How to create a scene

The building blocks of every story are the scenes. It is a self-contained unit of action, usually tied to a single location and event. In short, it is a combination of space, time and action.

Settings

This is what the scene looks like, the location and time. It focuses on the following

• Where: the location where all the action takes place, it could be a small a cupboard or as big as a star system (e.g. starship battle). If it is a recurring location, you might want to highlight the changes from the last time or emphasize that nothing has changed
• When: the time of day, the season, weather, cycle etc. Is it dark outside? Are the moons aligned? This will depend on the nature of your story and the use of time sequences.
• Sensory details: Imagine your readers being there, what can they see, hear, smell, taste or feel (e.g. cold)
• Atmosphere/mood: What sort of emotions does the place evokes, and what is the emotional impact on the characters. For example, a happy atmosphere may make the hero feel better and the secret antagonist feel sad
• What is the relevance of the scene to the settings, if any. This state whether the scene must happen there (e.g. hospital for patients), or just happen there (e.g. two characters ran into each other at the pub and talk)
• Emotional beats of the scene. For example, a character in a hospital, dying at the same hospital they were born, and had all their children.

Purpose

What do you want to achieve in this scene. This is where you state the new developments in the story, and how the scene contributes to the story at large or a particular arc.

Characters

Here you list all the characters in the scene and why are they in that scene? You want to primarily focus on their motivations, and then other information like

• Relationships to other character, any conflict or shared goals
• Emotions: how they are feeling at this moment

Purpose vs Motivation

Purpose is the author's perspective, why this scene should exist, it focuses on how to push the narrative forward, reveal crucial information or foreshadowing. While most scenes usually have a purpose, the presence/absence of a motivation can break the scene.

Motivations is an in-story "purpose" or reasons for what each character are doing in the scene, why they are acting in a particular manner.

For example, the purpose of the scene is to show that Character A (CA) is a fine swordsman, there are lots of ways to do this, perhaps, you can have a scene where someone (CB) mentions it, or a scene where a popular swordsman (PS) challenges CA to a sword fight and lost. Regardless of how yu want to achieve this, one thing is important, the characters involved should be motivated to perform this action.

Perhaps, CA steps on PS foot, which angers PS and challenges CA to a sword fight. CB who is a friend of PS and well acquainted with CA's prowess tried to dissuade PS because he thinks CA will kill PS.

In this situation, you have established a good motivation for each character while achieving the goal of the scene.

Events

Describe what happens in the scene. This can be broken down into three sections

1. Beginning
2. Middle
3. End

tip

Enter late, Exit early

Start your scene as late as possible, don't waste your readers time on unnecessary part of the scene like the character entering the scene, the meet and greet, small talk unless there is a reason to show the reader that part (e.g. hostilities).

Conversely, exiting early means end the scene as soon as possible

1. Beginning (Hook/Setup):

The status quo of the scene

• How does the scene start? (Dialogue, action, description, etc.)
• What is the initial hook that grabs the reader's attention?
• What is the immediate situation or problem?
• What is the power dynamic at the start of the scene?

2. Middle (Development/Conflict):

The thick of the story, the events

• How does the conflict or challenge unfold?
• What actions and reactions do the characters take?
• What dialogue, internal monologue, or sensory details are used to convey the scene's events?
• How does the power dynamic shift?
• Are there any rising stakes or turning points?
• How does the scene increase the tension?

3. End:

• How does the scene conclude?
• Is the character's goal achieved, partially achieved, or thwarted?
• What is the immediate emotional impact on the characters?
• Is there a cliffhanger or unresolved question that leads into the next scene?
• How does the scene transition to the next part of the story?
• What is the final emotional note of the scene?
• What is the power dynamic at the end of the scene?
• How does it end: Resolution/Cliffhanger/Transition

tip

Final line

The final line of a scene should encourage your reader to turn the page.

Types of scene

This is the overall nature of the scene. It is what the scene is all about, based on the combination of all previous information. Based on the purpose of a scene, you can determine what type to best achieve this purpose.

Common examples includes

• Conversation: Heart to heart, interrogation, divulging secret etc
• Action sequence: Fight scene, pursuit/chase
• Exploration: flashbacks, clue-finding, dream sequence
• Emotional: grief, romance, celebration
• Exposition: lore, festival, travel, daily life, scenic view
• Tension/Suspense: dilemma, ambush, trap
• Public event: party, market
• Tribulation: court, overcoming demons
• Twist/Revelation: backstab, prophecy, unmasking

Organising scenes

Figuring out the type of your scenes also helps you figure out how to organise the scenes. In order to keep your story exciting, it's preferable to mix things up with your scenes. Having 2 or more scenes that are exactly the same becomes boring and makes your story seems repetitive. In order to make story exciting, it might be tempting to pack your story with back to back action scenes, but this doesn't work either due to diminishing returns. In fact, creating contrasting scenes are usually more effective, like a quiet day that suddenly turns into an all out fight scene (as long as it's coherent of course). This is why war/battle scenes is usually preceded by a friendly atmosphere of characters laughing, heart to heart discussion about fears and hopes, adding dimensions to the character.

Here is an inexhaustible list of scene.