Journal Entry:
Describe what you see.
Title it.
Journal Entry
Describe what you see now.
Title it.
Exploding a Moment
Writing a Scene in Slow-Motion:
Using Snapshots, Explode the Moment
Thoughtshots, and Shrink a Century
Hypersensitivity of your senses
Imagine that all of your senses are set to hypersensitivity,
meaning that you now have a heighten sense of sight, smell,
touch, taste and hear.
You can see every detail, smell things in the air, your touch
is so sensitive that you can feel everything, you can even
taste things that are in the air, and you can hear every
sound including the beating of your own heart and those
around you.
Then reexamine the photo and write what your senses
sense when they are set to hypersensitivity mode.
Describe what you see now with your
hypersensitive senses.
Title it.
What are Snapshots?
• Snapshots ask writers to put
on their writing binoculars
and help readers create
pictures in their minds.
Writers can create snapshots
by describing every part of a
scene in great detail.
• Be creative! Be specific!
• Some of the best snapshots
are those that use at least two
of the five senses. What does
this scene smell like? What
does it look and feel like?
Now you try it. Looking back
at what you have written,
highlight where you have used
imagery to provide more detail
to create a snapshot in the
reader’s mind. Now take one of
those sentences and “Explode
the Moment.”
Explode the Moment
• “…allows writers to stretch the exciting seconds
of their stories into what seems like hours,
creating suspense for the reader to savor.” Slow
motion, step by step.
• Provide your reader with a frame-by-frame
picture of the action.
• SHOW don’t TELL—paint a picture, freeze an
image with your words. Describe in intricate
detail. Zoom in closer and closer. Try using
similes or metaphors, vivid words, and your
senses to create your image.
Explode the Moment
Select one of your snapshots and
slow it down, frame-by-frame.
Thoughtshot
• Tell, don’t show. Share your inner thoughts and feelings
as a writer. Put yourself in the scene.
• Use Internal Monologue: what are you thinking at that
very moment?
• Use Flashback: think back about something that has
already happened.
• Flash-Ahead: think about something that is going to
happen or might happen in the future. Writers often use
flash- aheads when a character is trying to make a
decision.
• Pick a point of view: a different perspective.
Create a Thoughtshot
Select one of the people in the
photo and “tell don’t show.”
Shrink a Century
• Show the passage of time.
• Show the passing of a long period of time
with one or two sentences.
• Focus on the importance or meaning of
the time rather than details.
• For example, “She died.” doesn’t reveal the
importance or the meaning of the
experience. More effective, “We married
in the spring; she died in the fall. It was
bitterest winter of my life.”
Create a Shrink the Moment
Reveal the passage of time by omitting detail, but
revealing the importance and meaning of the
experience.
Writer’s Toolbox Techniques
•
•
•
•
Snapshot Tips:
• Use two or more of the five senses: hearing, feeling, tasting, smelling,
seeing. Use literary and poetic devices.
• Remember showing, not telling!
To Explode a Moment Tips:
•
Tell, don’t show.
•
Set the scene in slow motion, frame-by-frame
Thoughtshot Tips and Techniques:
• Flashback
• Flash-Ahead
• Internal Dialogue
Shrink a Century Tips:
•
Compress a large amount of time, but reveal the importance and
meaning of the experience.