When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Discuss the practical use of Dramatica. Have questions about how throughlines should be used, how to create Complex Characters or even the various combinations of the 12 Essential Questions and how they will affect your story go here.
Kenneth

When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Kenneth » Feb 12, 2009 1:12 am

I had been playing with Dramatica Pro demo on-and-off, and have read the two Dramatica books at least twice...but still no breakthrough, no "a-ha!" moment for me.

Is there any plan to release an updated Dramatica Pro, hopefully to include the new storyforms alluded to in this forum?

Hopefully it'll be easier to use.

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Feb 18, 2009 1:06 pm

Dramatica Pro 5.0 is long overdue...and we're still working on it. I wanted it to be out last May (that's 2008), so guestimating an E.T.A. is senseless at this point.

That said, we plan on having a long testing period for one of the new features. That will be one of the earlier features incorporated so that we can get a lot of feedback and usage on it before release. When that alpha and beta testing periods approach, I will post a notifications here and to the Dramatica listserv for interested participants. No ETA on when that will happen at this time.
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joe52

Getting Started Guide (first time user) would be tremendous

Postby joe52 » Feb 19, 2009 5:39 am

Would you include a getting started guide (for Dramatica and the WDK) that walks through a simple example, for the first time user. I've seen comments in a number of websites that brought up the same issue, using either Dramatica or the WDK is a challenge for the new user because of a new vocabulary, and the lack of an simple example that goes step-by-step from start to finish on completing a StoryForm. I had bought the WDK a couple of years ago, and spent a month trying to learn how to use it, then gave up. It was trying, having to go through the forums and online documentation when I wanted to go through a quick start guide to get started using the WDK; then later gradually learning more as I went along, pretty much the same for most software (I didn't need or want to read the entire manual for Word or Excel just to start using it, in the case of the WDK I just wanted a 15 minute guide to develop a StoryForm)

About a month ago I bought the WDK again, I lost my first copy when I moved. I started to repeat the same process again, then I found an article "Instant Dramatica" by Armando Mora, at http://www.dramatica.com/theory/addl_ma ... atica.html. This is the beginning of a good quick start quide for Dramatica. The article took parts of a short story and went through the steps (the how and why) needed to select a few StoryEngine and StoryGuide settings to develop a single StoryForm. Compared to going through the entire StoryGuide setting, it was simple and direct to the point. But I have the WDK. I went through the article and found the 7 steps used for Dramatica and wrote what I thought were the steps using the WDK, then made a post "7 newbie questions" in the Dramatica Theory forum.

A couple of days later I got a reply, that briefly went through each question individually. Now I have the beginning of a quick start guide for the WDK. The reply also went through some of the equivalent settings in the WDK when a setting in Dramatica is not available in the WDK such as:
    1. OS problem equivalent in Writer's DreamKit is the Overall Story Concern.
    2. MC Domain equivalent in Writer's DreamKit is the MC Throughline.
    3. The nature of the Story Goal (e.g. Obtaining) is always the same as that of the Overall Story Concern (e.g. Obtaining). Pick one and you've picked the other. Even though you can not pick the Story Goal in Writer's DreamKit, you CAN pick the OS Concern, which sets the Story Goal to be the same.

If the original article had the entire story and all steps for Dramatica (including all the encoding and illustrating parts) rather than omitting parts, it would be an excellent quick start guide for Dramatica. The same for the WDK, if it covered all the equivalent settings in the WDK when a setting in Dramatica is not available in the WDK.

Kenneth

Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Kenneth » Feb 19, 2009 11:39 am

Chris Huntley wrote:Dramatica Pro 5.0 is long overdue...and we're still working on it. I wanted it to be out last May (that's 2008), so guestimating an E.T.A. is senseless at this point.

Wow...that's 9 months and counting.

Can you share what's holding the software?


Chris Huntley wrote:That said, we plan on having a long testing period for one of the new features. That will be one of the earlier features incorporated so that we can get a lot of feedback and usage on it before release. When that alpha and beta testing periods approach, I will post a notifications here and to the Dramatica listserv for interested participants. No ETA on when that will happen at this time.

Can you share anything on the new features?

Have you revised the fundamental theories underlying Dramatica?

I hope the next version will be much easier to use...

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Feb 26, 2009 12:46 pm

Delays were completely non-Dramatica-related. Other projects took resources and staff away from the Dramatica project (much to my chagrin).

Most of the new features are designed to make Dramatica easier to use. That's our number one priority. What they are specifically has still not been made public.

