Like probably maybe most of you, I receive several forwards a day from
friends and fellow designers, who freely declare, "you're gonna love this." And while
I'd heard of tilt-shift photography,
I'd never seen the technique applied to art. Here, a select few Van Gogh paintings, many of which I know
well and admire greatly, are dramatically transformed with the tilt-shift treatment.
It was as if I was experiencing them if for the first time. And since
then, I've not stopped thinking about this dreamy perspective or how I wish I could travel at a slant into all
the paintings at the MIA.
Try your hand at the tilt-shift technique in Photoshop.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Social media: Put a ring on it
Anyone who has managed a social media presence knows that you have to roll with the punches and accept that sometimes you will have no control over what happens. Oftentimes you can only control your response to issues that arise.
But committing to social media strategy can make inevitable challenges easier to deal with and give you the opportunity to have more strategic responses.
So, to quote Beyonce: Put a ring on it.
For example, sometimes a cranky "friend" will dis a professor on your department's Facebook page--this can present an opportunity to engage students on what the department can do better and hopefully cause others to chime in about what they like about the department now.
Or, let's say someone hacks into your account and spams everyone. While that can be embarrassing, it also provides you with an opportunity to show some humor with your audience when notifying them that you are not, in fact, a princess from a small foreign nation looking for help in managing your vast fortune.
This article gives a helpful snapshot of how to establish a successful social media strategy and plan for the unexpected: http://rushprnews.com/2011/01/29/establishing-a-sustainable-social-media-marketing-strategy?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
But committing to social media strategy can make inevitable challenges easier to deal with and give you the opportunity to have more strategic responses.
So, to quote Beyonce: Put a ring on it.
For example, sometimes a cranky "friend" will dis a professor on your department's Facebook page--this can present an opportunity to engage students on what the department can do better and hopefully cause others to chime in about what they like about the department now.
Or, let's say someone hacks into your account and spams everyone. While that can be embarrassing, it also provides you with an opportunity to show some humor with your audience when notifying them that you are not, in fact, a princess from a small foreign nation looking for help in managing your vast fortune.
This article gives a helpful snapshot of how to establish a successful social media strategy and plan for the unexpected: http://rushprnews.com/2011/01/29/establishing-a-sustainable-social-media-marketing-strategy?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Writing for radio, Barry White, and the importance of being an organ donor
It still surprises me that soul-singer Barry White died of kidney failure. It seems like, with a voice so smooth--responsible for hits like, "Can't Get Enough Of Your Love, Babe", and "You're The First, The Last, My Everything"--that someone (a lady?) would have just given him a kidney if he'd asked*(if you are offended by this joke, see the asterisk below and calm down. If still offended, see the double "**" asterisk).
Evidently, a great voice isn't the only factor when it comes to persuasive messaging.
Writing for radio
Take radio storytelling as an example, and in an example totally opposite ladies man Barry White, listen to this radio spot a friend of mine wrote: Instant Birth Control (it has three variations, and it's worth listening to all three).
My friend, a successful copywriter with a Minneapolis ad-agency, had this to say about the process:
"Radio writing is one of the hardest in advertising. It requires a knack for writing believable dialogue and good voiceover talent to deliver it...It's theater of the mind--your script has to get the listeners there, has to build a scene in their heads."
Filling in details
The U's Ryan Maus, who with voice talent and U writer Rick Moore does the weekly U of M Moment, echoes the sentiment. For the Moment, Maus sometimes repurposes audio from a U video, but in some cases they'll lose the supplementary visual context and have to rewrite the script so Rick's smooth voice can fill in the details. Listen to "Researcher brings mind control into 3D" as an example. I mean, how does radio compete with 3D! (Err...imagination?).
Writing for time
I've been thinking a bit about writing for radio lately, getting some tips from an MPR higher-up. His critique of my first submission included "think about out loud delivery/read out loud--your sentences are too long," and "the whole piece should be 2-3 minutes, and each sentence should be able to be read in 5 to 6 seconds."
Radio is simple, direct, and brief, and that's not always the case with writing for the eye. Sentences on a page have the luxury of time...they can run their fingers through your hair all day if you like, just like Barry White. You can go back and read, and read, and read some more until you're satisfied and understand. With radio (radio proper, not online fidget-with-the-controls-radio), you hear it once, probably in your car. It needs to be clear and crisp and you can't (or likely won't) go back again.
In any case, it's another adventure in writing, and one that I'm just beginning. I think it's going to help my writing to really stop and think about whether I need this word or that; whether "excessive use of verbal ornamentation" can't be trimmed down to mean "too many words."
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to read this post out loud.
