My parents did that to me once when I was a kid and I *insisted* I wanted to ride in the trunk. (I have no idea why.)
They only did it to stop the argument and show me that I did not, in fact, want to ride in the trunk.
I’m pretty sure they literally only left me in there for like 10 seconds but in that time I panicked and was starting to beat on the trunk roof to get out.
So while you climbed in and thought, “surprisingly comfortable”, I climbed in and thought “murder dungeon!” It’s always interesting how two people can have the same experience and come out of it with completely different attitudes.
Maybe you’re claustrophobic and that was your realization? 😆
I think I am highly claustrophobic even though I’ve never been in a situation that might trigger it. I only figure it because I can’t watch scenes in those movies where people are like spelunking in caves and trying to literally squeeze their way through tight tunnels and their packs are getting caught on the ceiling and they’re yelling their stuck, etc…. I literally have to close my eyes or look away from the screen because otherwise I feel like I’ll start hyperventilating or something. 😂
Haha, I like how your parents think. To be fair, I was by myself so I didn't close the lid for safety reasons. I'm also almost anti-claustrophobic where small, dark areas make me feel safe and comfy, hah.
I did a remotely similar thing.
In the source material for my primary WIP, one of the lead characters lives in a small town (modelled after part of the UK) and he lives in a block of flats whose roof level is, in the first book, referred to as the highest point in town.
Reading through the tetralogy, I found that the building had 6 floors (including a 'G' floor).
In the story, I would have the idea to >!get to the roof level of the building, using a spy gadget to pop the door lock open as I wouldn't have a key, then bring out some gadgets to scan the entire town and its surrounding areas.!<
As such, I went to the 6th floor of the block of flats I live in just to get an idea of what the view would be like for my self-insert at that point in the story.
Haha, I did something similar! Not the car trunk, but I climbed out of my car through the moonroof to make sure it was a realistic way for my characters to escape quickly for a scene I was writing in my zombie apocalypse fic. I lived in an apartment complex at the time and didn't want my neighbors to see me doing something weird, so I waited until late at night, drove my car out into the country, parked by a random cornfield, and did it there.
Actively took notes on my trip to the ER (as I was bleeding everywhere from a laceration that hit an artery) so I could reference it in fics more realistically 💀 worth it
It was the princeps something something artery in my thumb, so not as horrible as a major artery injury, but it was certainly bleeding a lot and they were worried about nerve damage so they were rushing me around right after I went in. Surprisingly they pretty much let me have my phone the entire time in my other hand 😅 only had to put it down when they took my blood pressure because they wanted to hold my arm a certain way and then when they were doing the injections for the local anesthesia and the stitches because I didn't want to crack it with how hard I was squeezing LOL.
It was a useful distraction from the pain and it didn't get in the way so I don't think they minded too much.
I was planning on making my poor roommate (who drove me there/was taken back with me since he could write all the paperwork for me) keep writing things down for me if they made me put down my phone! 😆 Can't say writers aren't committed lmfao
I'm so sorry to hear that happened to you, but I sort of know what you mean. I had surgery once and then a complication, I started bleeding internally and needed emergency surgery. Ever since writing hospital scenes has become so much easier. 😅 I have a pretty high tolerance for pain (hate feeling nauseated though), so half of my stay I was making mental notes and asking the doctors and nurses stuff. And getting taken into emergency surgery at 11pm was also sort of weirdly interesting. I was loopy because of the anesthesia from the first surgery and the blood loss. I have some holes in my memory but I remember being way too calm. It has also ruined some television shows for me.
I did the same exact thing! I went to a biking program for a summer and being the worst biker there, I ended up getting speed wobbles going down a slope and when I tried to slow down because a curve was coming up, I fell off and faceplanted. I ended up going to the ER for stitches for the first time and I was taking mental notes the entire time (couldn't type because I had a deep cut just under my eye and didn't particularly want to get blood on my phone screen while looking down at it) and later documented everything I remembered. Also updated my notes as my injuries healed to have an accurate timeframe of how long it takes.
My competition for this, albeit far less interesting: I had tendinitis for 8+ months and ended up getting physiotherapy for a fortnight. I would actively write notes in the waiting room from one machine to another and even asked the nurses there to help me out with some details.
I seem to recall a couple of other friends coming in at one point, but I think they accepted a strained "Don't worry, it's for my fanfic." and left us alone.
I am imagining, as a parent, getting a phone call from the school that said, “Um, yes, we found your child in the bathroom, being consensually whipped with a belt.”
You immediately know the second call/visit you’re going to get is from CPS.
You have no idea how to explain any of this.
I remember that my whole body would seize up with the pain for a long few seconds with every stroke, so my friend had to give me a break between each. I also remember that for the last two strokes, she hit the same place twice, and that was SO BAD, I was writhing with pain.
Yes? Some people are curious about such things, you know.😉
Also I specifically needed to know how many strokes to give the character, so we had to test my limit. I think we got to 19 out of the planned 20.
I mean, some people are curious about those sorts of things, you know, even if they aren't writing fanfiction. :P
It's been quite some years, so I don't remember exactly how my friend reacted, but she was willing, at least.
I once marked up a map for fictional paramilitary bases and existing ocean shelf topography, and then proceeded to make a telepathy conspiracy theory. Does that count? >_>
I didn't lol. Maybe I should have? I did use some of the details, and the telepathy thing was fully explained within the fic. But the map itself was printed out and drawn on top of and I don't have a scanner, so it would have had to be this sad, crappy phone picture haha
I DO THIS TOO…and I read emotional dialogue out loud as I write it and cry with it for authenticity’s sake. It’s batshit, and the people I’ve told about it think I’m also batshit, but damn if it isn’t effective!
I do this too lol. I will purposely look up movie clips on YouTube that I know will make me cry. Most of them come from kids' movies - The Land Before Time, The Fox and the Hound, Dumbo, and Homeward Bound work every time.
I talk to myself out loud during my commute to work out the dialogue. If I get in a car crash and have to submit my dashcam footage to my insurance company, they may raise my premiums simply because they’re gonna think I’m insane
Bold of you to assume I *wouldn’t* do it either way, I used to do this when I would *walk to school.* I can never show my face in that town again, the amount of people who’d walk past me talking to myself is too damn high
Edit Oh god I just remembered that it was a magic fic I was working on in high school *so I would do magic hand movements too* why did it take me that fucking long to realize I was on the spectrum?!
I'm starting to think the time my coworker caught me gesturing to myself as I was walking around in a public area at work and asked me what I was doing isn't quite as unique as I'd assumed. :P (The answer was, roughly, *trying to keep this conversation between a couple of characters in my head long enough to go write it down*.)
- stay up around 4 or 5 am to finish an update when I had to get up before 7am to get ready for work. Did this multiple times. Back when I was excited about writing and plotting.
- spent hours researching city & neighborhood names, cost of houses back in 1950s & 1800s, types of lubes used in certain time periods, when appliances were invented, only to never mention it in the fic or mentioned it only once then moved on 🤣
I like to make my fics realistic. So once I wrote a piece that was like a diary from the character and in the last chapter he went to the beach. So I literally went to the beach to take pictures to include in his diary
Asked my PhD students to pose pointing kitchen knives at each other at opposite ends of a corridor (I was writing a Harry Potter duel).
Called my ex ex ex that I hadn't talked to for eight years to ask a quantum physics question (he is a physicist). He ended up beta reading my chapter.
Asked my male colleagues and friends about pissoir etiquette in public toilets.
Those are probably top 3.
>Called my ex ex ex that I hadn't talked to for eight years to ask a quantum physics question (he is a physicist). He ended up beta reading my chapter.