In case you weren't aware of it, we have "Getting Started" videos online that act as a starting guide for new users. It walks through the Level One StoryGuide (which is the same for Writer's DreamKit and Dramatica Pro), creating a story in the process. Here's a link to the videos on Dramatica.com:

http://www.dramatica.com/tutorials/index.htm
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Kenneth

Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Kenneth » Mar 01, 2009 2:52 am

Chris Huntley wrote:Delays were completely non-Dramatica-related. Other projects took resources and staff away from the Dramatica project (much to my chagrin).

I hope you can put Dramatica 5 higher on your priority list.

Any chance of releasing Dramatica 5 within 6 months?

BTW, if somebody has Dramatica 5, will you charge for Dramatica 6 when it comes out?


Chris Huntley wrote:Most of the new features are designed to make Dramatica easier to use. That's our number one priority. What they are specifically has still not been made public.

Thank you.

The Dramatica concepts are hard to grasp, internalize, and use.

I hope Dramatica 4 will make things so much easier.


Chris Huntley wrote:In case you weren't aware of it, we have "Getting Started" videos online that act as a starting guide for new users. It walks through the Level One StoryGuide (which is the same for Writer's DreamKit and Dramatica Pro), creating a story in the process. Here's a link to the videos on Dramatica.com:

http://www.dramatica.com/tutorials/index.htm

Thanks for the link.

I had been looking at the videos, and played with the Dramatica demo.

Dramatica is still not clicking in my head...

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Apr 06, 2009 1:16 pm

Any chance of releasing Dramatica 5 within 6 months?

BTW, if somebody has Dramatica 5, will you charge for Dramatica 6 when it comes out?



I cannot quote deadlines. I'd be a much happier person if I could, but experience has told me NOT to do it because it is far more often wrong than not.

Yes, it is likely that we will charge for Dramatica 6, even for Dramatica 5 users. However, we tend to have a liberal upgrade policy and relatively inexpensive upgrade prices. (No, I don't know what the upgrade price for Dramatica 5 is at this point in time.)
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buedefixe

Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby buedefixe » Feb 03, 2010 2:17 pm

Nearly a year has passed since the last update. Any news?

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Feb 04, 2010 9:23 am

We're still plowing away at it. We're hoping to do some preliminary in-house testing of a couple of the major features next week, but we are still a way off from public beta testing.
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Pages

Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Pages » Dec 12, 2010 6:43 pm

Is the new version getting close? Has anyone heard anything?

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Dec 15, 2010 5:02 pm

I know I sound like a broken record, but we ARE working on DPro 5, diligently. We've completed nearly all the major features and are in the process of cleaning up the rest of the outstanding issues. We have a handful of people that have been using it for about five months now, but until we have a basic feature lock, we won't be going into wide beta.

I wish I could give you an E.T.A., but you can tell from this thread that calling out a timeframe might be suspect.

Cheers,
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby KatYares » Dec 30, 2010 12:45 pm

Waiting for the upgrade has been an exercise in patience. BUT, I know it will be worth it. Still use Dramatica for every story I write and for those I crit.

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Jan 04, 2011 2:42 pm

Thanks Kat. I find the wait excruciating, and I'm WORKING ON THE DARN UPDATE. Thanks to all of you for hanging in there while we get the new version together. I believe it will have been worth the wait whenever it FINALLY comes out.
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Chipotle

Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chipotle » Jun 17, 2011 8:35 am

(First-time poster, but reasonably long-time -- if sporadic -- user of Dramatica Pro.) While I hope this shall be seen as a gentle nudge rather than a whine, Dramatica Pro will not run under Mac OS X 10.7 "Lion." (DP4 is a PowerPC program and runs in emulation on Intel Macs, and the emulation framework is being dropped from 10.7.) I'm certainly hoping the in-development version of Dramatica Pro 5 has moved, if not to the Cocoa framework, at least to a current version of Carbon?

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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Jun 17, 2011 1:23 pm

We will begin alpha testing Dramatica Pro 5 shortly, and beta testing before the end of summer (sooner, if possible). Depending on how the beta testing goes, we expect to have Dramatica Pro 5 out by the holidays...but no promises.

We have already tested Dramatica Pro 5 on Lion and it works swell.
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby stephenbuck415 » Jun 17, 2011 1:56 pm

Hi Chris.

Have the Dramatica terms changed in some way, or have the definitions in the Dramatica Dictionary been re-written/revised/expanded?

