The Editor and the Medium: How to Ensure your Success

by NDK Creative Artist

Editing and proofing any work of art & entertainment is the final part of the production process before the work is delivered to the intended public. It is the most important phase in the ending of the work, and it is a demanding process requiring a great deal of knowledge and experience that can only be truly gained by doing it.

There are good books (reviews and recommendations to come later) available and also some great tips on editing around. But there is one that is consistently missed by every author-writer-editor I’ve ever read, and it’s right in front of all our noses all the time. Isn’t that always the case with the great truths?

Across the field in every artistic discipline this important principle has apparently missed definition, though some do it instinctively and as a matter of procedure and good practice, so while I didn’t invent this, I’ve never found a place where this was stated with clarity as I’m going to state it now, though those I personally train, always learn it.

To pick up mistakes you otherwise will not see, change the medium in which the work is presented.

How to change the medium?

Well, you need to get creative to do this. Here are a few I’ve used successfully:

• If you’re reading a screen using a word processor print the document and use a pencil to find the errors. Move the article from word processor to HTML Put the words in a different font. Reading three times aloud is useful. But after three times it loses its effectiveness (see below for more on this).

• If you’re recording a song, listen to it through headphones, radio speakers, ear buds, in a media player. Watch it on a video while listening. Have someone else play it live.

• If you’re working with a painting or 3D art (e.g. sculpture), take photographs (and you should do this anyway, to record the various stages of the work, as this helps to develop value and improve provenance).

• Working with a tv or film, move the work from a color screen to black & white, or to a smaller screen, or a larger one.

The principle is:

To see what’s really there that you can’t see, change the medium.

You will be surprised how simple and effective this principle is. It permits you, as the author, to see your work anew and it helps to create the intellectual distance and degree of unfamiliarity necessary to look at and consider a work with fresh eyes.

Discovery

I remember how I discovered this principle. An actor had written a book for a course that was adapted from someone else’s original work with permission, which put even more pressure on quality standards, expectations and requirements.

Six people had proofed the work six times each. When they sent it to the printer they were confident they had picked up every single error.

The book came back, beautifully bound, leather cover, gold embossing, and they trembled with anticipation and excitement for the impression was one of quality–and that is what it’s all about.

The author opened the cover to look at the title page and gasped in horror! There, right on the title page was the first error. They had missed it. The title was misspelled! Front page; title; six people; go figure, well, don’t because I’ve done that and you’re reading the result.

Since then I have tested this very thoroughly in all sorts of media. It uniformly works as described herein.

The Theory of Changing the Medium

The mind is a superb instrument, but as it works close to the thing being created familiarity begins to create author blindness. The mind no longer sees the thing it is looking at. It sees what it thinks it sees, and not what is there. This creates a problem for any creator, and for anybody who is charged with the task of proofing a work for the purposes of quality control. When the work is translated or transposed into another medium, e.g. from audio to print (notation) in the case of a composition, or from recorded speech to transcript, then errors become apparent. It is the change in the medium that, for a brief period in time, provides the mind with an opportunity to see familiar things as if they were new.

So here we discover the fundamental behind this principle of changing the medium:

To detect mistakes you must be able to perceive them first.

At the point where you no longer see them, then you are exhausted (rest) or, too tired of the work–change the medium.

When you Change the Medium, Proof the Work

There’s another important principle at work here, and it’s to do with quality control of work you create. Every time you change the medium, proof the work. The moment that work is moved into a new medium, proof it. You will find new things every time. But don’t release the work until it has been proofed.

The time to proof is when you change the medium.

At this time and for a brief period thereafter you can see it with fresh eyes, or ears.

The moment when the medium is changed is important. It is the most critical time to proof the work.

It is always effective to have others work with you to constructively critique a work you have created, though watch out for the liabilities that arise when you involve others. You must check their work when they say it is done.

I always, always, always, check the work. Always. And I consistently find errors and things missed. The business of creativity is extremely demanding work, often underrated. This is one of the few times you can get away with using one word more times than it should in normal circumstances appear in close proximity. There are no hard and fast rules.

When you find errors in the work of quality control you must correct the person who made the error, gently, respectfully. Over time the relationship built up becomes strong, but the person doing the checking is also subject to ‘blindness’ (they become familiar with habits, style, and other factors and cease to see what is in front of them) and they are also, from a production perspective, a medium for the work, and the principle to effectively pick up errors and improve quality is change the medium.

“The moment all those words on the page appear to be a forest, and the trees cannot be seen…”

Editors should always proof several authors’ works. The experience gained will give them knowledge as author and/or editor to draw upon that ultimately improves the quality of everything they do (great writers are good editors first).

In any creative medium, the responsible editor will also recognize the signs that indicate they are now too close to see the work. The moment all those words on the page appear to be a forest, and the trees cannot be seen is the time to turn over the work to another editor–change the medium.

There is more to be said on this subject and we’ll revisit in later articles. Your questions and comments are welcome. Do let me know how you get on with applying these principles.

Where do we go now?

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