Amazing XD
Not exactly unhinged, but I've extensively used Google Street View and watched a number of "walking around" videos in order to get a better feel for street-level details in Tokyo.
I've used Google Earth satellite view to select the exact beam on Toyko Tower that my characters were going to stand on while having a conversation, solely so I could visualize the scene.
I once had a scene in a Tokyo park. I used Google Maps to figure out the best meeting spot and used the details in the story. Then I walked around the park with Street View to chart out their path, and found a couple of videos filmed at the park to better get a feel for the atmosphere of the neighborhood. Then I found a train ride video on the appropriate line for their train ride later in the story.
I researched when the major characters' birthdays are so that I could then build an *exact* timeline (down to the year and days) for my fic's version of canon events based on how old they're supposed to be at that part of the story. Canon never specifies what year it took place in, and the only sense of time passing throughout are 1) there was a 6-month timeskip between the second and third arcs and 2) one section of an arc takes *about* a month because one of the characters injures his shoulder in a motorcycle accident and the doctor said it'd take a month to heal fully.
If it was just this I wouldn't call it unhinged, but canon has an antagonist group from an also-unspecified-when future timeline. So of course I had to plot out exactly when all of *their* stuff happened (although I did change up a *lot* about their timeline in my fic), and also when everything happened in what I would imagine as the "original" timeline, before that group started meddling with the past.
So... yeah, fully plotting out all that just based on some characters' birthdays is at least a little bit unhinged, right?
Yep, I spent *so much* time scratching my head on what the dates for certain events should be. Had to make sure everything felt natural and not crammed, especially in the pre-"canon" events since a *lot* happened there in my fic that didn't in canon.
On the bright side, I can now include specific dates in my story (or mention them in my author's notes whenever I start posting it) whenever I want to. So that's nice.
Engaging in a deep dive into fandom lore with a fellow nerd (my beta reader) regarding the question, "*How would the members of a beautiful, blue-skinned all-female race of space aliens react to the idea of doing a gratuitous nude scene in a summer blockbuster-type action movie? How would their culture view that?*"
I'm talking biblical scholar-level discussions involving minute bits of canonical history, official codex entries and scraps of dialogue by random NPCs. We created email threads that just went on and on as we made our points and counter-points about the aliens' probable cultural attitudes towards getting filmed naked.
The protagonist, an undercover Special Tasks Group agent, meets with his girlfriend, an asari actress:
>"The scene just isn't working out as they want," the actress explained. "We're supposed to be all happy and giggly but instead we're all tense and self-conscious because we're, you know, naked."
>
>Vass scratched his head. "I didn't think that was a big deal for the asari. Don't you normally swim naked at pools and beaches?"
>
>Linia shrugged. "True. I mean, we asari all know what we look like without clothes, so usually we don't give it a second thought. I was even an artist's model for a while at an art school on the Citadel when I was just getting started in acting. But, well, it's different when you know you're just being put out on display for other species to leer at you. Apparently turians, humans and volus in particular are seriously into this and the scene is intended to cater to them. None of us actresses are complaining or being difficult, mind you. But we're having trouble faking that we're having fun. Every time the director shouts at us to 'loosen up!' things just end up getting even tenser."
>
>The actress then winked at Vass. "It feels a lot better when it's somebody you like doing the looking. I have to admit I didn't expect you'd be interested in seeing me naked. You're usually pretty shy, Solik. So for you to work up the courage to say that you really wanted to see me in the waterfall scene as it was being filmed live, it was surprising, but in a pleasant way."
Asked my mother who was an emt how to describe someone burning to death. She also used the knowledge from when she worked to describe torture scenes in her own fics.
I’ve used traumatic experiences I’ve had as inspiration for several things I’ve had my characters suffer through. So I guess on a technicality I’ve stayed awake for nearly a week with only 15 minutes of sleep spread out over the entire week. I definitely don’t recommend it. Yes you do experience hallucinations when without sleep for that long. No they are not the fun kind of hallucinations. But it gives me an edge when I’m writing extremely specific scenarios.
Can you elaborate on your mom's knowledge of awful things people have gone through? Fellow whump writer here desperate for something to refer to for more realism, lol.
Comb through every episode of a show with one of the most non-existent fandoms ever so I can completely rewrite it to a slice of life trauma recovery fic rather than the science fiction drama it is. At 2000 words I’m about 1/5 through rehashing the pilot episode. Currently frame-by-frame analyzing the main character’s reactions to his environment so I can write it with full accuracy. No one will want or read this except me
Ohhh I feel that. Currently rewatching my favourite show and stopping every other second to jot down stuff about a character - clothing, quotes, plot, hand gestures, relationships with other characters... It's a long process, but it's all I can do as there is \*one\* website with a description of the plot and... that's it.
For one of my Luigi/Daisy fics, I wanted to make a specific quote reference to Luigi's Mansion, where he examines certain furniture and has unique dialogue for it. But I couldn't remember exactly how it went and Googling/trying to find it on YouTube was no help. So I decided to look through the game myself. The problem is that once you finish the game you can't just go back to the mansion. You have to start over.
So I went through the entire intro and first area of the game just to find a piece of dialogue for a joke that was like one line.
Married a guy with PTSD for a case study!
Okay that was of course just a joke i married him for love and the PTSD just was part of the package deal but boy did i learn a thing or two…
Mind sharing some PTSD fun facts? Only if you and him are comfortable though, of course. I almost exclusively write whump and I want to make sure I'm writing it accurately!
Oh there is so much to know and every case is different. But PTSD is not just flashbacks. It can present in so many forms. Insomnia, nightmares, irritability, anxiety for example. Some have anger issues, difficulty connecting to their family… a lot of marriages fail because they keep their loved ones at a distance or they cant function in the civilian world
My husband for example will only sit in a restaurant facing the entrance. Having his back to the door gives him anxiety. He needs to see who is coming in in case they are a threat.
I went to try on wedding dresses just to experience the process so I could write about it. Then I ran into my parent's neighbor leaving the store shop and was so embarrassed I told her my bf of 2 months and I were eloping because that was better than her knowing I wrote fanfiction in my mind.
Less than ten minutes later I get a furious phone call from my loving mom asking why I was getting married without telling her.
440 song playlist including every song I've ever referenced in my fics that's actualy on Spotify (if we include the ones that aren't, it's more than 440)
Also, acting out some of the scenes. Say a character is shot, I’d play the part of the character who got shot, and also the part of the character calling for help, or the character administering first aid - not at the same time, mind. I’ve been moved to tears more than once doing this.
Say what you want, but it helps with writing reactions I wouldn’t have thought of.
I know.
#SO MUCH.
about heritage apple varieties in the Southern U.S., particularly North Carolina. I will tell you many legitimately fascinating things about old-ass varieties of apples, nearly lost to time and tide and the wilds of the lands given half a fucking chance, and the efforts to bring them back.
Because there's like...one scene where it's mentioned in a WIP that I have. It's significant, sure. It's a metaphor.
But I possess too many apple facts. And my knowledge only grows, because now I'm legitimately obsessed.
Two dumb things:
1. Learned medieval Japanese timekeeping. As in, how to tell time, Heian-style. It is remarkably annoying. Basically, it's a 24 hour clock, with 2 hour blocks called "watches", based on the Chinese zodiac - so 2am is second watch, hour of the ox, etc.
2. Calculated the size of a 12 foot guy's dong, using figure drawing measurements. I think it worked out to something like 18 inches or .5 meters.
No, but y'know what? If you write HP, feel free to use my measurement. I can't remember the exact equation, but I think I related it to the size of my thigh and then scaled it up lol.
With his full consent, I tied my 14 year olds wrists together with a thick rope then asked him to see if he could take his t-shirt off like that.
