April 29th, 2010 Comments Off
April 26th, 2010 §
Satire remains one of the only truly effective methods for dealing with hype, and if it’s one thing that needs a healthy dose of satire, it’s corporate-and-guru-driven webspeak.
Of course, satire’s most effective when it’s only one step removed from reality, which is why the Web Economy Bullshit Generator (at dack.com) offers so much entertainment value for so little time invested (it’s a synergistic hyper-relateable entertainment technology):
It automatically generates gibberish corporate-speak phrases (the button actually says “make bullshit”), including doozies like:
- disintermediate proactive technologies
- matrix virtual infrastructures
- strategize 24/365 web services
- incentivize plug-and-play infomediaries
- architect one-to-one infrastructures
- synthesize impactful channels
- grow cross-media infomediaries
Sadly, you could pack a corporate pitch/report with fertilizer like this and do just fine. But remember: That way lies madness.
In fact, the Undergrounders should feel free to add their own real-life corporatespeak phrases in the comments section (use fake names if you feel the need to protect yourself).
Me? I’m heading off to innovate enterprise functionalities so I can seize synergistic paradigms for my clients, who are currently incubating end-to-end user experiences.
Then I’m probably going straight to hell.
Keep writing, Tom Chandler.
April 22nd, 2010 Comments Off
April 22nd, 2010 §
Storyboarding is an essential part of the creative copywriter’s process; every commercial I ever wrote first came to life as a storyboard.
But don’t think the storyboard’s utility is limited to video. Even if you don’t make movies, a storyboard can quickly become an essential tool when developing animated ads, web site sliders, podcasts, video and other “rich” media.
All require planning.
All involve movement, time, a sequence, and graphics, type or sound elements.
And all benefit from the application of a simple storyboard.
For example, on a recent Web project, I used a simple storyboard to plan the order & content of the site’s home-page sliders.
I was happy I did.
Originally, the concept in my head seemed lucid and logical. But getting it on paper made it clear my “lucid” idea was muddled and out of order.
Score one for storyboarding.
Storyboards: Care & Feeding
Storyboarding doesn’t require a lot of instruction; it’s about as intuitive as it gets.
You simply use the solid-line boxes to represent the visual elements, and add directions in the box below.
Those directions can include:
- Copy
- Transitions (like “fade to black”)
- Voiceover directions
- Music
- Visual ideas
- Actor’s direction
- Whatever the heck you want
A Few Helpful Hints
Don’t overthink the details on your first pass.
Getting your concept down on paper – in broad strokes – is more important than sewing up every detail.
And you’ll be amazed at the number of times you realize – after storyboarding your drop-dead solid idea – that you’ve gotten it all wrong.
Also, some folks – who feel they can’t draw – won’t attempt a storyboard.
Which is a huge mistake.
A storyboard’s screen is not the place for a detailed drawing (unless you’re making a movie).
Use an oval to represent a face. A square to represent a book. In other words, use symbols.
You need a visual representation of any graphic element, but mostly to offer a reality check on size, movement, etc.
In other words, if you’re using a human face to convey an emotion, that face better be big enough to “read.”
In the same vein, storyboarding an animated 125 x 125 banner ad could make it clear you’ve got too much happening in too little space.
Finally, don’t be hemmed in by your storyboard. It’s a rare concept that can’t be improved by more thought, so don’t narrow your vision simply because you’re working within little square boundaries.
In other words, live a little (creatively speaking).
Templates? Did Someone Say Template?
In the past, I used a storyboard I created in a graphics program – complete with rounded corners on the screen – but found it too specialized for today’s online work.
And happily, I stumbled across one I like better. (Visit this site for other storyboard options.)
(click to visit the download site)
It’s nothing fancy – it represents the storyboard stripped to its bare essentials – but it’s the perfect all-around storyboard for the all-around copywriter.
A Word of Warning
You might be tempted to storyboard on your computer.
Don’t do it.
At least not on your first draft.
You’ll find yourself contaminating your “big think” time with details.
Get the concept roughed out using broad strokes, refine it – and only then move to a computer storyboard.
I’ve used computer generated storyboards in the past, but in the client pitch stage, where the time invested finding photographs or drawings (and the readability of computer-set type) really pay off.
An Old Tool For New Media
Given the “rich” nature of today’s media channels, a storyboard could easily become one of the modern copywriter’s most useful tools.
Download it, save it, print it and use it whenever you’re working on a sequential, moving project.
It will help you get your head into the game. And your concept in order.
Keep storyboarding, Tom Chandler.
April 21st, 2010 Comments Off
With at least some of us still smarting from April 15 (that’s tax day to my non-USA readers), it’s a good time to look at my favorite kind of software:
The Free kind.
PC Magazine recently fired off their “The Best Free Software of 2010” article, and a quick look suggests a lot of interesting goodies – though disappointingly few writer-specific freebies.
Sure, Google Docs, OpenOffice and Zoho all made the “office” list (as did the interesting Windows text editor Notepad++). But nowhere did I see a hint of the text processor for the modern online writer – a breed of editor so advanced, it apparently hasn’t been invented (more on this soon).
