Theo -- your point about a primary sense is so interesting! I know I hav a visual sense somewhere. I guess I'll just have to see if I left it under the bed. Or maybe I put it in storage.

I hear voices, I see the occasional tilt of a head or the flicker of eyes. I picture the rooms they're in clearly, but I very rarely describe it unless it's important to know there's a table over there or there are swords on the wall. And if the swords are important, I try to mention them several paragraphs before the fact.

I admire all to heck people who can write prose poems of descriptions. I can do it if I try, but it's always after the fact, and I can't help thinking I'm putting stumbling blocks in the story.

I always know the sight and smell and sound of a room, but unless it's important to the character to take notice of them, I don't mention them.

I visulalize what I'm reading or writing very clearly-- often, it's like a little movie in my head, camera angles and lighting and all. Then again, I generally suck at description and write tons of dialogue. Huh.

I can usually see and smell and taste and feel what I'm writing about pretty well. I just can't hear it, and that screws up my dialogue. Dialogue I write always sounds really unnatural. I've been trying to work on it, but I don't think it's getting much better.

Yes, Holli! Watching hte movie in my head and writing down what happens! It's always been like that, I can just focus on the inside of my head and there's this whole other world going on. When I'm stuck I set up the people on the stage, give them some vague stage directions, then watch how they get from point A to point B.

How do people ever manage to write short stories and novellas?

I've seen some pretty flexible definitions of "short stories"... if yours ends at 14k, it could still be considered "short".

Considering that what's considered "average" for a novel is getting towards 100k these days, especially in fantasy and sci-fi.

Watching hte movie in my head and writing down what happens!

The best self-description I've managed to come up with is that I feel like a director/producer of improv theater (though I have no idea what that's like). I have to get all the props and costumes, the animals, the special effects... and then try to convince the actor/characters that my plotline is a good idea. They tend to argue on the fine details, especially if it involves pain.

Yes, Holli! Watching hte movie in my head and writing down what happens!

Yes, this. I have this too. And because I love to write first person POV, I also have "watch the scene from behind so-and-so's eyes".

They tend to argue on the fine details, especially if it involves pain.

This also. I have the occassional one who argues in favour. I blame my Jossverse fanfic for that.

The best self-description I've managed to come up with is that I feel like a director/producer of improv theater

That sounds like the way I work. I've got a point A, and I give the characters a rough shove in the direction of point B. I'll then type out a rough outline with dialogue fragments, almost as if I were taking notes while watching a scene unfold. I don't worry so much about the niceties of language or punctuation. Later, I'll go back and render the scene into prose.

I'll then type out a rough outline with dialogue fragments, almost as if I were taking notes while watching a scene unfold.

And for you that's an actual document? I ask because I've been thinking about my writing process recently, and why I don't edit nearly as much as some people do. I think the thing is that this first draft I do enteirly in my head, going over it several times to get details right, and then the first one that exists as a document is practically an editing stage. I might go over again for grammar and word choice, but I don't normally do hundreds of edits on paper.