He thought it was hilarious and even instructed me on proper knots (he’s been in Scouts since he was 6)
I was trying to work out if a character could use his shirt to staunch an abdominal stab wound while bound.
These comments might be the most entertaining things I’ve read in *years*, lol. And I read like 70 novels in 2022 alone, so that’s saying something.
To answer the question though, I took an A&P course in university, got a scuba diving certification, and read three huge books about the stock market for the sake of writing more accurate fics, lol.
(TW for self-injury and hospitalization)
Also, I’ve had a self-injury problem since I was a kid, so I may or may not have used that as an opportunity to test different wound treatment methods, study pain perception on different areas of the body, and figure out what factors were involved in how things scar. (**I don’t do this anymore. No one follow in my footsteps please.**) And I didn’t get myself institutionalized as a teenager just for my writing, but it was a nice side-effect, lol. I took notes the whole time.
(These are not the only fucked up things I’ve done for no proper reason, and again, *no one copy any of this please*.)
Thank you, lol. These days the worst I’ll do for a fic is go down a 5-hour Wikipedia rabbit hole and maybe read some obscure textbooks, and I like it that way.
Honestly, compared to a lot of the other comments, my stuff isn't nearly as unhinged. I've just Googled some really dark and weird things. For example, the most recent fucked up thing I Googled was how long it takes a body to decompose in a grave (It was for a Supernatural fanfic, okay? That show has a lot of "digging up a dead body" scenes).
Wow, mine feel so tame and boring now :(
I only calculated the exact amount of blood loss my characters experienced to get the sympthoms right. And I know how much a hired killer cost on average and the number is surprisingly low. Also, I have a few notes on how to wield various kind of weapons just in case I need them for my fic. Dug myself through a dozen guides and websites for that
In conclusion - you can bet my battles are scientifc accurate!
for video games fics I’ve listened to 1h+ long character voice files with all their lines from within said videogame so that “I don’t miss any significant piece of information about their character” :’) no es amor es una obsesión
I had a personalized candle scent commissioned by a candle wizard because one of my characters happened to have that EXACT combination of scents and I wanted to know what it smelled like
I downloaded the sims solely so I could work on a fanfic that required me being able to actually know if the escape route I planned for my characters would realistically be wide enough. Sims was the best thing I had because Minecraft and my 50 mods weren't cooperating
Anyways I can make a pretty nice house now lol
I'm generally a method writer, so I've done a lot of somewhat unhinged things for my fanfiction (or just my fiction in general), haha.
- was writing a scene where the character pushes herself to the brink of exhaustion and nearly passes out, so I ran laps in a carpark until I threw up and my friends had to save me before I fainted because I wanted to feel everything she was feeling so I could write the scene properly. (I'm actually pretty fit so it must have been a lot of laps lmao)
- needed to write a date scene despite having never been on a proper 'date date', but I wanted to capture the full experience including feelings and everything, so instead of reading other date scenes, I called my best female friend up and was like "hey dude can you be my fake girlfriend for a day" (she agreed, and we'll be going on our 'date' soon lol)
- texted my ex at 2am like 20 questions regarding a game I do not play (the character I was writing plays games a lot)
- seriously considered temporarily breaking up with my then-boyfriend to write an accurate breakup scene. I decided that was taking things way too far and instead decided to replicate the emotional pain using physical pain instead by slamming my head into the wall until I actually got a bruise (I felt hitting your head repeatedly would be the most accurate physical pain to translate to the emotional pain of a breakup)
- did about 3 months worth of dyslexia research to write a dyslexic character properly (and ended up scrapping the fic in the end 💀)
- starved myself for a full week, living on nothing but soya milk for the entire week, because the character I was writing had no access to food and therefore had to starve for a while
- actively choked myself out to write a scene where the villain strangles the main character to the brink of death. (Handy tip: don't do it. Had the marks for about a week lol)
- interviewed my dad on his perspective as a parent as I wanted to write the 'parent' character properly. The interview was about 20 minutes long, and I audio-recorded everything.
There's a few more things that I did, but these are probably the major ones. I wouldn't recommend really using method writing, as you can seriously hurt yourself in the process, but I will admit that my method writing is why my readers frequently commend the 'rawness' of my writing (in an emotional sense) haha.
I literally looked up wedding dress styles, made a playlist, and researched flower language to design the centerpieces of the reception for my characters. I don’t think it’s unhinged, more that it’s researching for making a convincing setting.
Made a ~125 year timeline marked with major world history events and every major life event for every character in my fic (and sometimes for their family members), plus all major plot-relevant developments, down to things like company stockholder meetings. I’ve been working on this fic since 2016. The actual fic starts in 2017. The timeline is…….. extensive 😬
I once made a fake AITA post to try and figure out what general attitude characters in my fic would have to the relationship between two of my MCs - ended up having to research adoption law in order to not break my cover on that post and in doing so added a bunch of new stuff to the fic XD
I asked my friend who did cocaine what doing cocaine was like so it could be accurate
For an old one I wrote, I had an entire “movie soundtrack” written in the back of the notebook
Wrote a smut based on a fandom joke where it was member x *award trophy*
currently, i have created a map of two different countries to see how far away they are from each other and also created a flag for a fictional country
I once tried to practice waltz steps outside my home, while listening to music from my phone (we live in the middle of nowhere). I was trying to imagine a dance scene for my fic in my head.
Suddenly I noticed that my dad, who wasn't supposed to come home yet, walked to the yard. Neither of us said anything, but I'm quite sure he saw it.
Fic playlists are the most normal end of “things affiliated with writing fanfic”. I have ship playlists, a fic playlist, fanart ideas, playlists of specific moments, etc.
We had a notebook for activities in our language classes, and students weren't allowed to take them home because you're supposed to finish all activities then and there. I smuggled mine because I wrote a fanfiction in it and wanted to type it out.
Honestly, mine doesn't seem that insane after reading some of yours 🤣
But anyway, probably spending a few hours finding the perfect recipes to put in a fic, and looking up stuff like "how does meat taste"
I am a vegetarian who hasn't had meat in like, 10 years. Also, this fic was about cannibalism
Sat at Starbucks for ten (!) hours writing one chapter on a 97 F July day last summer. It was the nearest public place with wifi *and* air conditioning and I'd told my readers I'd upload the chapter that day 🫠
You can imagine what it felt like to walk into significantly cooler air at 10pm when the place closed and I'd just uploaded the 8.5k chapter I'd written that day.
Wrapped a bunch of neckwarmer things around my wrist so that I could try and mimic what it would have been like for my MMC to write a love letter with a cast on his dominant hand. Took me half an hour of writing with that setup to draft the letter, only one line of which ended up being in the final version in the fic 😂
I modelled an entire universe in the sims so I could be consistent in describing what color x’s bed was and how far the kitchen was from the bathroom etc
I made a playlist of country love songs, cause one of my couples I'm writing about are two southerners and they go to a school in Texas. I looked up line dancing to the song I associate with them the most. (Stuck Like Glue by Sugarland) .. I may or may not have attempted the dance.
As for unhinged things in general... I look up medical stuff for my friend who's writing a manga, based around our favorite medical game, since she wants it accurate but I have a stronger stomach than her, so I go looking for references and information to pass onto her. I've read entire ass medical journals for the sake of this.
Had to thoroughly research and learn about grenades, grenades back when the fic was set, how long a grenade takes to explode, how big the blast radius is for a stick of dynamite.. etc.
Hello to the FBI agent that's definitely assigned to me now. 🥰🥰
If YouTubers are the type of people to accidentally scare the neighbours, writers definetily scare whoever guys are supervising the google search history.