Thanks
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby Chris Huntley » Jun 19, 2011 8:26 am

The definitions have not been rewritten at this time, nor am I sure that they will be.

We are considering four term changes.

For Problem-solving style, we are going to make the following changes:

-- Logical will be changed to Linear
-- Intuitive will be Holistic

I plan to also make the following change:

-- Main vs. Impact Character throughline will be changed to Relationship (Story) throughline (with and without "story")

I am also seriously considering changing Impact Character to Influence Character. It is a bit softer than Impact or Obstacle Character, which speaks of nuanced influence on the MC instead of the direct assault on the MC that Impact and Obstacle indicate.

Any thoughts?
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby stephenbuck415 » Jun 19, 2011 12:27 pm

Chris Huntley wrote:Any thoughts?


LEGEND OF ACRONYMS

First I'd like to suggest that a Legend of Acronyms be created. The other day on Convore I asked what PSR was... my mind was racing through so many definitions that I simply didn't think of it as a reporting abbreviation. Several months ago on the list I used the terms OS, SS, MC and IC and Mike asked (paraphrased into my own words) "the what?".

I think that providing a Legend of Acronyms will also be helpful to the new user of Dramatica, because those of us who are familiar with it eventually begin to chat using abbreviated terms.

PROBLEM SOLVING STYLE

Logical / Linear
Intuitive / Holistic

I think the new terms are more user friendly and will be better received by new users.

MAIN VS. IMPACT THROUGHLINE and OBSTACLE/IMPACT CHARACTER

I see that the term Relationship has been around since at least 2004 (http://www.dramatica.com/theory/tip_of_month/tips/tip0504.html).

I feel that Relationship can be a good change if it is pluralized. When I have discussed the Impact Character role during meetings and emphasized the fact that it can be Impact Characters (IC), only the singular definition is accepted by most. If eyes have not already started to gloss over from having to think about their story to such a technical degree, I get looks of rejection when I explain that the IC can be more than one character... and usually a bit later in the meeting it has been followed by the question "what if I have more than one character functioning as the impact character?".

I feel that pluralizing it in the beginning will make understanding its use easier in the long run, probably because if one is told "it can be a lot" in the beginning and then being given permission to reduce it to one character is easier than adding new characters to the role.

BACKGROUND

Add definition for BACKGROUND.
http://www.dramatica.com/theory/tip_of_month/tips/tip0603.html

STORY TENDENCY

Add definition for STORY TENDENCY.
http://www.dramatica.com/theory/tip_of_month/tips/tip0999.html

ARGUMENT / INEQUITY

The Grand Argument Story is "A story that illustrates all four throughlines (Overall Story, Main vs. Impact Story, Main Character, and Impact Character) in their every story point so that no holes are left in either the passionate or dispassionate arguments of that story -- A Grand Argument Story covers all the bases so that it cannot be disproved...." - Dramatica Dictionary

I feel that once an aspiring or average writer hears the word "argument" with the definition of the word story, they think that if they are going to use Dramatica theory it means they will not sit down and write but rather sit down and fight. I've seen quite a few shoulders be drawn upwards in stress on hearing the word "argument" in the definition, so an alternative way to explain the concept would be great.

"According to Dramatica, every Complete Story is an analogy of a single human mind trying to deal with an inequity."
- Melanie Ann Phillips, Writing With The Story Mind.

Inequity is another word that seems to disrupt the creative flow and cause eyebrows to squeeze inwards towards the nose.

I feel that the term Inequity is perfect for the writer like me, who thinks technically, and screenwriters who plan to continue writing professionally, but definitely not the average creative writer. Although the definition of inequity is understood easily enough, it may be associated to math, chemistry, physics, and other academics that require a lot of technical thought rather than something that stimulates creative writing.

As with argument, I feel that if an additional definition is created to appease the average creative writer who doesn't want to think technically about their writing but use Dramatica would be useful.

I will be able to make additional/alternative definition suggestions by September or so.
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby stephenbuck415 » Jun 19, 2011 6:10 pm

Re: https://convore.com/dramatica/character-driven-dramatica/
"Dramatica is set up to focus on on a pair of major characters, which is difficult to adapt to a story that has three or more major characters"

The above quote is a perfect example why I feel Obstacle/Impact/Relationship Character should be plural (along with the MC vs. IC throughline).
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Re: When will next update of Dramatica Pro be available?

Postby JRH147 » Jun 20, 2011 9:10 am

The problem with pluralizing the terms as you suggest is that often, when someone says there are more than three major characters, they have more than one story going on.


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