The Midnight Diaries of Catty Wampus

junk in the trunk: what I learned

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Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

I want to send out a huge thank you to everyone who submitted comments on my last post, http://www.sabudesign.com/cattywampus/?p=237Junk in the Trunk, whether it was here on the blog or in e-mail or in person. It’s so amazing to get everyone’s input to guide me, or confirm my suspicions about an idea, or to bring up thoughts that would never have occurred to me at all.

I ask that you indulge me as I run down the list of things I learned from this experience, and what I will do my best to apply to the next project.

As a refresher, here is the audio in the four abandoned sections from Junk in the Trunk:

Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

Thing I Learned #1:
A Story is a Sequence of Events

Almost everyone said the same thing after listening to the audio: The first section was good and interesting, and the other sections felt flat and kind of dull. I absolutely agree.

The first section has a basic structure–an anecdote. One thing happens, and then the next thing happens. You’re constantly waiting to find out what the next piece of the story is. The other three sections have almost no momentum at all because they are simply Renee telling you what you’re listening to. In essence, there’s nothing to keep you interested and wanting to hear more.

In my original idea, I thought that talking over the music would be the most interesting part of the piece and so that’s what I geared everything towards. This is partly based on my enjoyment of the “Music Mondays” section of the Adam Carolla show every week, where each of the three crewmembers of the show play music based on a theme. They talk about the music, interject personal stories, and crack jokes, and it is always interesting and funny. I realize now that I must be missing what makes those segments work on the Adam Carolla Show, because my three “talk over the music” sections certainly have none of the appeal or interest that theirs does. I recognize that the personalities are different, but something tells me that the structure probably has as much to do with the people.

Thing I Learned #2:
What People Hear is What People Hear

This is a useful tip for any animators reading this as well. You see, many people made suggestions and had ideas about different ways I could have edited the piece to be more interesting. And I was struck with the instinct to argue back “Well, I tried that idea…” or “No, that doesn’t work because…” or “No, no, the reason I did it this way is because…”

When all is said and done, however–all is said and done. Your audio (or animation) is put out there for people to see, and you’re not going to be able to be there to explain it to everyone who gets to hear it. You have to be comfortable letting it lie where you leave it, and take everyone’s comments as they come. Your listeners don’t know anything about the work you put into the project, they just know what they hear when you present it to them. If you tell them how to listen to it after the fact, you run the risk of sounding like a douche.

Thing I Learned #3:
Planning Planning Planning

You can’t just sit down with a microphone and talk to someone, even for an hour and a half, and expect that you’ll get something decent out of it. You have to have at least a little bit of an idea about what you want your final piece to be, and then prepare questions to direct you towards appropriate answers while still allowing the interview to feel open and natural.

Now, to be fair to myself, I had actually done a good amount of planning. The mistake, as I mentioned earlier, was that I thought it would be interesting to talk about the music itself and so that’s what I planned for. If I had kept in mind that what I really needed was a story, my planning would have been different: I might have tried to talk to Christine, or been more inquisitive about how Renee searched for the songs, what other people have thought of her Mix tape, etc. Hopefully I’ll know better for next time.

Thing I Learned #4:
You Learn by Doing

This might be another one that’s familiar to budding animators. As it applies to audio documentaries, it goes something like this: I have read a tone of websites and articles, heard many instructive podcasts, and watched many YouTube interviews with Ira Glass, all of which had great information about what it takes to put together a decent and interesting piece. But even if I had read everything there was to read on the subject, I’m not sure that my first piece would have come out much better than this. That’s because we tend to learn the most from our experiences.

There’s that old chestnut about an artist needing to get 5,000 bad paintings out of themselves before they reach the good paintings. The adage says nothing about reading 5,000 books about paintings. You just have to do ‘em. And by doing it more and more, the more you’ll remember for the next time you dip your brush into your palette.

Thing I Learned #5:
Try Try Again

I’m already thinking about what my next piece will be. And I know that these lessons will be carried into it–some of them might become sharper, and other new lessons will almost certainly occur to me. The people who have been doing this well have been doing it for years, so I’m not discouraged by a first-time attempt that isn’t a blockbuster. Stay tuned for the next one, whenever it arrives. I’ll need your feed back then as much as ever.

Thanks again to everyone for listening, and for enduring the silent days and nights here at the Midnight Diaries. Now that this piece is out of my system, I can get back to more puppets and stop signs. Come back this Friday if you don’t believe me.

Cheers!

Posted in Podcast, music | No Comments »

junk in the trunk

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Friday, June 13th, 2008

(note: if you simply want to hear the audio in this post, scroll down to the end–but I hope that what I’ve written will give it some context, and be interesting enough to read through)

Learning a new skill can be exhilarating. It can be fun, and frightening, and inspiring. It can also be incredibly frustrating.