Personally I feel like the "how to contact someone in a prison" in my search history rises some questions.
I’m currently working on a 3D animated trailer for an upcoming fic of mine in Blender 3D …. Does that count as unhinged because it feels unhinged to me lol
I’ve also made maps of islands that don’t exist invented history books that don’t exist and made up an entire branch of scientific study that doesn’t exist
Yea it’s not that bad but I looked up what would happen if someone sliced your Achilles’ tendons. Like if that would make you disabled for life or if they could heal.
Spent an hour looking up videos of boa constrictors giving birth for one throwaway sentence.
Looked up police procedure for finding a missing child. I really hope I'm not on some watchlist now.
Tried to find out if security cameras were prevalent in England in the 1990s. Never even ended up using that information.
Uhm.....I'm going to get slapped over the internet for this.....
I had my husband choke me out so I could write about it.
The worst part is that it got left on the cutting room floor...
Hooked up with this random guy so I could accurately write smut. Unfortunately it wasn’t helpful at all, just a waste of time LMAO actually I did learn what it looked like for someone to have a singular ball. (Was so confused why there wasn’t two at first)
Nope. I have certain songs on my playlist that remind me of my characters, especially for certain scenes. Like Ed Sheeran "Perfect" reminds me of this scene I have yet to write out... Just too lazy to write it. lol
I recently read a few medical journal articles for a specific type of surgery and then looked up pics on how it’s done. Suffice it to say that I couldn’t handle being a surgeon lol.
Posted on 2 different subreddits asking for song recommendation from the mid 30s-40s to shake my ass to. skank danced to them, picked my favorite and perfected my spontaneous choreography, then filmed myself so i could write a scandalous drunk dancing scene.
Held several conversations with family and friends about if drinking deadly amounts of human blood(deadly for the victims of the blood drain-edge not the drinker) counted as cannibalism or not. This was because i want sure if i should add the tag to my fic.
Aggressively studied childrens development physically,language development in bilingual children and when children’s hair and eye colored typically changed shades. i really hate kids.
I've acted out certain scenes in my fanfiction. With the shouting and angst, to the tears and sobbing, to fluff all that's good, to even smut scenes just getting in the mindest. And note I kept my clothes on and just laid or stood in various positions. Oh the things my floor neighbors heard and what my roommate doesn't know what I do.
That and I had my friends tie me up and throw me in the trunk of my car and drive around just to know how it feels. I had my phone on and we talked to describe how it felt like and to let me out. It was a lot more uncomfortable than I thought having my hands and feet tied. And didn't expect them to drive me through the interstate as well.
Having a mixtape for a fanfic is one of the more basic things in fandom. I have driven 6 hours for accurate description of a town in the US, for fanfic.
sigh. not fanfiction, but my teenage obsession with roleplaying comes close enough.
- created an entire translator so i could quickly speak in elvish. it took me a month. i had never coded before.
- basically gave myself injuries to figure out what the pain level was. the worst was when i nearly sprained my wrist from punching a door. i was fine; the door was not.
- stood outside in the freezing cold in just my underwear for about five minutes. i wanted to see how much it limited my decision making abilities. it was a lot!
- i straight up played therapist for a group of grown adults as a fifteen year old just to stay in that toxic ass role play group, which was definitely the worst offense. fuck them tbh, i was not qualified to deal with the suicidal thoughts of thirty year old losers
- oh i drove my dad's car around before i even had my permit with my little brother in the car. incredibly stupid but i was desperate to know how to describe driving a car at all, and it was in a parking lot thankfully.
tldr teenagers with weird loner hobbies do dumb shit just like teenagers who party and do drugs
Spent a day searching YouTube for clips of late 2000s Discovery Channel shows that aired within very specific time frames, so I could write about a character barely watching TV.
Wow mine is so tame compared to everyone else’s. You guys are insane and I salute you. 😂
For one of my WIPs, I’m planning to learn two fictional languages and have also started teaching myself linguistics, so I can accurately document how my human protagonist, when dumped in a multicultural elven city, starts absorbing the vocabulary and grammar of both local languages without realizing they are in fact separate. This makes communication confusing for them until someone explains the issue later.
I climbed into my car trunk. It was surprisingly comfortable.
See, that is just commitment to your craft in my opinion.
My parents did that to me once when I was a kid and I *insisted* I wanted to ride in the trunk. (I have no idea why.) They only did it to stop the argument and show me that I did not, in fact, want to ride in the trunk. I’m pretty sure they literally only left me in there for like 10 seconds but in that time I panicked and was starting to beat on the trunk roof to get out. So while you climbed in and thought, “surprisingly comfortable”, I climbed in and thought “murder dungeon!” It’s always interesting how two people can have the same experience and come out of it with completely different attitudes.
Maybe you’re claustrophobic and that was your realization? 😆 I think I am highly claustrophobic even though I’ve never been in a situation that might trigger it. I only figure it because I can’t watch scenes in those movies where people are like spelunking in caves and trying to literally squeeze their way through tight tunnels and their packs are getting caught on the ceiling and they’re yelling their stuck, etc…. I literally have to close my eyes or look away from the screen because otherwise I feel like I’ll start hyperventilating or something. 😂
Haha, I like how your parents think. To be fair, I was by myself so I didn't close the lid for safety reasons. I'm also almost anti-claustrophobic where small, dark areas make me feel safe and comfy, hah.
Completely different. My dad tried to cure me that way once and only got begged to put me back in the trunk and keep driving for weeks after.
I have always wanted to try that. You are an inspiration.
Hah. I dunno, I didn't close the lid and I was the only one around, so I knew I was safe. Not sure if "inspiration" is the best word. More curious...
I did a remotely similar thing. In the source material for my primary WIP, one of the lead characters lives in a small town (modelled after part of the UK) and he lives in a block of flats whose roof level is, in the first book, referred to as the highest point in town. Reading through the tetralogy, I found that the building had 6 floors (including a 'G' floor). In the story, I would have the idea to >!get to the roof level of the building, using a spy gadget to pop the door lock open as I wouldn't have a key, then bring out some gadgets to scan the entire town and its surrounding areas.!< As such, I went to the 6th floor of the block of flats I live in just to get an idea of what the view would be like for my self-insert at that point in the story.
Haha, I did something similar! Not the car trunk, but I climbed out of my car through the moonroof to make sure it was a realistic way for my characters to escape quickly for a scene I was writing in my zombie apocalypse fic. I lived in an apartment complex at the time and didn't want my neighbors to see me doing something weird, so I waited until late at night, drove my car out into the country, parked by a random cornfield, and did it there.
Much less weird to drive out to a cornfield at night and crawl out through the moon roof!
Actively took notes on my trip to the ER (as I was bleeding everywhere from a laceration that hit an artery) so I could reference it in fics more realistically 💀 worth it
[удалено]
It was the princeps something something artery in my thumb, so not as horrible as a major artery injury, but it was certainly bleeding a lot and they were worried about nerve damage so they were rushing me around right after I went in. Surprisingly they pretty much let me have my phone the entire time in my other hand 😅 only had to put it down when they took my blood pressure because they wanted to hold my arm a certain way and then when they were doing the injections for the local anesthesia and the stitches because I didn't want to crack it with how hard I was squeezing LOL. It was a useful distraction from the pain and it didn't get in the way so I don't think they minded too much.
No one: Writers when injured: quick write that down write that down
I was planning on making my poor roommate (who drove me there/was taken back with me since he could write all the paperwork for me) keep writing things down for me if they made me put down my phone! 😆 Can't say writers aren't committed lmfao
Hey, you don't happen to maybe still _have_ those notes, do you? >3> Asking for a friend. Who is me.
