This letter/A4 size chart called "Timeliner Mini" is the perfect place to start outlining a story. It is a useful tool for writers of movie scripts or books to map out the backbone structure, blueprint or theme of the story. Several grids showing structure and plot points of popular writing methods provide the frame to pour your story into. (And yes, there is a Timeliner Maxi.Check it out when you're ready to take the next step and flesh out that blueprint.)

Who should get this chart?

Anyone who wants to write a commercially successful story, either as a movie script or as a novel and needs a starting place for setting up general story structure and major plot points. If you've been sitting too long in front of a white sheet of paper and weren't sure how to start, or got lost with too many story ideas and no strategy on how to organize them into a coherent story, this chart can help. With it you can create a first outline, red thread or backbone that holds your story together. It helps to nail down the core idea, before you work it out in detail.

What's on this chart?

Hold the chart in landscape format and you'll see two timelines (the upper being the first, the lower the second half of the story) with a lot of white space for your notes underneath. The timelines contains:

At the top you'll also find space to write down title, version and date. Right next to it there are slots for entering your characters. A light gray help text gives you a first starting point, naming the first 5 characters as Hero, Opponent, Love Interest, Mentor and Sidekick. Enter up to 12 characters here, or leave blank for now and fill out later.

There’s an upper and a lower section. What’s that all about?

One of the main advantages of this chart is that you can see the outline of your entire story at one glance on one sheet of paper. To allow that to happen, the story timeline is cut in half so that it fits on a ledger/A4 sheet. The 50% point in a story is a major break point, so it doesn't feel like an interruption having the story continue on the second line.

How do I use this chart in my everyday writing?

Use this chart at the very beginning of a writing project, when all you have are a few general story ideas and maybe a few scenes and dialog lines. At that point, it would make no sense to write down the entire story (the entire script or novel) from start to finish and then make changes to scenes or story structure afterwards. Better arrange all theme aspects in the right order on this chart before fleshing them out in individual scenes. Once nailed down, you can always refer to this chart during the later writing process, since all scenes you eventually come up with should preferably support this theme and advance this plot as it is mapped out here. Once you have the story, you can continue to create actual scenes in the Timeliner Maxi.

Should I know the archetype models on this chart?

Yes. You can read a lot out of this chart right from the start, but not everything can be understood without background knowledge about the models. If you want to read further: Most of the experts who's models are features on the chart have written books available on Amazon and other major book stores, so it would probably be a good idea to get some of the books to enable you to fully extract and make use of the compressed knowledge on this chart.

How accurate is this?

In terms of storytelling structure Truby’s „The Anatomy of Story” and Vogler’s „The Writer’s Journey” seem to be more accurate than others, therefore their story structure models appear on the chart as a general backbone on which to align your story, but they can potentially be exchanged with any of the other existing structures out there. This chart simply provides a frame and a grid on which to align your imagination. It gives writers and designers one more tool besides talent and intuition to create a compelling story faster and easer than without it.

What are these color bars?

Please visit the cartafina  storymeter page for an overview on the color bars, which also appear there. All cartafina charts are related and can be used in combination with each another.

Is this your opinion?

No. While this kind of work cannot be accomplished without some form of generalization in closing logical gaps or pinning down the position of elements, it is generally just based on the facts at hand. It simply connects the dots. An insane amount of hours has flown into creating this overview and trying to make it as general as possible and now it should be pretty accurate as a general reference on which to align and straighten your story while still leaving enough room to let your tory flow in its own, unique way. You can let it break out of the frame any time you want, but when it happens, you'll know and you can break the rule consciously and with good reason.

Who created this?

Petra from cartafina. Petra is an Information Architect and Interaction Designer who helps large companies create valuable customer experiences on the web. With this chart her goal is to make complex information accessible and understandable for creative people so they can make fast, informed decisions. This chart wants to take some of the planning difficulty out of people's writing project so they can focus more on the creation and less on the organisation of information.

Can I print this chart?

Yes. It fits on „Letter” (US) or „A4” (Europe) size paper where it is readable with regular eyesight. It is created in vector format, so you can scale it up (or down) to any other paper size without loss of quality. That is if you find it hard to read or want to hang it on the wall, for example. The chart comes in two formats: a PDF to carry around with you on any digital device that can display PDFs, and a 'Pages 09' document that opens with Apple's iWork 09.

Attention Windows users: unfortunately there is no software at the moment that would allow the setting and moving of text boxes as it is possible with Apple's 'Pages 09' software. But you can still make good use of the PDF, both as electronic form or as printout. A PC version will be added as soon as the functionality is supported.

For the greatest aha effect use this chart together with the moviemeter, novelmeter and/or  storymeter.

Can I edit the charts?

Yes, you can edit both the PDF and the Pages document. You can open the PDF in a layout application, edit it, write on top of it or copy the text and graphics and use them in your own artwork. With the Pages document, you can edit, move, fill or delete the text boxes. The only requirement with all forms of editing the charts would be that whatever you do with them adheres to our terms and conditions outlined in the disclaimer.

Can I duplicate and / or distribute this chart?

Duplicate yes, distribute no. Make as many digital copies or printouts for your own personal use as you like, but distributing or selling it is not the cartafina way of doing things. The price of each chart is roughly that of a restaurant visit (sometimes even less) but a cartafina charts should have plenty more satisfaction value for years to come. So please encourage your friends to get their own copies. That way they will also become official members of the cartafina clan entitling them to free updates and other member benefits. (Read our disclaimer for more information.)

Will this chart be updated from time to time?

Yes. The chart started with version 1.0. We are currently at 1.1. which corrects some misspellings. Buyers of this chart will automatically get the latest version. If small corrections or updates are made, cartafina will send an updated charts to all previous buyers of this chart free of charge. (please allow 1-2 weeks for this to happen. There is that day job.) And just as with updates of software, big changes or additions will require a new purchase or an upgrade fee. If you bought this chart at some point in the past, come back to this page from time to time to see the latest version.

What do I get when I buy this?

You get two documents: a PDF document (about 500 KB) and a 'Pages' document (about 900 KB), inside a ZIP (of about 1100 KB) which you can download immediately after your payment. The PDF can be opened on any computer or digital device that has the free Adobe Acrobat Reader installed. (On the Mac, you can also use the pre-installed Preview) . The 'Pages' document can be opened on any Mac that has the Apple software iWork 09 installed. If you have a PC and can't install iWork 09, the PDF should still be useful either as a digital form or as a printout, even if you can't move the text boxes around. Instead you can load the document into Word or any layout software and add you own text boxes. Both, the PDF and the Pages 09 document fit on letter or A4 paper and can be scaled up or down for printout on larger or smaller paper.

Got an unanswered question? Mail it or proceed to yet another add-to-cart opportunity:

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Where and how you can use
cartafina products

You can use cartafina charts as a reference in any of your creative projects. Print them, frame them, blog them. As often as you want, anywhere you want. For commercial use in courses or learning materials, please contact cartafina. Read the disclaimer for more information.

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Who creates all these charts?

Cartafina is Petra's Information Architecture Store. Petra is an Information Architect and Interaction Designer who helps large companies create valuable customer experiences on the web. Petra is passionate about finding and telling the magical story around a product or service and offering simple solutions to complex navigational problems. Contact herfor employment or project inquiries.

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