---
title: Locations
category: Locations
tags: locations, setting, continuity, movement
contextKey: locations.overview
micro: Track places, movement, spatial continuity and how settings affect scenes.
quickTitle: What are Locations?
quickSummary: Locations help you manage story places, keep character movement believable and make setting part of the plot.
screenshot:
---

# Overview

Locations are the places where your story happens. They can be broad settings, such as a city or estate, or specific places, such as a bedroom, kitchen, railway platform, office, cellar or garden path. PlotDirector uses locations to support both atmosphere and continuity.

A location is not only scenery. It affects what characters can see, hear, hide, discover and misunderstand. In a tightly plotted story, the distance between rooms may matter. In a mystery, who could hear a conversation may matter. In a romance, returning to the same place after an emotional change may matter. Locations give those details a stable home.

You can begin with a simple list of important places and add detail later. As your project grows, location relationships and scene links help you understand how characters move through the world of the story.

# When Should I Use This?

Create a location when a place appears more than once, affects continuity, or shapes the action. A named house, shop, school, hospital ward or train carriage may deserve a record. A vague background street probably does not, unless it becomes important later.

Use locations whenever spatial logic matters. If a character enters from the landing, exits to the kitchen, overhears something through a wall, or hides an asset in a locked cupboard, location tracking can prevent confusion during revision.

# How To Use It

Start by naming the location clearly. Add a short description that captures what a writer needs to remember: layout, mood, access, important objects, or story significance. If locations relate to each other, record that relationship. For example, a bedroom may connect to a landing, a cellar may be beneath the kitchen, or an office may overlook a courtyard.

Assign locations to scenes and scene characters where useful. A scene can have a primary location, while characters can have current, entry and exit locations. This is especially helpful when validation warns that a character has no location set.

During revision, use location information to check whether movement, sightlines and timing make sense.

# Example

Location: "Blue Bedroom"

Description: "A guest bedroom at the back of the house, cold even in summer, with a locked connecting door to the nursery."

Scenes in this room might involve Rebecca finding a clue, Beth refusing to enter, and later the connecting door being opened. Tracking it as a location keeps the physical logic and emotional meaning together.

# Writer Tip

Let locations carry story pressure. A place can become more tense each time the reader returns to it, especially if new knowledge changes what the same room means.

# Common Mistakes

- Creating locations only as decorative settings rather than story spaces.
- Forgetting entry and exit locations when several characters move through a scene.
- Changing a building layout in revision without updating earlier scenes.
- Treating a location's emotional meaning as static when events have changed it.

# Related Guides

- [Scenes](/Help/Article/scenes.overview)
- [Characters](/Help/Article/characters.overview)
- [Story Assets](/Help/Article/storyAssets.overview)
