Hello, fellow campaigners of the writing world! A. F. Kopp here (a day late again) with some information on the coolest scheduling and organizational structure I know: Trello (and no, this is not a paid promotion. I just love it a lot).
I have a free account so I have 10 free boards I can use (I’m already using 8, lol).
Here is an example of what the sidebar looks like on Trello. You can collaborate with team members (if you have some because I do not) and assign different projects to each other.
And as you can see, I’ve used a lot of my boards. The first is for my blog/newsletter that I use probably the most.
Then I have a few “worlds” for my writing and worldbuilding ideas: Almerr (fantasy), Tuckerton (hisfic), Uncitizens (scifi/scifa), and Young Victors (superhero). Some of these projects are soooo far down the line so I just pop in and write an idea down or make a character sheet, etc.
My Set-Ups
Planning
This next image I’m showing you is my basic “planning” set-up. I have a to-do list, what I want to work on today (sometimes I have a slot for “the week”), pending, and done. I also have a last random/template area to store ideas and such.
Worldbuilding
This is my next “template” that I use for my worldbuilding. This one is my Uncitizens world and I set it up a bit differently than my planning boards. Just a heads up, some of my other worldbuilding boards are better organized with the tags, but I only tagged characters and couple other things in this one.
I have my braindumps first so that I can just pop in Trello either from the web or on my phone (and it’s all synced!) to access my ideas from ANYWHERE as long as wifi is present.
Next, I have resources where I store my ideas for different things I’ve created or gathered regarding information on the story. I created some cool maps for the quadrants mentioned in the story!
Lastly, the next few I have are of planets and their characters. I guess it could be a bit of a spoiler, but not really. These are some of the main characters in the series (and prequels) that you’ll find out about sooner than later. (I also have a templates section but I have too many planets for it all to fit on the screen nicely).
Other Tools on Trello
Lists
You can make lists on Trello! Here is my writing checklist for wordcount goals for Uncitizen’s!
Deadlines
You also can creat deadlines with Trello and assign certain people to it. The only downside I’ve found with this tool is that it only notified you before the deadline and not before the work-period starts. For example, if I want to work on this project below between February 1st and February 28th of next year, I will only get notified like a day before the 28th. So, what I’ve done to get around this is to make my start date the deadline date and then just change the deadline once I start working on it.
Well, that is it for today! I hope you are now inspired to try Trello. It’s been a lifesaver for me and my many projects, so I hope this gives you an idea on how to work it or use it for yourself.
How do you all stay organized?
Salutations, fellow adventurers!
Respectfully,
A. F. Kopp Author 