I'm best at writing drama or romance (though the latter did take a lot of practice XD). But I do know how to convey character emotions, especially during conflicts and sappy moments. XD
  

Weaknesses:

• Most of the time, I just don't know how to end a story, and I end up tripping all over words trying to write it, or making the finale much longer because I'm figuring out a good way to finish everything. Though there are some endings I'm proud of...
  
• I overload on the descriptions from time to time. For example, I tend to describe a character's clothing down to the last fold, or spend an entire paragraph elaborating on something that isn't even relevant to the plot.
  
• Action scenes...it takes me a while to write one, because I end up writing one that's extremely awkward and I insist on redoing it over and over till I get it just right. >_> Yeesh.
  

[/shadow]

[Deleted]

sytra said:

What are YOUR weak and strong points in writing, or if you're an artist, drawing? We all have something we're good at, and something we could use a little work on.

Comic-wise me two weaknesses er mutant neopets (which mayhaps er why I been practicin' wit' Arpeggio so much lately) and especially the head o' Baby Kougras. So if droplet hopes ta make a cameo... *ahem* It ain't goin' ta be purdy.

Other flaws in me work...

Personality

Me prefectionist nature. I tend ta scritinize me work ta the extreme an' will hold a comic mayhaps t'ree times longer than need be afore sendin' it oot fer publication.

Color

The thorn in me side, which er why I perfer workin' in B & W. Tisn't color itself that er me problem, but shadin' ta give me work a real 3D appearence.

STRENGTH

A talent ta visualize t'ings ta scale. Me wife hates it cause I started doin' me Neopian cartoons ta scale. It gives the comic a whole new dynamic when ye see a 17cm tall Flotsam, a 35 cm tall Peophin, an' a 60 cm Tuskaninny talkin' aboot issues. I er lookin' for'ard to seein' that dynamic play oot twixt the green paw lupes an' the 'Squall.' Mu ha ha ha har!