Storytelling Basics
This is the most basic storytelling construct that you could have and is basically a skeleton for what you can dress all of those wonderful elements to your story.
Character and Conflict
First, decide who is your main character. You must have a main character.
Then Find out what forces are working for your character and what forces are working against.
There are a number of forces always working for the main character and against the main character. If there’s another character who really doesn’t have that much invested and there’s not that much at risk for that person, then that’s probably not a good main character to choose.
When you have a lot of obstacles for and against the character and it’s quite balanced, the forces for and against, then that’s probably a good character.
you might want to try plotting out the pros and cons, the forces going for the character, the forces going against the character.
Focus
Then you need to figure out your focus statement. The easiest way to figure out a focus statement which is one sentence which will be your angle into the story, it’s the angle that will help you tell the big picture.
It is not a sentence about what the topic is about. Or the issue. It is not a sentence about what the subject of the story is about. It is the focus statement of your character. What is this guy’s/gal’s quest?
If your character wanted to climb an iceberg , what is their focus? It could be as simple as they really want to climb. They just really want to find an iceberg to climb because they get off on the thrill of reaching the top. But it’s a big challenge.
So, that’s’ one sentence. They’re looking for an iceberg that they want to climb because they get off on it.
You can always boil down a focus statement to somebody wants to do something because. It can be someone wants to build a shelter, stop a logging operation, create a political group…… but you can always boil down a focus statement to somebody wants to do something because.
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So you have your character on his/her quest and you’ve got the forces for and against.
Hook
So right off the bat, the first thing that you want to do when you start any story is the hook. This is what you need to do to grab peoples’ attention. You want people to pay attention to your story. You want people to not change the channel. You might want to think about using your strongest sound, your strongest words, your strongest video, to really grab peoples’ attention.
But in the hook you don’t want to show the climax. Because you also want to build the suspense. So don’t give away the ending in the hook. Tease them. Make them want to watch all the way through.
In the hook you may want to introduce your main character and to set up what their challenge is.
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The next part where the excitement dips a bit is
Context.
And this is where your story lives or dies. You make this too short, people might not be able to understand the rest of your story. You make this too long, you might lose your listener or viewer. This is the need-to-know information to be able to move on with the story.
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The next part is the story
Story Unfolding
This is the story of your main character and their quest. Secondary characters are introduced. Here you can usually find a good spot to put a statement of enticement. And that’s where you actually get to hear from the character about the challenge ahead.
The unfolding can be divided into however many sections you want to. Or however many different scenes, or obstacles. All of these obstacles you can make into a different little section in the story unfolding. This is when the little parts will start revealing themselves and you’re building the drama.
As you’re going on, you’re building the excitement and just raising the whole drama of the story until you get to the climax.
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Climax
Every piece has some sort of climax – or ah ha moment – It can be the moment where your character succeeds – or doesn’t. Or it can be the most powerful moment you have – whether that’s visual. Action. Or an interview clip.
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Wrap up
After that, you have what’s known as either the wrap-up or denouement In this part in the denouement, you can always do a recap of what you’re hook was. You could do some forward thinking. What’s coming up next for your character? Or you can just wrap-up the story that you’re telling.
Scenes and Sequence
Current affairs and News stories, whether they’re 2 hours or 2 minutes, are made up of scenes.
A scene sets your character and what their quest is
A scene should have some element that shows a unique part of your character
A scene can be one shot – or several shots which make up a sequence
A sequence is a visual unfolding which sets the mood/ tone of a story. It can have an element of surprise (a reveal)
Sequences can move between macro and micro of a person’s world. They set up and give insight to a person’s world
Macro shots – where are they, what’s the big picture – your character’s relation to the outside world. This can show conflict.
Micro shots – what are they doing? What is the visual essence to what they are about
Scenes should have an upsound/soundup to punctuate and drive your story forward
Your scene sets the mood of your story
Editing allows you to build scenes which move you forward and back in time
Prepared by Mark Solnoky, APTN for Week 7 INCA 200 Summer Institute in Journalism
June 18-22, 2018