Hey Reader, I put a bag of popcorn in the microwave and set it for about two minutes. For the first thirty seconds, nothing happens. NOTHING. I start wondering whether the microwave is broken. Whether I should open the door and check that the bag is still in there. Whether I need a different microwave. Nope, none of that helps. Then .... one kernel pops. One #@$)%ing kernel. After all that waiting, there is a single piece of popcorn in a bag I was counting on to feed me. OK feed is a strong...
2 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, Would you be completely opposed to spending an hour a week, for eight weeks, on how you come across? No is a fine answer. This one's worth your time either way. Did you ever take a breath then run out of time before the sentence is over? Easy fix - take that breath before your cue starts. It takes a little bit of time to get used to it, like rubbing your stomach and tapping your head. But you figure that taken breath out, and you'll be able to start right when you need to, and...
12 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, I had one client for years. Good work, warm relationship, and I wanted more work. After on of our business lunches, I steeled myself, and asked "Can I have more work?" I meant it as warm, I like working for you, and this is something I really enjoy doing. Instantly, I saw in their eyes, that this was not a welcomed conversation. The relationship never got back to what it was. It cooled. Permanently. Think about the way I asked, and the three things this cost me: Not sharing...
20 days ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, When I started, I thought pacing in Audio Description was arithmetic. Count the frames, count the syllables, make it fit. Here's what I've been doing, and it works: pick the verb first. An intent verb is what you're doing to someone. To reveal. To warn. To disarm. It's what you're doing. You add these intent verbs to scripts, to make them come to life. And every intent word you add has its own speed built into it. Assault might take its time. Smash is instant. When a cue feels...
23 days ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, In June I sold you three programs at once and asked you to pick between them in the first email, before you knew enough about any of them to pick. That was a lot! Some of you told me so. This fall there's one thing. You'll get a few more emails about it and then it's done. If you'd rather sit this one out, click here and I'll leave you off the rest. You stay on the newsletter and nothing else changes. Here's the one thing. BoothCamp. Eight weeks, eight people, starting Wednesday...
27 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, Here is the technical breakdown of how I walk. I shift my weight to my right foot. I lift my left, bending at the knee. I extend it forward. I lean into the space where my foot is going, and my left knee bends again to catch me. I transfer my weight to the left, and pick up my right. All of that happens in about a second. I'm told I learned it by leaning forward until I fell, and my feet ran to catch up. There were times I went down face first. I still do occasionally. But I walk...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, I got back from LEAD conference last week, where AD Training Retreats ran a full day workshop and panels on Audio Description. Throughout the week I reconnected with old colleagues, made some new ones, too. And my favorite part, which seems to go with this conference: I didn't have to work at any conversaions. If anything we were limited by time to get to the next panel. I had an experience in conversation with someone who keeps forgetting to take their medication. And then my...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Hey Reader, A picture is worth a thousand words, right? Film runs at 24 frames per second. So every second of a movie is 24,000 words to choose from, and the Audio Description writer gets to use about nine of them. Nine. And they still come back with something close to poetry. I don't know how they do it. The space we Audio Description performers have is still sometimes like two seconds. Most cues that we read off of that Audio Description script live between two lines of dialogue. The writer...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, I had the best six weeks of my career and I still had to talk myself into getting on the train. That part I don't usually put in writing. Carnegie Hall, where my name was in the Playbill and up on the screen for a film I produced the Audio Description for. San Diego Pride, over 200 floats described live, with Joshua Loya. Three panels at Comic-Con, including one where I coached alongside Scott Brick, TJ Storm and Eric Martin, and one called Comics for the Blind, where a Braille...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read