Research and Reality

As I begin to research my science topics in earnest, I am presented with a question. Do I follow the fiction created by other sci-fi writers, or update to current scientific terminology.  The truth that's been revealed is that the lexicon of literature and the lexicon of reality are two different things.  I suspect that the trade off, is using the more up-to-date language will leave an air of reality to the fiction, while using the old language would make for easy short hand.

Research has been a more interesting and engaging phase than I had originally predicted. I am starting to work my way through a number of exercises espoused by Syd Fields and finding them very useful. In fact, I can see now in movies where certain exercises were not engaged.  I'll pick on a current release - The Proposal.  This was not a bad movie. I enjoyed. However, it was apparent to me that the final film did not have the influence of a fully fleshed out biography for the male assistant, Andrew Paxton.  We see his childhood home and there isn't a single book in it. He never offers any explanation as to why he wants to be an editor. All the while his father is angry that he's not following in his foot steps.  These are oversights that would have flowed effortlessly from the script and into the story had he had a fully developed back story.

It wasn't until I made this ever so clever observation about this movie that I bought into the need for a bio/backstory for characters.  So... In for a dime in for a dollar. I started with the main character's father and I'm moving from there.