---------------------------------
*I fully realize kidney failure is not a laughing matter. More than 4,000 people died along with Barry White in 2003 (U.S.) because of the lack of available donors, and that number approaches 5,000 per year now, with more than 80,000 waiting for a donation. It is important to talk about these things in the ways we best communicate. Be an organ donor. Further, a U study has shown there are no adverse long-term consequences of kidney donation.
**My mother has one functioning kidney and another that is functioning at something like 20 percent. I love my mom, and should it come down to it, I'm prepared to go to bat for her, and convince my brother to donate one of his kidneys.
More information:
Writing For Radio: Journalism 2.0
How Writing a Radio Ad will Improve your Copywriting
Evidently, a great voice isn't the only factor when it comes to persuasive messaging.
Writing for radio
Take radio storytelling as an example, and in an example totally opposite ladies man Barry White, listen to this radio spot a friend of mine wrote: Instant Birth Control (it has three variations, and it's worth listening to all three).
My friend, a successful copywriter with a Minneapolis ad-agency, had this to say about the process:
"Radio writing is one of the hardest in advertising. It requires a knack for writing believable dialogue and good voiceover talent to deliver it...It's theater of the mind--your script has to get the listeners there, has to build a scene in their heads."
Filling in details
The U's Ryan Maus, who with voice talent and U writer Rick Moore does the weekly U of M Moment, echoes the sentiment. For the Moment, Maus sometimes repurposes audio from a U video, but in some cases they'll lose the supplementary visual context and have to rewrite the script so Rick's smooth voice can fill in the details. Listen to "Researcher brings mind control into 3D" as an example. I mean, how does radio compete with 3D! (Err...imagination?).
Writing for time
I've been thinking a bit about writing for radio lately, getting some tips from an MPR higher-up. His critique of my first submission included "think about out loud delivery/read out loud--your sentences are too long," and "the whole piece should be 2-3 minutes, and each sentence should be able to be read in 5 to 6 seconds."
Radio is simple, direct, and brief, and that's not always the case with writing for the eye. Sentences on a page have the luxury of time...they can run their fingers through your hair all day if you like, just like Barry White. You can go back and read, and read, and read some more until you're satisfied and understand. With radio (radio proper, not online fidget-with-the-controls-radio), you hear it once, probably in your car. It needs to be clear and crisp and you can't (or likely won't) go back again.
In any case, it's another adventure in writing, and one that I'm just beginning. I think it's going to help my writing to really stop and think about whether I need this word or that; whether "excessive use of verbal ornamentation" can't be trimmed down to mean "too many words."
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to read this post out loud.
---------------------------------
*I fully realize kidney failure is not a laughing matter. More than 4,000 people died along with Barry White in 2003 (U.S.) because of the lack of available donors, and that number approaches 5,000 per year now, with more than 80,000 waiting for a donation. It is important to talk about these things in the ways we best communicate. Be an organ donor. Further, a U study has shown there are no adverse long-term consequences of kidney donation.
**My mother has one functioning kidney and another that is functioning at something like 20 percent. I love my mom, and should it come down to it, I'm prepared to go to bat for her, and convince my brother to donate one of his kidneys.
More information:
Writing For Radio: Journalism 2.0
How Writing a Radio Ad will Improve your Copywriting
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Mysterious 111
Maybe you've heard? This is WEIRD:
Well, not really that weird. Here's the "how." Simple math, right.
(For all the kids born after 2000, your answer will be 11.)
- Take the the last two digits of your birth year.
- Add that number to the age you will turn
on your birthday this year. - The answer will be 111.
Well, not really that weird. Here's the "how." Simple math, right.
(For all the kids born after 2000, your answer will be 11.)
"I am," I said: Social Media and me (and Neil Diamond)
A new me is rumored to be in the works, with public release to occur later this week. The new me, called "iMe," will feature a me that can be downloaded for various tasks and fun times, ranging from "work" to "friendship" to "party buddy," without actually needing the real me to be present. The new tool will save those who acknowledge my existence considerable time. Real me could not be reached for comment, and may not, in fact, actually exist at all.
I wrote that about a year ago as a status update on Facebook. It's ironic that I'm now using it as a lead for a post about the potential ills of social media and media tech in general.
I'm not going to harp on it too much here though, except to say that there will come a day when I run screaming into the woods leaving a trail of cell phones, laptops, and probably pants, behind. Besides, plenty of dire warnings are already cropping up; but with warnings come the potential for solutions and balance. Two in particular from this past week are worth a read:
The first regards Susan Maushart, who unplugged her teenagers for six months. No Internet, TV, iPods, cell phones, or video games. She calls her book The Winter of Our Disconnect. In my opinion, the best takeaway, in easy-to-digest sound bite (tweet?) format, of course, is this line: "Her girls had become mere 'accessories of their own social-networking profile, as if real life were simply a dress rehearsal for the next status update.'"