After listening to so many episodes of This American Life and Radio Lab and any number of the wonderful documentaries at Transom.org, I decided that I would try my hand at producing an audio piece of my own. As luck would have it, my friend Renee had a story that seemed like it would provide a great opportunity for a first attempt: she had made a mix tape for a friend, and the inspiration for the mix was funny and quirky and I knew it would be a lot of fun to talk about!

Renee and I sat down earlier this year to record the initial interview that would give me a foundation to build the documentary on top of. Renee is always great to talk to, and I truly enjoyed interviewing her for an hour and a half about the mix tape, the songs she included, and even some personal stories she associated with particular songs. I felt like I was off to a great start.

It turns out that the interview was the easiest part of the process. When I tried to edit the audio together into a cohesive story, I discovered it wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be.

This is generally the case when you’re trying anything new. Many of the people who read this blog are animators. They can testify that their first attempts at animation were difficult, and may have even ended in abandonment. But they learned from those first attempts, and brought that knowledge to their second attempt. The second attempt may have been a bit better, but chances are that it was another opportunity to learn how to approach their third attempt.

And this is where I am with my first attempt at putting together an audio piece. I have reached a point where there are several sections I am proud of, and some I am less than happy with. Overall, I have learned a great deal from this experience. The piece is unfinished, but I will take my experience and knowledge and carry it over into my second project, whatever that might be.

The lack of posts at this blog has been due to my decision that I would not write another word for this blog until I was ready to post either the finished audio, or at least something that would give me closure on it. And so, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to ask for 6 and a half minutes of your time to listen to four sections of the unfinished audio documentary, Junk In The Trunk

Enjoy!

Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

I would appreciate any feedback you have; whether you enjoyed it or not (and why), whether the story was easy to follow (and if not, where and why), the production quality, the editing choices, anything at all. I look forward to hearing your thoughts, and I will take them with me to guide me on my next project as well.

Finally, and most importantly, I want to express special gratitude to my very good friend Renee Marcotte, who has always been a source of smiles and laughter for me. Renee is the curator of the Gassy Knoll Gallery here in Portland, along with her boyfriend Robert Lewis, who has been one of my best friends for years and I hope will continue to be for years to come. Thanks so much to both of you!

Posted in Eric's Stories, Podcast, midnight diaries radio, music, people | 7 Comments »

un-political

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Sunday, February 5th, 2006

Before I start in this week: I’ve just learned that blogger has been having trouble keeping the comments that people post. So if anyone has left comments lately and you haven’t seen them on the site, please don’t think I deleted them. I have just set up an option that allows comments to be mailed directly to me so I at least know what you’re saying and I can (hopefully) respond to you. Please accept my apologies, and feel free to re-send any comments you may have left recently. Especially about the podcast.

I know that may seem like pandering–but any blogger knows that comments are the little hugs and kisses that warm the heart in this community. Sure, it’s fun to write, but it’s also wonderful to know that people think you’re saying something worthwhile, or funny, or even disagreeable. It’s the dialogue that makes it fun, y’know?

One final thing about the podcast: I’ve decided that since we’re trying to do one per month, I’ll keep a link to the podcast in my weekly posts until there’s a new one. You’ll find the link below. Now, on to business!

- - - - - -

Earlier this week I heard something about President Bush that made me angry.

Actually, it wasn’t about the President himself. It was a newscaster, discussing what he thought Mr. Bush would talk about during his State Of the Union address. The news guy mentioned that Bush will have to be careful not to upset too many people.

Because (said the news guy) at the moment, George W. Bush has the lowest approval rating for a post-war president. Who was in their second term. Except for Nixon.

Now, I don’t want to get bogged down in personal politics or anything. I believe what I believe, and you believe what you believe, and maybe we believe the same thing and maybe we don’t.

What I’m talking about right now has nothing to do with Bush and has everything to do with the way that things are spun for us. Let’s look at the stats again, shall we?

George W. Bush has the lowest approval rating ever;
For a post-war president;
In his second term;
Except for Nixon.

GAH!! Where to begin??

Alright, obviously, the first part of the message is all you’re supposed to pay attention to. “Lowest approval rating ever.” That will give people enough to chew on, right? But then they have to keep qualifying it. They qualify it so much that it becomes meaningless.

How many post-war presidents have there been? Off the top of my head: Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Ford, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush. Right? Did I miss any?

Oh ho ho ho… but wait! Not all of those had TWO terms! So we’ll revise. Again, off the top of my head (and I may be mistaken), but I think the only ones with two terms were: Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, and now Bush.

Oh ho ho ho… but wait! We have to cross Nixon off the list, because he actually DID have the lowest rating. Now we have Johnson, Reagan, Clinton, and Bush.

So if you want, I guess we can say that Bush has the lowest approval rating among those four. Which doesn’t sound nearly as bad as the implication that it was the worst among the 50-some Presidents this country has ever had.

Does it make you angry that the media tries to twist your brain around like this? I mean, sure, plenty of people are angry with Bush and his administration. Plenty of people strongly disagree with his policies and ideals. Can’t we find a way to voice our disappointment without trying to twist things around? Do we really need to SCROUNGE for legitimate complaints?