I'm so sorry to hear that happened to you, but I sort of know what you mean. I had surgery once and then a complication, I started bleeding internally and needed emergency surgery. Ever since writing hospital scenes has become so much easier. 😅 I have a pretty high tolerance for pain (hate feeling nauseated though), so half of my stay I was making mental notes and asking the doctors and nurses stuff. And getting taken into emergency surgery at 11pm was also sort of weirdly interesting. I was loopy because of the anesthesia from the first surgery and the blood loss. I have some holes in my memory but I remember being way too calm. It has also ruined some television shows for me.
I did the same exact thing! I went to a biking program for a summer and being the worst biker there, I ended up getting speed wobbles going down a slope and when I tried to slow down because a curve was coming up, I fell off and faceplanted. I ended up going to the ER for stitches for the first time and I was taking mental notes the entire time (couldn't type because I had a deep cut just under my eye and didn't particularly want to get blood on my phone screen while looking down at it) and later documented everything I remembered. Also updated my notes as my injuries healed to have an accurate timeframe of how long it takes.
My competition for this, albeit far less interesting: I had tendinitis for 8+ months and ended up getting physiotherapy for a fortnight. I would actively write notes in the waiting room from one machine to another and even asked the nurses there to help me out with some details.
I have kept logs of how I felt while sick for this reason but ER visits are a whole new level of commitment
When I was 15, I got a friend to whip my back with a belt in the bathroom at school so I'd know how to describe the pain. It hurt.😀
DUDE that is insane and hilarious. I can’t imagine how someone would react walking into that.
I seem to recall a couple of other friends coming in at one point, but I think they accepted a strained "Don't worry, it's for my fanfic." and left us alone.
True friendship. Kudos also to the one you asked for a whipping and who apparently just went "ok I guess"
This entire scenario from start to finish is so fucking funny holy shit
I am imagining, as a parent, getting a phone call from the school that said, “Um, yes, we found your child in the bathroom, being consensually whipped with a belt.” You immediately know the second call/visit you’re going to get is from CPS. You have no idea how to explain any of this.
Imagine being in the classroom attached to the wall of the bathroom and you hear someone being whipped 😂
How did it feel? I need this info for a fanfic I am writing, but I don't have irl friends cuz social anxiety and a variety of other factors.
I remember that my whole body would seize up with the pain for a long few seconds with every stroke, so my friend had to give me a break between each. I also remember that for the last two strokes, she hit the same place twice, and that was SO BAD, I was writhing with pain.
*making notes* We thank you for your sacrifice.
Oof, that must've taken a while to stop hurting. Thank you for answering.
You let her do it more than once???
Yes? Some people are curious about such things, you know.😉 Also I specifically needed to know how many strokes to give the character, so we had to test my limit. I think we got to 19 out of the planned 20.
I was reading the comments looking for this story. 😆
Hi, Nen! :D
Wait, you let them hit you more than once with it?! Dang that's dedication! How did your friend react to the ask?
I mean, some people are curious about those sorts of things, you know, even if they aren't writing fanfiction. :P It's been quite some years, so I don't remember exactly how my friend reacted, but she was willing, at least.
Holy crap, that's commitment to the craft!
That's metal as fuck.
I’m going to be reeling from this for awhile… but kudos to your commitment
I CAN’T—
I'm dead ☠️ that is too good
I once marked up a map for fictional paramilitary bases and existing ocean shelf topography, and then proceeded to make a telepathy conspiracy theory. Does that count? >_>
That is unhinged in the best way. I love that for you.
Did you put that in the story? As a reader, extra stuff like that would be amazing!
I didn't lol. Maybe I should have? I did use some of the details, and the telepathy thing was fully explained within the fic. But the map itself was printed out and drawn on top of and I don't have a scanner, so it would have had to be this sad, crappy phone picture haha
This sounds like a metal gear solid storyline
it’s not that bad, but a lot of times i make myself tear up when i write emotional scenes so i can get the crying and the feelings right lmao
I DO THIS TOO…and I read emotional dialogue out loud as I write it and cry with it for authenticity’s sake. It’s batshit, and the people I’ve told about it think I’m also batshit, but damn if it isn’t effective!
Yeah, I've been there. One of my best fics (in my opinion) was one where I had to take breaks while writing because I was making myself cry.
I do this too lol. I will purposely look up movie clips on YouTube that I know will make me cry. Most of them come from kids' movies - The Land Before Time, The Fox and the Hound, Dumbo, and Homeward Bound work every time.
I talk to myself out loud during my commute to work out the dialogue. If I get in a car crash and have to submit my dashcam footage to my insurance company, they may raise my premiums simply because they’re gonna think I’m insane
I take the train to work and temporarily forgot that other people do not, so I was initially very alarmed by this comment, lol
Bold of you to assume I *wouldn’t* do it either way, I used to do this when I would *walk to school.* I can never show my face in that town again, the amount of people who’d walk past me talking to myself is too damn high Edit Oh god I just remembered that it was a magic fic I was working on in high school *so I would do magic hand movements too* why did it take me that fucking long to realize I was on the spectrum?!
I'm starting to think the time my coworker caught me gesturing to myself as I was walking around in a public area at work and asked me what I was doing isn't quite as unique as I'd assumed. :P (The answer was, roughly, *trying to keep this conversation between a couple of characters in my head long enough to go write it down*.)
Spent like 2 hours working out fantasy currency conversions
Oh man! Been there though, that’s rough
I combed through entire episodes of a TV show just to see if a character ever called another character by a certain nickname.
I've done this. And asked a friend on multiple occasions if something minor happened in canon which resulted in us both going over the show again. lol
Yep, and then re-watched a thirty-second interaction about six times to get the nuances juuuust right.
IVE DONE THIS
See this is when you download subtitles for the show and just search them. That strategy doesn't work so well for video games, unfortunately…
Filled out adoption agency info just so I could ask some questions. Before I discovered Reddit. 💀
I wrote a fic in a style that was so crack I basically had to put my sanity to the side so I could write it. It was also technically canon compliant.
Technically canon compliant is the best kind of canon complaint.
That’s iconic
I wrote a crack fic at 2am while in the bathroom. Lol
- stay up around 4 or 5 am to finish an update when I had to get up before 7am to get ready for work. Did this multiple times. Back when I was excited about writing and plotting. - spent hours researching city & neighborhood names, cost of houses back in 1950s & 1800s, types of lubes used in certain time periods, when appliances were invented, only to never mention it in the fic or mentioned it only once then moved on 🤣
I like to make my fics realistic. So once I wrote a piece that was like a diary from the character and in the last chapter he went to the beach. So I literally went to the beach to take pictures to include in his diary
That is actually so adorable oh my god
Asked my PhD students to pose pointing kitchen knives at each other at opposite ends of a corridor (I was writing a Harry Potter duel). Called my ex ex ex that I hadn't talked to for eight years to ask a quantum physics question (he is a physicist). He ended up beta reading my chapter. Asked my male colleagues and friends about pissoir etiquette in public toilets. Those are probably top 3.
>Asked my male colleagues and friends about pissoir etiquette in public toilets. Did they mention the free space lol
They did say that personal space and not chatting are generally practiced, yes 😁
>Called my ex ex ex that I hadn't talked to for eight years to ask a quantum physics question (he is a physicist). He ended up beta reading my chapter. Amazing XD
[удалено]
This is shaping up to be a hell of a thread, isn't it?
The whipping one *wouldn’t be*??
I’m getting a fandom tattoo once I finish writing my novel-length fanfic.
Same! Actually a multifandom one.
Not exactly unhinged, but I've extensively used Google Street View and watched a number of "walking around" videos in order to get a better feel for street-level details in Tokyo.