Otherwise, it’s a mix of the usual suspects and some intriguing newcomers, in categories like:
- Anti-Malware
- App Launchers
- Audio
- Backup/Synch/Storage
- Blogging
- Browsers
- Calendar/PIM
- Conferencing/VoIP
- Displays
- Email
- File Transfer/Sharing
- File Viewers/Converters
- Finance
- Fun/Home
- Graphics
- Instant Messaging
- Maps
- Media Manager
- Networking
- Office
- Operating Systems
- Printing
- Process Monitors
- Remote Access
- RSS Readers
- Search
- Security/Encryption
- Social Networking
- System Utilities
- Video
What’s “Free” Really Good For?
I run my business atop Ubuntu Linux, so my hard disk is largely populated with free software.
Which works extremely well.
And while the mainstay applications get all the ink (OpenOffice, GnuCash (financial), GIMP image editing, etc), the real benefit of free software is your ability to try new things – without a big investment.
Ever created a podcast? I hadn’t – until a client asked if I was interested in producing a regular segment for them.
I billed them for the hardware and the time, but a fast download of Audacity sound editing software (free) had me underway in literally minutes.
I’ve written plenty of radio, and those skills came back fast.
But I learned a lot.
I learned that podcasts were as easy to produce as everyone said.
And that my voice isn’t suited for broadcast (actually, I knew that already, but forgot).
Of course, the point here isn’t that I have grating, nasal voice.
It’s that I tried something I wouldn’t have attempted had I needed to plunk down a couple hundred dollars.
The same is true of video editing (OpenShot video editor), mind mapping and a few others.
Free software offers more than a product at no cost; it’s a chance to try something new sans the barrier of a sizable investment.
Keep writing (and experimenting), Tom Chandler.
April 19th, 2010 Comments Off
One of the most painful aspects of working as a copywriter is seeing your painstakingly assembled sentences sliced and diced by a client with a fourth-grader’s grasp of syntax.
It’s painful (we’re writers after all, eager for the occasional morsel of praise), but hell, we’re getting paid.
So we suck it up and move on, trying not to let the client drive a stake through our response rate or dangle a modifier in the midst of our call to action.
After all, almost no writer’s work is universally accepted or loved, and anyone who needs a reminder of that little fact might want to peruse an Examiner article titled “The 50 best author vs. author put-downs of all time.“
Even literature’s giants can’t agree about what’s good and what’s not – so what chance do we have?
A few examples of the carnage:
3. John Keats, according to Lord Byron (1820)
Here are Johnny Keats’s p@# a-bed poetry…There is such a trash of Keats and the like upon my tables, that I am ashamed to look at them.
4. Edgar Allen Poe, according to Henry James (1876)
An enthusiasm for Poe is the mark of a decidedly primitive stage of reflection.
5. John Updike, according to Gore Vidal (2008)
I can’t stand him. Nobody will think to ask because I’m supposedly jealous; but I out-sell him. I’m more popular than he is, and I don’t take him very seriously…oh, he comes on like the worker’s son, like a modern-day D.H. Lawrence, but he’s just another boring little middle-class boy hustling his way to the top if he can do it.
6. William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, according to Samuel Pepys (1662)
…we saw ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ which I had never seen before, nor shall ever again, for it is the most insipid ridiculous play that ever I saw in my life.
Today’s moral? Nobody’s words gain universal acceptance, and neither will ours. You just do good work, feel good about it all, and move along.
Keep writing, Tom Chandler.
April 15th, 2010 Comments Off
April 14th, 2010 Comments Off
From The Department of Time-Killing Online Diversions comes the OneWord site, which simply gives you one word, an editor, and sixty seconds to write about it.
The results are streamed for all to see:
Not all the results are necessarily pretty (in fact, most are horrifying), but the occasional gem makes it interesting.
It’s yet another online-fueled way to kill an afternoon (similar to the WriteOrDie program, which administers irritating noises when you stop typing).
Still, you can’t watch an episode of Top Chef without wondering if a similar, timed format wouldn’t offer a compelling online competition for writers, who would chop, slice and cook up sentences for general consumption – and a trio of judges.
Keep dreaming, Tom Chandler.
April 8th, 2010 §
April 6th, 2010 §
While the internet has radically altered the face of marketing, us poor writers remain stuck with the same old-fashioned letters, overbearing grammar rules and boring punctuation that have always held us back.
Isn’t it time we threw off the yoke of our linguistic oppressors? Isn’t it time we evolved the language to fit our new digital, lifestreaming reality?
I agree.
Which is why CollegeHumor.com’s publication of new punctuation designed expressly for the digital age caught my eye – especially the lovely, revelatory Demicolon:
Clearly, the expert linguists at CollegeHumor.com are bold thinkers: they also suggest digital-age punctuation marks like The Double-Reverse Sarcastimark, the quotificent Isolation Marks (which isolate your perfect text from the error-riddled crap you’re quoting), and the Victory-Carries-The-Wind symbol, which allows you win any online argument – no matter how tenuous your position.
Frankly, the writing world has waited a long time for this kind of forward-thinking punctuary revolution.
No longer will our tiny little hobbit writer’s hands be tied by outdated punctuation – marks that barely got the job done when words were still printed on paper.
See you on the bleeding edge of our New Digital Frontier,
Tom Chandler.