I swear.

I happened to catch a little bit of the Randi Rhodes show on Air America the other day. She made me so angry. I mean, she obviously wants to make people “I hate Bush” angry, but she made me “I can’t listen to your show another galdern minute” angry. It was non-stop talk from her over and over, with an occasional caller–and while she has the free airwaves, and enough time to discuss policies and agendas, and how to make things better, this is message I got from her program:

George W. Bush is not the brightest light bulb in the chandelier.
Oh, and George W. Bush was raised in a very well-to-do family, and that has largely helped carve out the path of his life for him.

Oooooooooooh. Ooooooooooooh. I mean, c’mon! It’s 2006! Don’t we have anything of substance to say?? Do we have to re-hash the same superficial nonsense from even before the first election?? I fully expected her to bring up the “nucular” thing again!!

Alright, I’m going to get off of my soapbox in just a moment. I’ll end by saying this. Listen:

I don’t care if you’re a Bush supporter or a Bush detractor. All I ask is that when you’re talking about politics, do your best to add some meat to your discussion, eh? Forget about Democrats This, or Republicans That, or Christians Blah Blah, or Left Wing Liberals Blee Blee Blah Blee Blah. Why not actually, you know, talk about things?

*sigh*

(Incidentally, when I’ve brought this up among friends at work, there has been some conjecture about whether a “Post-war President” means “A President after WWII” or “A President who was in office at the end of a war.” I think it’s the former, but most people seem to think it’s the later, so they’re probably right. Either way, I still think that the whole lowest-ratings-description is a pretty sad-sack and roundabout way of trying to paint someone.)

- - - - -

Hey? Did you not get a chance to tune in to the Eric and Noelle Show yet? Well you’re in luck because it’ll be available throughout the month:

The Noelle and Eric Show - Episode 2

Feel free to ask us any questions we can answer on the air, or would like to suggest things you’d like to hear about, or if you just have a comment, send your thoughts to podcast@sabudesign.com

Posted in Long Post, Podcast | No Comments »

podcast #2

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Wednesday, February 1st, 2006

I’ve been listening to podcasts for a few months now. There’s a lot of good ones out there. And those that are just beginning seem to have this in common: All of the new podcasters offer large apologies for sound quality, and tell you that they aren’t professional audio engineers, and they hope the listeners will forgive them, and yadda-di-yadda-di-yadda-di-ya.

So let’s just pretend that you all know I’m not a professional audio engineer.

Yadda-di-yadda-di-yadda-di-ya. My point is: Welcome to Podcast #2!!!

Noelle and I got together to talk a little bit more about a broad range of topics. We decided not to limit ourselves to movies this time around. We go all over the place, and we hope you’ll be entertained while you tune in. The plan is to do this about once a month, and we think it will be a lot of fun.

You can download the long-awaited Podcast #2 here:

The Noelle and Eric Show - Episode 2

By the way, “The Noelle and Eric Show” is just a placeholder name. We’re still trying to think up a really good ‘un.

If you want to suggest a name for our show, or ask us any questions we can answer on the air, or would like to suggest things you’d like to hear about, or if you just have a comment, feel free to leave a comment here on the blog, or send any thoughts to podcast@sabudesign.com

Until next time, then… Lanis Kabae, everybody!

Posted in Podcast, Short Post | No Comments »

radio

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Sunday, December 25th, 2005

Merry Christmas, everybody!

I was debating about whether I should call attention to the holiday or not. After all, I myself do not celebrate Christmas, or much of anything. But whether I celebrate anything, or whether you do, and whatever faith or spirit you hold within you, I don’t think it’s ever inappropriate to wish you the best of good will and wishes for peace and smiles, however you may find them.

This week, I’ve decided to do a little something on this here blog o’ mine. Here’s the story:

Once upon a blue moon ago, Noelle and I decided it would be fun to radio show together. After a heapload of exploration (mostly from Noelle’s side of the bargain), we concluded that our best bet would be to approach a local public radio station with a demo tape.

We put together a demo show called “Watch This,” during which we reviewed a movie we had rented. Sadly, we were never able to get straight answers from the radio station about who to talk to, or where to send anything, or protocols or procedures, or anything. Frustrating!!

Our little radio test has been sitting on my hard drive for over a year now.

But guess what! Noelle and I have decided to say “Screw that public radio station! What if we resurrected the idea as a… (wait for it)… podcast!”

So here it is, folks: the radio test Noelle and I recorded, thinking we’d be big famous radio stars someday. If you enjoy listening to us, maybe we’ll start putting together a little segment once a month or so. We think it’d be a lot of fun!

Watch This - Episode 1

If you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment here on the blog, or send any thoughts to
podcast@sabudesign.com

With nervously crossed fingers… we hope you enjoy it! Merry Christmas!

Posted in Podcast, Short Post | 3 Comments »

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