The second comes from MIT professor Sherry Turkle, who writes in her new book Alone, Together, that loneliness is failed solitude, explaining, "If you don't learn how to be alone, you'll always be lonely. We're raising a generation that has grown up with constant connection, and only knows how to be lonely when not connected...if you grow up thinking it's your right and due to be tweeted and retweeted, to have thumbs up on Facebook, we're losing a capacity for autonomy both intellectual and emotional."
My own greatest concern with social media--and remember, we're talking about me here--is with the development--or rather, overdevelopment--of the ego. So much of the focus of so much social media is on "me."
Before you denounce me, a disclaimer: I'm not going to even begin to contend that social media is a bad thing overall (just that it is an all-consuming monster that feeds on the flesh of humans and which can never be satiated). It has the capacity to do and has already done many wonderful things, particularly in the way of charity and disaster response.
But today, it seems more and more that the new American Dream is to go "viral;" a celebrity culture where everyone is a celebrity. In point of fact, no matter how much you tweet about yourself, or how awesome and interesting your status updates are, or whether 100 million people watch your YouTube video--the majority of the world will never have any idea who you are or were. It's true: of the nearly 7 billion people in the world, nearly 7 billion of them have no friggin' idea who you are, and they never will. Fact. In some ways then, you are already dead. Sorry. My point, I guess, is this: you better make sure your intentions for using social media are about more than you.
Neil Diamond: social media pioneer
In any case, take heart: the majority of the world also has no idea who Neil Diamond is, even though he's been pumping out hit after hit for more than 30 years, and looking awesome doing it, particularly during his sequined phase. But there's an important philosophical question about Neil here apropos to my point: Is Neil Diamond's sequined shirt an accessory to Neil Diamond, or is Neil Diamond an accessory to his sequined shirt?
Neil, of course, has already posted on this exact issue, in his hit, ""I am," I said.
I leave you with some of the lyrics:
"I am," I said
To no one there
An no one heard at all
Not even the chair
"I am," I cried
"I am," said I
And I am lost, and I can't even say why
Leavin' me lonely still
I am available for karaoke upon request.
I wrote that about a year ago as a status update on Facebook. It's ironic that I'm now using it as a lead for a post about the potential ills of social media and media tech in general.
I'm not going to harp on it too much here though, except to say that there will come a day when I run screaming into the woods leaving a trail of cell phones, laptops, and probably pants, behind. Besides, plenty of dire warnings are already cropping up; but with warnings come the potential for solutions and balance. Two in particular from this past week are worth a read:
The first regards Susan Maushart, who unplugged her teenagers for six months. No Internet, TV, iPods, cell phones, or video games. She calls her book The Winter of Our Disconnect. In my opinion, the best takeaway, in easy-to-digest sound bite (tweet?) format, of course, is this line: "Her girls had become mere 'accessories of their own social-networking profile, as if real life were simply a dress rehearsal for the next status update.'"
The second comes from MIT professor Sherry Turkle, who writes in her new book Alone, Together, that loneliness is failed solitude, explaining, "If you don't learn how to be alone, you'll always be lonely. We're raising a generation that has grown up with constant connection, and only knows how to be lonely when not connected...if you grow up thinking it's your right and due to be tweeted and retweeted, to have thumbs up on Facebook, we're losing a capacity for autonomy both intellectual and emotional."
My own greatest concern with social media--and remember, we're talking about me here--is with the development--or rather, overdevelopment--of the ego. So much of the focus of so much social media is on "me."
Before you denounce me, a disclaimer: I'm not going to even begin to contend that social media is a bad thing overall (just that it is an all-consuming monster that feeds on the flesh of humans and which can never be satiated). It has the capacity to do and has already done many wonderful things, particularly in the way of charity and disaster response.
But today, it seems more and more that the new American Dream is to go "viral;" a celebrity culture where everyone is a celebrity. In point of fact, no matter how much you tweet about yourself, or how awesome and interesting your status updates are, or whether 100 million people watch your YouTube video--the majority of the world will never have any idea who you are or were. It's true: of the nearly 7 billion people in the world, nearly 7 billion of them have no friggin' idea who you are, and they never will. Fact. In some ways then, you are already dead. Sorry. My point, I guess, is this: you better make sure your intentions for using social media are about more than you.
Neil Diamond: social media pioneer
In any case, take heart: the majority of the world also has no idea who Neil Diamond is, even though he's been pumping out hit after hit for more than 30 years, and looking awesome doing it, particularly during his sequined phase. But there's an important philosophical question about Neil here apropos to my point: Is Neil Diamond's sequined shirt an accessory to Neil Diamond, or is Neil Diamond an accessory to his sequined shirt?
