Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Word Cloud

This is the word cloud created by the first 10,000 words of my WIP. I did it for two reasons: first, I wanted to check what words were appearing the most and second, for fun!

I was pleased with the result; the biggest word is the surname of my main character (he's usually known by his last name) and all my other characters are there as well.

I would suggest you try it yourself. You can make your own word cloud at wordle.net. It's a fun way to see if you're over-using certain words or if your choices are correct.

See your writing as a piece of art! Amusing and informative; you just can't lose.

18 comments:

  1. What a brilliant and funny way of using a word cloud!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for sharing, Elspeth! I'm going to have to try this very soon. I may even have to post my results on my blog too. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Dorte, Joanne, Stacy; It's just fun. However, it is a useful tool for showing you your most repeated words.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love it. It is art and gives me goosebumps. And I will try it sometime.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Elspeth - What a terrific idea! A word cloud! I'd never thought of that before, but I must do it. You should take pride in the fact that your own is so very nicely focused : ). I can tell just by looking at it that your story is probably nicely focused and the plot builds on itself. That takes talent.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Very clever. I notice the word "back" ranks high on your list. It is my favorite word (as my editor likes to remind me).

    ReplyDelete
  7. Thanks! I never knew where to go to get this.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I've seen this before, but was afraid to try for what it tell me...yes, I'm a coward. Happy Thanksgiving, Elspeth. Galen

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hi, Elspeth, I was here, but not sure my comment posted. Happy THanksgiving..Galen

    ReplyDelete
  10. Journaling Woman; Try it! It's fun.

    Margot; What lovely things you say! I hope you're right.

    Patricia; I noticed that. Hmmmm.

    Laura; Try it!

    Galen; Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

    ReplyDelete
  11. It's great but I can't figure out how to save it so that I can use it on my blog. :(

    ReplyDelete
  12. Laura; Do a screen capture. Go to their FAQs; all is explained!

    ReplyDelete
  13. I do this quite a bit when I'm editing for those pesky words I just can't seem to eliminate -- like just for example :) Plus, it's fun!

    ReplyDelete
  14. I'll have to try this. Hard to pass up amusing and informative!

    ReplyDelete
  15. I love this tool.
    The words I tend to overuse is back and know/knew.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Two things - I had you on my blog list and lost you somehow then I come here and you've done the same thing as me! Weird - I spent the morning making word clouds of all of my novel -three chapters at a time - I printed them and am looking at them to make sure I don't overuse some words also they give the gist of what is going on - I can see how I weigh different aspects etc... fun no?

    ReplyDelete
  17. This is absolutely brilliant. Thank you very much.

    ReplyDelete

Please leave a comment as I love to hear from you!