Background noise

[MSTarot]

I have a story I'm trying to finish up that in the background I have a TV playing.

Lines from old shows (ones most of us know) keep popping up through out the story.

Been looking at ways to make these stand out from the body text of the story. I had thought about italics.( not wanting to use bold) The problem I have is, well one I don't know how to set up italics in a story.

I normally copy and past when I post a story. I think Italics you have to do differently.

The other is I'm not always crazy about seeing italics. There is an element of eye strain in reading it.

Do I have other options here? I know someone (I think Dark) posted a way to center thing up on the page. Or is there a separation I could use that would stand out well?

This was one idea I had.

~~ Knight Rider, a shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who does not exist ~~


Other options and opinions please.

 

[sr71plt]

I think the italics would be best. If you cut/paste, you can denote italics with the normal coding (unlike on the forum) <I> at the beginning, and </I> at the end.

 

[RejectReality]

Everywhere you want italics, place it between tags like this.

There was a moment of awkward silence, made even more awkward when Sheriff Bart on the television said, <i>Excuse me while I whip this out.</i>

You type the tags directly into the text before pasting. I tend to keep a "clean" copy and create one specifically to copy-paste from with the tags included, but that's just me.

That slash in the second tag is important. That's what tells the webpage to stop using italics.

 

[PayDay]

If using Word, place the italics in the story, then count the instances with the Styles and Formatting tab, then, when the story is submitted, write (at the tippy top of the story): 'To Liteorica: As per the submission guidlines, there are (blank) instances of italics in this story which begins after this sentence.'

Works for me.

I also put a note in the box on the submit page, something like 'Special Instructions are at the top of the story.'

I've done this with all of my stories, they all have italics, and Laurel has never yelled at me. This is the way it's noted to do somewhere in the submission guidelines if not submitting text code.

 

[sr71plt]

Why make Laurel do the work when you can easily do it yourself?

 

[lovecraft68]

I would always do it myself because I wouldn't trust it to the site to get it right. She's breezing through a lot of stories and doubt she wants to take a lot of time fixing things like that.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I'm sure Laurel will appreciate you doing the cut and paste, I think that's what she does with the word docs that are submitted. And if you include the <i></i> html tags I'm sure she will appreciated it even more.

HTML Tags that can be used in cut and paste...

Italics <i>italics</i>
Bold <b>bold</b>
Underline <u>underline</u>

Center

<center>center</center>​

Blockquote (indent)

<blockquote>blockquote</blockquote>​

How blockquote works.

 

[RejectReality]

That example doesn't quite show what blockquote does. It sets the text enclosed by the tags off an equal distance from both margins. You can't really see the offset from the right in the example.

I find it useful for flashbacks and such. It provides a distinct "this is something different" cue for the reader, and isn't anywhere near as eye-straining as a large block of italics or something.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

That example doesn't quite show what blockquote does. It sets the text enclosed by the tags off an equal distance from both margins. You can't really see the offset from the right in the example.

I find it useful for flashbacks and such. It provides a distinct "this is something different" cue for the reader, and isn't anywhere near as eye-straining as a large block of italics or something.

Click the link...that shows you.

If you read the text in the left pane you will see the right pane has formatted it completely different. The wrap of the words is different.

You can also stack your <blockquote> tags...

<blockquote><blockquote> Once upon a time there was an old troll who haunted the halls of Literotica. This troll would purposely mis-read posts by others and start a flame war, all the time laugh because he was safe and sound behind his computer screen. This trolls name was...</blockquote>​

The more you do the farther from each margin the text will be indented. You can try it out at the link I provided.

 

[RejectReality]

Click the link...that shows you.

If you read the text in the left pane you will see the right pane has formatted it completely different. The wrap of the words is different.

The link is what I meant. Without normal text to compare it against, I could see the left offset, but the right offset isn't as clear.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

The link is what I meant. Without normal text to compare it against, I could see the left offset, but the right offset isn't as clear.

Try it with your own text. That's what that page is about.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I have a story I'm trying to finish up that in the background I have a TV playing.

Lines from old shows (ones most of us know) keep popping up through out the story.

Been looking at ways to make these stand out from the body text of the story. I had thought about italics.( not wanting to use bold) The problem I have is, well one I don't know how to set up italics in a story.

I normally copy and past when I post a story. I think Italics you have to do differently.

The other is I'm not always crazy about seeing italics. There is an element of eye strain in reading it.

Do I have other options here? I know someone (I think Dark) posted a way to center thing up on the page. Or is there a separation I could use that would stand out well?

This was one idea I had.

~~ Knight Rider, a shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who does not exist ~~


Other options and opinions please.

This is a dandy writing problem, and there oughta be contests that expose nifty solutions. Put all the submissions in one 'story,' vote via the comment section.