The Importance of Story Layouts

For me, the layout doesn't really matter.

I mean, yeah, I'll make layouts and occasionally banners for my own stories, but if I was to go on another story to read it and it had a bad layout, I'd just use the default.

The way I see it, is that yeah, the layouts make it look nice, but at the end of the day, they don't change the authors writing ability.

^ And I'd only go to default if I really didn't like the colours, or they were too bright and clashed.
Or if the background was a banner that wasn't very good. :tehe:

I love making layouts. To me it's like picking out the cover picture for my book.
I don't know, I'm wierd. :XD

^ I get what you mean; I'm the same.

kryptonite.:

I love making layouts. To me it's like picking out the cover picture for my book.
I don't know, I'm wierd. :XD

I can agree with that, especially when looking at things from a reader's perspective. It's like when you're at the store and looking at the selection of books - the more interesting the cover, the more likely you are to pick it up and check it out, and see if you want to buy it or not.

I like it when an author makes their own layouts, as long as it's not a cluttered mess, or the colors hurt my eyes. It helps when the writing is actually visible, as well. I hate it when light-colored writing is on a dark background.

I love it extra lots if the layout is related with the story. Like, not just the banner.
Like, the layout sets kind of like an atmosphere or a mood in the story.

^ Too true. I have a guilty pleasure for when authors have their characters drawn up (and by "drawn up" I mean "artistic representation," not "random picture of some scene chick that the author took from PhotoBucket.") and then somehow incorporate it into their layout. I did so for my fic, though I still have some fine-tuning to do, because it still looks odd on very wide computer screens, and I like to think it adds an extra...something to the overall presentation to the story.

Yeah. And like, I'm not gonna read a story about depression that has a pattern in the background full of sunshines and rainbows. It's ridiculous.

^ Hah, yeah. It does help when the images - if images are used - go along with the theme or tone of the story, too.

I'm getting irritated with pre-made Mibba layouts.
It shows how much more you care for a story if you took the time to make a layout.

kryptonite.:

I love making layouts. To me it's like picking out the cover picture for my book.
I don't know, I'm wierd. :XD

I do, too.
Love might be an understatement.
I have two-hundred something layouts and only 188 stories.

Since A Few Aprils Ago. I planned on making icons and layout of it, and then here comes a story for Hayley, oddly enough. And then the grou[s icons resembled her The Sauce interview--and it all made sense.

So, yes, I do like a layout that matches the tone of the story or whatever-also when the font is readable and visible to the eye.

Well, I think that the story layout helps the reader experience the aroma of the setting and general point to the story. Pre-made layout or not, I don't think it matters.

Alphabet Soup:

Well, I think that the story layout helps the reader experience the aroma of the setting and general point to the story. Pre-made layout or not, I don't think it matters.

Well, think of it this way...

I've already read 1004723047205 stories with the same pre-made layout in them. They all had different plots, but the same layout. So do they have the same "aroma" for the setting?

^You never know.
I believe the main emotion of it. The plots may be different, and stylized differently and so forth. But the true, hidden emotion behind everything.

The Way:

Alphabet Soup:

Well, I think that the story layout helps the reader experience the aroma of the setting and general point to the story. Pre-made layout or not, I don't think it matters.

Well, think of it this way...

I've already read 1004723047205 stories with the same pre-made layout in them. They all had different plots, but the same layout. So do they have the same "aroma" for the setting?

I said that it helps. Not as much as others, but to some extent.

I'm a sucker for a well-made layout. It's important to me. And if it doesn't fit the mood of the story... :cheese:

comedically tragic;;:

I'm a sucker for a well-made layout. It's important to me. And if it doesn't fit the mood of the story... :cheese:

Same. :cheese:
It's like...if you have a really happy, nice, fluffy story, you're not going to have a dark layout with like...a picture of a razor blade as the background. It doesn't work.

I don't know if it's just me, but if a story has its own original layout which fits the concept and the mood perfectly (or even just... well) then it has its way of sticking in my memory.
It just makes it more different than the rest if it has its own layout.

I make a new layout for every story. Oneshot or not. I don't reuse layouts and I don't use premades (save one or two really old crap stories).

I work hard on them as I would a banner, since quite often I edit the image myself to work. The new one I just did was made specifically for my oneshot and only for my oneshot and it shall only ever be used for that oneshot.