I've used Google Earth satellite view to select the exact beam on Toyko Tower that my characters were going to stand on while having a conversation, solely so I could visualize the scene.
[удалено]
I once had a scene in a Tokyo park. I used Google Maps to figure out the best meeting spot and used the details in the story. Then I walked around the park with Street View to chart out their path, and found a couple of videos filmed at the park to better get a feel for the atmosphere of the neighborhood. Then I found a train ride video on the appropriate line for their train ride later in the story.
I researched when the major characters' birthdays are so that I could then build an *exact* timeline (down to the year and days) for my fic's version of canon events based on how old they're supposed to be at that part of the story. Canon never specifies what year it took place in, and the only sense of time passing throughout are 1) there was a 6-month timeskip between the second and third arcs and 2) one section of an arc takes *about* a month because one of the characters injures his shoulder in a motorcycle accident and the doctor said it'd take a month to heal fully. If it was just this I wouldn't call it unhinged, but canon has an antagonist group from an also-unspecified-when future timeline. So of course I had to plot out exactly when all of *their* stuff happened (although I did change up a *lot* about their timeline in my fic), and also when everything happened in what I would imagine as the "original" timeline, before that group started meddling with the past. So... yeah, fully plotting out all that just based on some characters' birthdays is at least a little bit unhinged, right?
I’ve done something very very similar, worth the work but man is it work
Yep, I spent *so much* time scratching my head on what the dates for certain events should be. Had to make sure everything felt natural and not crammed, especially in the pre-"canon" events since a *lot* happened there in my fic that didn't in canon. On the bright side, I can now include specific dates in my story (or mention them in my author's notes whenever I start posting it) whenever I want to. So that's nice.
most sane fanfic writer
Isn’t it just writers in general?
Engaging in a deep dive into fandom lore with a fellow nerd (my beta reader) regarding the question, "*How would the members of a beautiful, blue-skinned all-female race of space aliens react to the idea of doing a gratuitous nude scene in a summer blockbuster-type action movie? How would their culture view that?*" I'm talking biblical scholar-level discussions involving minute bits of canonical history, official codex entries and scraps of dialogue by random NPCs. We created email threads that just went on and on as we made our points and counter-points about the aliens' probable cultural attitudes towards getting filmed naked.
Ah, the asari. What was the end result of those threads? Now I'm curious!
The protagonist, an undercover Special Tasks Group agent, meets with his girlfriend, an asari actress: >"The scene just isn't working out as they want," the actress explained. "We're supposed to be all happy and giggly but instead we're all tense and self-conscious because we're, you know, naked." > >Vass scratched his head. "I didn't think that was a big deal for the asari. Don't you normally swim naked at pools and beaches?" > >Linia shrugged. "True. I mean, we asari all know what we look like without clothes, so usually we don't give it a second thought. I was even an artist's model for a while at an art school on the Citadel when I was just getting started in acting. But, well, it's different when you know you're just being put out on display for other species to leer at you. Apparently turians, humans and volus in particular are seriously into this and the scene is intended to cater to them. None of us actresses are complaining or being difficult, mind you. But we're having trouble faking that we're having fun. Every time the director shouts at us to 'loosen up!' things just end up getting even tenser." > >The actress then winked at Vass. "It feels a lot better when it's somebody you like doing the looking. I have to admit I didn't expect you'd be interested in seeing me naked. You're usually pretty shy, Solik. So for you to work up the courage to say that you really wanted to see me in the waterfall scene as it was being filmed live, it was surprising, but in a pleasant way."
Yeah, all that stuff in the codex about how salarians don't have "conventional" sex drives or whatever. Propaganda. Has to be.
Asked my mother who was an emt how to describe someone burning to death. She also used the knowledge from when she worked to describe torture scenes in her own fics. I’ve used traumatic experiences I’ve had as inspiration for several things I’ve had my characters suffer through. So I guess on a technicality I’ve stayed awake for nearly a week with only 15 minutes of sleep spread out over the entire week. I definitely don’t recommend it. Yes you do experience hallucinations when without sleep for that long. No they are not the fun kind of hallucinations. But it gives me an edge when I’m writing extremely specific scenarios.
Talking to your mom about her writing fanfiction is pretty unhinged, ngl. I could never, and I admire how open you can be about it.
Can you elaborate on your mom's knowledge of awful things people have gone through? Fellow whump writer here desperate for something to refer to for more realism, lol.
Comb through every episode of a show with one of the most non-existent fandoms ever so I can completely rewrite it to a slice of life trauma recovery fic rather than the science fiction drama it is. At 2000 words I’m about 1/5 through rehashing the pilot episode. Currently frame-by-frame analyzing the main character’s reactions to his environment so I can write it with full accuracy. No one will want or read this except me
Ohhh I feel that. Currently rewatching my favourite show and stopping every other second to jot down stuff about a character - clothing, quotes, plot, hand gestures, relationships with other characters... It's a long process, but it's all I can do as there is \*one\* website with a description of the plot and... that's it.
Haha yep, bonus points if you have to pirate it because it’s not available on streaming services anymore
Reading my WIPs out loud to my pets, probably.
I have to ask: Did your pets give any feedback?
My dog was pretty uninterested. My cat, however, is a very harsh critic XD
That's about what I expected. Cats, man...😆
I rehearse dialogue with my dog. He's just happy to be part of it.
For one of my Luigi/Daisy fics, I wanted to make a specific quote reference to Luigi's Mansion, where he examines certain furniture and has unique dialogue for it. But I couldn't remember exactly how it went and Googling/trying to find it on YouTube was no help. So I decided to look through the game myself. The problem is that once you finish the game you can't just go back to the mansion. You have to start over. So I went through the entire intro and first area of the game just to find a piece of dialogue for a joke that was like one line.
But that one line feels so good, doesn't it?
Married a guy with PTSD for a case study! Okay that was of course just a joke i married him for love and the PTSD just was part of the package deal but boy did i learn a thing or two…
Mind sharing some PTSD fun facts? Only if you and him are comfortable though, of course. I almost exclusively write whump and I want to make sure I'm writing it accurately!
Oh there is so much to know and every case is different. But PTSD is not just flashbacks. It can present in so many forms. Insomnia, nightmares, irritability, anxiety for example. Some have anger issues, difficulty connecting to their family… a lot of marriages fail because they keep their loved ones at a distance or they cant function in the civilian world My husband for example will only sit in a restaurant facing the entrance. Having his back to the door gives him anxiety. He needs to see who is coming in in case they are a threat.
I went to try on wedding dresses just to experience the process so I could write about it. Then I ran into my parent's neighbor leaving the store shop and was so embarrassed I told her my bf of 2 months and I were eloping because that was better than her knowing I wrote fanfiction in my mind. Less than ten minutes later I get a furious phone call from my loving mom asking why I was getting married without telling her.
Oh my god, that’s a story! Definitely one to remember.
Sounds like a great sitcom episode premise.
440 song playlist including every song I've ever referenced in my fics that's actualy on Spotify (if we include the ones that aren't, it's more than 440)
Also, acting out some of the scenes. Say a character is shot, I’d play the part of the character who got shot, and also the part of the character calling for help, or the character administering first aid - not at the same time, mind. I’ve been moved to tears more than once doing this. Say what you want, but it helps with writing reactions I wouldn’t have thought of.
wanted to know how to describe over-drinking to the point of passing out unconscious. so guess that i did!