Neil, of course, has already posted on this exact issue, in his hit, ""I am," I said.
I leave you with some of the lyrics:
"I am," I said
To no one there
An no one heard at all
Not even the chair
"I am," I cried
"I am," said I
And I am lost, and I can't even say why
Leavin' me lonely still
I am available for karaoke upon request.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Every tear, on every face, tastes the same
I was listening to a Mavis Staples song the other day, (accompanied by Jeff Tweedy of Wilco on the album, "You are not alone," which he produced), when I heard that lyric. I thought to myself, "Damn, that is a beautiful line." In so few words it says so much about shared human experience and emotion, and in this case, pain and sadness. It's poetry, and it got me stuck in time for just a second.
Do all tears taste the same?
But then I thought, "Wait, do all tears really taste the same?" I'd be lying if I hadn't tasted my own, and maybe a couple others'...but I haven't done the necessary research. So I read through some studies performed by trained researchers.
It turns out, most tears consist of electrolytes, proteins, albumin, lipids, mucins, and other small molecules, all in varying degrees, but particularly affected should the crier be beset by disease. So, Jeff Tweedy, all tears do not taste the same, especially to the refined palate.
This is sometimes what happens when you look too deeply into something; you can forget where you started from, and what it meant. But don't confuse this with the cliché, ignorance is bliss; it's not quite that. The beauty I knew and the emotion I felt for a moment from hearing that phrase wasn't ignorance. Quite the contrary.
The value of a good communicator
It turns out Jeff Tweedy is a good communicator. Mavis and Jeff probably wouldn't have gotten very far with "You are not alone," singing about albumin and mucins in varying degrees.
Often, this is what being a communicator means--finding meaning in something which is frankly uninteresting to very many people, and making it understandable, interesting, and even inspiring. If you've done any science writing, you may know this.
Deane Morrison just had a piece the other day, a perfect example of taking the mundane to many and making music from it. Read "From sunlight to synfuels," to see what I mean. Think of the difference if the researchers had simply published 100 pages of their findings. Maybe being a good communicator is about staring into the abyss and coming right back out again, only to say, "it's not that deep; I found a way out."
Don't get me wrong, though. I'm not saying that there isn't beauty in an atom, a quark, or even dark matter. They're beautiful to someone--namely, most likely, the brilliant scientists and researchers many of us work with. The parts, the whole: the atom, the universe. The tear, the pain, the sadness, the disease, and the mucin. We need everybody at every level to understand this world and make it better, but that understanding always comes from communication, and the best of it from those capable of staring into the abyss unscathed.
Do all tears taste the same?
But then I thought, "Wait, do all tears really taste the same?" I'd be lying if I hadn't tasted my own, and maybe a couple others'...but I haven't done the necessary research. So I read through some studies performed by trained researchers.
It turns out, most tears consist of electrolytes, proteins, albumin, lipids, mucins, and other small molecules, all in varying degrees, but particularly affected should the crier be beset by disease. So, Jeff Tweedy, all tears do not taste the same, especially to the refined palate.
This is sometimes what happens when you look too deeply into something; you can forget where you started from, and what it meant. But don't confuse this with the cliché, ignorance is bliss; it's not quite that. The beauty I knew and the emotion I felt for a moment from hearing that phrase wasn't ignorance. Quite the contrary.
The value of a good communicator
It turns out Jeff Tweedy is a good communicator. Mavis and Jeff probably wouldn't have gotten very far with "You are not alone," singing about albumin and mucins in varying degrees.
Often, this is what being a communicator means--finding meaning in something which is frankly uninteresting to very many people, and making it understandable, interesting, and even inspiring. If you've done any science writing, you may know this.
Deane Morrison just had a piece the other day, a perfect example of taking the mundane to many and making music from it. Read "From sunlight to synfuels," to see what I mean. Think of the difference if the researchers had simply published 100 pages of their findings. Maybe being a good communicator is about staring into the abyss and coming right back out again, only to say, "it's not that deep; I found a way out."
Don't get me wrong, though. I'm not saying that there isn't beauty in an atom, a quark, or even dark matter. They're beautiful to someone--namely, most likely, the brilliant scientists and researchers many of us work with. The parts, the whole: the atom, the universe. The tear, the pain, the sadness, the disease, and the mucin. We need everybody at every level to understand this world and make it better, but that understanding always comes from communication, and the best of it from those capable of staring into the abyss unscathed.
Query: Your favorite online tools
Have you tried wordmark.it? It's a fun and helpful online application that lets you preview words with the fonts installed on your computer. Definitely a time saver when you're trying to choose an appropriate font.
What about your favorite online tools? Have you recently come across any great online resources like this?
What about your favorite online tools? Have you recently come across any great online resources like this?
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