Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

60%
+1 −0
Q&A In what order should I describe a setting?

I don't know if there's a rule, but I have a meta-rule: the description has to follow an eye-line. That is, everything is described in the order that a person might see it. So I might start with ...

posted 13y ago by Malvolio‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T01:33:17Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/2599
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Malvolio‭ · 2019-12-08T01:33:17Z (almost 5 years ago)
I don't know if there's a rule, but I have a meta-rule: the description has to follow an eye-line. That is, everything is described in the order that a person might see it. So I might start with the sky, then the trees then the dirt; or the outside of the building, then the doorway, the foyer, the corridor, and then the room. Something to give the user a sense of _movement_.

I'm basically aping the camera motion from a movie, which may or may not be a good thing in itself, but at least it give me -- and maybe the reader -- some structure.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2011-04-24T07:15:06Z (over 13 years ago)
Original score: 5