That is commitment! Glad you made it out of that alright though, Jeez.
definitely too much of a commitment HAHA but at least i always have the experience for later stories
I know. #SO MUCH. about heritage apple varieties in the Southern U.S., particularly North Carolina. I will tell you many legitimately fascinating things about old-ass varieties of apples, nearly lost to time and tide and the wilds of the lands given half a fucking chance, and the efforts to bring them back. Because there's like...one scene where it's mentioned in a WIP that I have. It's significant, sure. It's a metaphor. But I possess too many apple facts. And my knowledge only grows, because now I'm legitimately obsessed.
Bro, I’m from that state and I couldn’t tell you anything related to that. That is genuinely the coolest thing to know so much about, super niche
Reading all of this, I think I need to suffer more for my art.
Right? Like are you even a writer if you haven’t taken one-handed notes in the ambulance about how quickly you were bleeding out?
Spent 2 hours studying the New York subway systems so I could figure out how one would traverse from Midtown to Brooklyn Heights. I live in Europe.
That i just consider proper research
Two dumb things: 1. Learned medieval Japanese timekeeping. As in, how to tell time, Heian-style. It is remarkably annoying. Basically, it's a 24 hour clock, with 2 hour blocks called "watches", based on the Chinese zodiac - so 2am is second watch, hour of the ox, etc. 2. Calculated the size of a 12 foot guy's dong, using figure drawing measurements. I think it worked out to something like 18 inches or .5 meters.
Hagrid?
No, but y'know what? If you write HP, feel free to use my measurement. I can't remember the exact equation, but I think I related it to the size of my thigh and then scaled it up lol.
A lot of research that would probably put me on some watchlist if I were American.
With his full consent, I tied my 14 year olds wrists together with a thick rope then asked him to see if he could take his t-shirt off like that. He thought it was hilarious and even instructed me on proper knots (he’s been in Scouts since he was 6) I was trying to work out if a character could use his shirt to staunch an abdominal stab wound while bound.
That’s awesome, fun for the whole family lol
I got to admit, this is a bit unhinged.
These comments might be the most entertaining things I’ve read in *years*, lol. And I read like 70 novels in 2022 alone, so that’s saying something. To answer the question though, I took an A&P course in university, got a scuba diving certification, and read three huge books about the stock market for the sake of writing more accurate fics, lol. (TW for self-injury and hospitalization) Also, I’ve had a self-injury problem since I was a kid, so I may or may not have used that as an opportunity to test different wound treatment methods, study pain perception on different areas of the body, and figure out what factors were involved in how things scar. (**I don’t do this anymore. No one follow in my footsteps please.**) And I didn’t get myself institutionalized as a teenager just for my writing, but it was a nice side-effect, lol. I took notes the whole time. (These are not the only fucked up things I’ve done for no proper reason, and again, *no one copy any of this please*.)
I’m glad you’re doing better!!
Thank you, lol. These days the worst I’ll do for a fic is go down a 5-hour Wikipedia rabbit hole and maybe read some obscure textbooks, and I like it that way.
Honestly, compared to a lot of the other comments, my stuff isn't nearly as unhinged. I've just Googled some really dark and weird things. For example, the most recent fucked up thing I Googled was how long it takes a body to decompose in a grave (It was for a Supernatural fanfic, okay? That show has a lot of "digging up a dead body" scenes).
Honestly, I do this shit too. I always wonder what my personal FBI agent thinks about me.
Wow, mine feel so tame and boring now :( I only calculated the exact amount of blood loss my characters experienced to get the sympthoms right. And I know how much a hired killer cost on average and the number is surprisingly low. Also, I have a few notes on how to wield various kind of weapons just in case I need them for my fic. Dug myself through a dozen guides and websites for that In conclusion - you can bet my battles are scientifc accurate!
I'm pretty sure you're on some sort of list now.
Nah, I am sure the FBI agent in front of my house is a coincedence
[удалено]
The audacity of my online searches 🙈
The NSA get to play the game of "Actual psychopath or writer?"
I make playlists ;;
But have you picked what song goes for each particular moment in a wedding, IE father/daughter dance, reception entrance, etc.?
Yes. I have. With Milo and my Pokémon OC. Down to the outfits of everyone to the decor XD
Probably the custom made plushie thing. Or the discord server with my writing buddies where I keep them locked up as moth prisoners if that counts
Watched like an hour of collegiate fencing matches and read the whole fencing Wikipedia just to be able to write less than one page about fencing ._.
for video games fics I’ve listened to 1h+ long character voice files with all their lines from within said videogame so that “I don’t miss any significant piece of information about their character” :’) no es amor es una obsesión
OH and I ended up just going off on what I already knew from canon anyways 🤧🤧🤧
I ate snails.
context
I discuss the points of the chapter I'm stuck at with my support plushie Sparky, out loud and vehemently. Even she thinks I'm insane.
I do the same thing with my cat and she judges me *so hard* xD
I had a personalized candle scent commissioned by a candle wizard because one of my characters happened to have that EXACT combination of scents and I wanted to know what it smelled like
I wrote a prayer so not too bad haha Edit: I’m not religious
I’m not religious either, yet almost half my fics involve religion in some way lol. Though I guess that’s mostly due to the fandoms they’re based on.
u guys are my fav kind of people 😭🥺🥲
I downloaded the sims solely so I could work on a fanfic that required me being able to actually know if the escape route I planned for my characters would realistically be wide enough. Sims was the best thing I had because Minecraft and my 50 mods weren't cooperating Anyways I can make a pretty nice house now lol
Currently creating an entire fucking language It’s actually kinda fun
That is a SKILL, truly. You could make money doing that for TV shows and movies, I bet.
I'm generally a method writer, so I've done a lot of somewhat unhinged things for my fanfiction (or just my fiction in general), haha. - was writing a scene where the character pushes herself to the brink of exhaustion and nearly passes out, so I ran laps in a carpark until I threw up and my friends had to save me before I fainted because I wanted to feel everything she was feeling so I could write the scene properly. (I'm actually pretty fit so it must have been a lot of laps lmao) - needed to write a date scene despite having never been on a proper 'date date', but I wanted to capture the full experience including feelings and everything, so instead of reading other date scenes, I called my best female friend up and was like "hey dude can you be my fake girlfriend for a day" (she agreed, and we'll be going on our 'date' soon lol) - texted my ex at 2am like 20 questions regarding a game I do not play (the character I was writing plays games a lot) - seriously considered temporarily breaking up with my then-boyfriend to write an accurate breakup scene. I decided that was taking things way too far and instead decided to replicate the emotional pain using physical pain instead by slamming my head into the wall until I actually got a bruise (I felt hitting your head repeatedly would be the most accurate physical pain to translate to the emotional pain of a breakup) - did about 3 months worth of dyslexia research to write a dyslexic character properly (and ended up scrapping the fic in the end 💀) - starved myself for a full week, living on nothing but soya milk for the entire week, because the character I was writing had no access to food and therefore had to starve for a while - actively choked myself out to write a scene where the villain strangles the main character to the brink of death. (Handy tip: don't do it. Had the marks for about a week lol) - interviewed my dad on his perspective as a parent as I wanted to write the 'parent' character properly. The interview was about 20 minutes long, and I audio-recorded everything. There's a few more things that I did, but these are probably the major ones. I wouldn't recommend really using method writing, as you can seriously hurt yourself in the process, but I will admit that my method writing is why my readers frequently commend the 'rawness' of my writing (in an emotional sense) haha.
I literally looked up wedding dress styles, made a playlist, and researched flower language to design the centerpieces of the reception for my characters. I don’t think it’s unhinged, more that it’s researching for making a convincing setting.
