scene names in writing software

[Bman10119]

Not sure if this is the right area for this, so here goes lol. I recently got writeitnow and was moving my WiP over from word. I'm stumped as to what the purpose of titling a scene should be. I get that its to differentiate but how do you guys and gals go about naming scenes? Thanks!

 

[teacup]

I think you're talking about chapters, if not, then excuse my useless answer
I'd say, apart from to differentiate, the purpose of naming scenes is to grab the reader's attention. For me, at least, anyway. When I finish a chapter and see the next chapter's title, sometimes, if it is something particularly interesting to me it may make me read on rather than putting the book down for a night. Also for writing I'd say that naming them (if you name it before writing it) is good because it can keep your focus on that theme and the outcome of the chapter/scene.

How I go about it? I always have the scene I want to write in mind, so I try to come up with a good title, and focus on that when writing it. If I don't think of one then no matter, I just write. Then when I've finished the chapter I read through it and focus on what the chapter is really about, or an interesting point/part of the chapter, and name it after that. I'm not sure about anybody else, but that's how I do it.

Of course, untitled chapters work fine as well.

 

[Bman10119]

The software I'm ussing has chapter naming too, but it let's you break down the chapter into individual scenes within the chapter and asks for names for those as well. Which I have no idea how to name lol

 

[A. E. Lowan]

I had a program several years ago named PowerWriter that did the same thing. I just used shorthand identifiers for each scene, usually the important characters and location, or the event or a pivotal quote.

For example;

Winter and Jessie at Curiosity's

Jonathan and Jeremy in Jeremy's Office

"The time of hiding is over."

Battle at the Tower


Hope that helps!

 

[Steerpike]

Yeah, you can do it in Scrivener as well, I think. The names don't show up in the final version of the manuscript, they're just there to aid the author during the writing process.

 

[Asura Levi]

In this kind of software, titling a scene is just to help you, the writer to know before hand what scene is this, without having to read it. Useful when you want to come back to some event.

Of course, it depends of how you titled it.

 

[Bman10119]

So basically the scene title is whatever works best to remind you what's going on without reading it all. Awesome, ok. thanks!