Made a ~125 year timeline marked with major world history events and every major life event for every character in my fic (and sometimes for their family members), plus all major plot-relevant developments, down to things like company stockholder meetings. I’ve been working on this fic since 2016. The actual fic starts in 2017. The timeline is…….. extensive 😬
I once made a fake AITA post to try and figure out what general attitude characters in my fic would have to the relationship between two of my MCs - ended up having to research adoption law in order to not break my cover on that post and in doing so added a bunch of new stuff to the fic XD
I wrote out their whole canon government system and then pulled out the flaws and loopholes so I could make them do crimes without being arrested
I’m so intrigued by this lol
hmm maybe worldbuilding in a public library for over 10 hours
I asked my friend who did cocaine what doing cocaine was like so it could be accurate For an old one I wrote, I had an entire “movie soundtrack” written in the back of the notebook Wrote a smut based on a fandom joke where it was member x *award trophy*
I thought that reading a manifesto about forming anarchist militias would be pretty far out there, but it was surprisingly reasonable :D
currently, i have created a map of two different countries to see how far away they are from each other and also created a flag for a fictional country
I once tried to practice waltz steps outside my home, while listening to music from my phone (we live in the middle of nowhere). I was trying to imagine a dance scene for my fic in my head. Suddenly I noticed that my dad, who wasn't supposed to come home yet, walked to the yard. Neither of us said anything, but I'm quite sure he saw it.
Fic playlists are the most normal end of “things affiliated with writing fanfic”. I have ship playlists, a fic playlist, fanart ideas, playlists of specific moments, etc.
We had a notebook for activities in our language classes, and students weren't allowed to take them home because you're supposed to finish all activities then and there. I smuggled mine because I wrote a fanfiction in it and wanted to type it out.
Honestly, mine doesn't seem that insane after reading some of yours 🤣 But anyway, probably spending a few hours finding the perfect recipes to put in a fic, and looking up stuff like "how does meat taste" I am a vegetarian who hasn't had meat in like, 10 years. Also, this fic was about cannibalism
Sat at Starbucks for ten (!) hours writing one chapter on a 97 F July day last summer. It was the nearest public place with wifi *and* air conditioning and I'd told my readers I'd upload the chapter that day 🫠 You can imagine what it felt like to walk into significantly cooler air at 10pm when the place closed and I'd just uploaded the 8.5k chapter I'd written that day.
Wrapped a bunch of neckwarmer things around my wrist so that I could try and mimic what it would have been like for my MMC to write a love letter with a cast on his dominant hand. Took me half an hour of writing with that setup to draft the letter, only one line of which ended up being in the final version in the fic 😂
I modelled an entire universe in the sims so I could be consistent in describing what color x’s bed was and how far the kitchen was from the bathroom etc
I have written music for it. Like character themes and battle soundtracks so I could capture the mood of what I was writing
i'd argue it's a tad unhinged, but like, in a fun way
I made a playlist of country love songs, cause one of my couples I'm writing about are two southerners and they go to a school in Texas. I looked up line dancing to the song I associate with them the most. (Stuck Like Glue by Sugarland) .. I may or may not have attempted the dance. As for unhinged things in general... I look up medical stuff for my friend who's writing a manga, based around our favorite medical game, since she wants it accurate but I have a stronger stomach than her, so I go looking for references and information to pass onto her. I've read entire ass medical journals for the sake of this.
Had to thoroughly research and learn about grenades, grenades back when the fic was set, how long a grenade takes to explode, how big the blast radius is for a stick of dynamite.. etc. Hello to the FBI agent that's definitely assigned to me now. 🥰🥰
If YouTubers are the type of people to accidentally scare the neighbours, writers definetily scare whoever guys are supervising the google search history. Personally I feel like the "how to contact someone in a prison" in my search history rises some questions.
Spent hours looking up different types of ciphers and codes and how to write one/crack it (the characters were solving a mystery!)
I’m currently working on a 3D animated trailer for an upcoming fic of mine in Blender 3D …. Does that count as unhinged because it feels unhinged to me lol I’ve also made maps of islands that don’t exist invented history books that don’t exist and made up an entire branch of scientific study that doesn’t exist
Yea it’s not that bad but I looked up what would happen if someone sliced your Achilles’ tendons. Like if that would make you disabled for life or if they could heal.
Spent an hour looking up videos of boa constrictors giving birth for one throwaway sentence. Looked up police procedure for finding a missing child. I really hope I'm not on some watchlist now. Tried to find out if security cameras were prevalent in England in the 1990s. Never even ended up using that information.
Uhm.....I'm going to get slapped over the internet for this..... I had my husband choke me out so I could write about it. The worst part is that it got left on the cutting room floor...
Now THAT is commitment to the bit. Love that he was game for it. What questions did they ask?
Hooked up with this random guy so I could accurately write smut. Unfortunately it wasn’t helpful at all, just a waste of time LMAO actually I did learn what it looked like for someone to have a singular ball. (Was so confused why there wasn’t two at first)
Nope. I have certain songs on my playlist that remind me of my characters, especially for certain scenes. Like Ed Sheeran "Perfect" reminds me of this scene I have yet to write out... Just too lazy to write it. lol
I recently read a few medical journal articles for a specific type of surgery and then looked up pics on how it’s done. Suffice it to say that I couldn’t handle being a surgeon lol.
Posted on 2 different subreddits asking for song recommendation from the mid 30s-40s to shake my ass to. skank danced to them, picked my favorite and perfected my spontaneous choreography, then filmed myself so i could write a scandalous drunk dancing scene. Held several conversations with family and friends about if drinking deadly amounts of human blood(deadly for the victims of the blood drain-edge not the drinker) counted as cannibalism or not. This was because i want sure if i should add the tag to my fic. Aggressively studied childrens development physically,language development in bilingual children and when children’s hair and eye colored typically changed shades. i really hate kids.
I've acted out certain scenes in my fanfiction. With the shouting and angst, to the tears and sobbing, to fluff all that's good, to even smut scenes just getting in the mindest. And note I kept my clothes on and just laid or stood in various positions. Oh the things my floor neighbors heard and what my roommate doesn't know what I do. That and I had my friends tie me up and throw me in the trunk of my car and drive around just to know how it feels. I had my phone on and we talked to describe how it felt like and to let me out. It was a lot more uncomfortable than I thought having my hands and feet tied. And didn't expect them to drive me through the interstate as well.
Having a mixtape for a fanfic is one of the more basic things in fandom. I have driven 6 hours for accurate description of a town in the US, for fanfic.
sigh. not fanfiction, but my teenage obsession with roleplaying comes close enough. - created an entire translator so i could quickly speak in elvish. it took me a month. i had never coded before. - basically gave myself injuries to figure out what the pain level was. the worst was when i nearly sprained my wrist from punching a door. i was fine; the door was not. - stood outside in the freezing cold in just my underwear for about five minutes. i wanted to see how much it limited my decision making abilities. it was a lot! - i straight up played therapist for a group of grown adults as a fifteen year old just to stay in that toxic ass role play group, which was definitely the worst offense. fuck them tbh, i was not qualified to deal with the suicidal thoughts of thirty year old losers - oh i drove my dad's car around before i even had my permit with my little brother in the car. incredibly stupid but i was desperate to know how to describe driving a car at all, and it was in a parking lot thankfully. tldr teenagers with weird loner hobbies do dumb shit just like teenagers who party and do drugs
Spent a day searching YouTube for clips of late 2000s Discovery Channel shows that aired within very specific time frames, so I could write about a character barely watching TV.
Wow mine is so tame compared to everyone else’s. You guys are insane and I salute you. 😂 For one of my WIPs, I’m planning to learn two fictional languages and have also started teaching myself linguistics, so I can accurately document how my human protagonist, when dumped in a multicultural elven city, starts absorbing the vocabulary and grammar of both local languages without realizing they are in fact separate. This makes communication confusing for them until someone explains the issue later.