I get asked a lot about my process, software, and microphone for the screencasts I do at Tekpub. I figured I'd blog about it because the world needs better screencasts. This is part 1 of more to come...
I learned this from Scott Hanselman:
In other words: tell a good story. It’s amazing how often people overlook this simple truth: we’re built to listen and learn from stories. This is at the root of making a good screencast (or blog post or presentation or… anything you’re trying to convey to someone else).
All the rest are the details - where the devil lives :).
Let’s assume you know what you’re trying to convey to someone: perhaps how awesome your startup is, how to use a tool or programming language, or maybe how to create a screencast :). Now comes the structure that sits under the story.
This basic structure needs to get out of your brain, onto paper quickly. I usually open a text editor (like Sublime Text 2) and start throwing ideas down on what I want to convey. That’s what I did for this post here.
I thought about concept, tools, process - all of it and I wrote it down. Then I decided which was most important (the underlying concepts) and started with that - knowing I might change my mind as this all came together.
Our ideas are coming out of us - now let’s get it down somewhere. After I scribble ideas in a text editor (or on a piece of paper) - I wrap some structure around it. I used to Google Docs for this but have moved to Pages/iCloud. It doesn’t matter the tool - just be sure you have access to it when inspiration hits.
I really can’t emphasize that point enough. Inspiration will strike you and you’ll think “what a neat idea for a demo!” - write it down or lose it!
My outlines grow and grow - sometimes stretching 4 or 5 pages! This is what you want - everything out of you, into an outline.
One anxiety that I have to keep in a cage is my need to push content fast. I’ve learned over and over that rushing a creative process triples the suck. The opposite of this is also true - and is something you need to keep in mind: patience triples the awesome.
When you read my tips here, please keep this in mind. I’m fairly certain many reading this will say “that’s fine for you - I don’t have that kind of time”. I’ll rewrite that sentence for you thus:
That’s fine for you, I don’t respect my audience as much as you do.
If that sounds harsh to you - consider that you are, literally, trading the quality of the user experience over the lifetime of your screencast for a few hours of your time.
Be patient. It pays off.
We have 4 or 5 pages of ideas - demos, concepts, whatnot. It’s time to consider just how much we need to say. One thing I find helpful when deciding what to keep is to ponder how I learn - and what things make the biggest differences to me.
I’ve found that I learn the most when:
The rest is noise. Literally. More on this below.
This is where you need to stare at your “story arc” - your beginning, middle, and end. Remember: you’re trying to walk someone through a story, not impress them or sell them something. It’s always a temptation to “show someone how cool a tool is” - and no one cares.
They want to know how to use it - assume they think it’s awesome. Given that, how do you filter out the “noise”? Here are my tricks:
You should, literally, lose half your outline. Now’s the time for review - and some hard questions.
You are the story teller. The lead actor in a story written by you, about a thing. Consider that the best actors “melt” into their characters - you just can’t see them. There’s Daniel Day Lewis as Abe Lincoln and, of course, Heath Ledger as the Joker.
We’re not great actors - but we can use the same tricks:
The way I’ve put this to people is that you’re a human made of clear glass. The great narrators all have very warm, engaging tone in their pace and delivery - yet nothing that might convey who they are as a person. David Attenboro, for instance, is my hero.
A beginning, middle, and end. A commitment to be patient and focus on posterity - knowing this video will live on for years and the time you invest now will pay off in a big way. We’ve checked our egos and have a clear focus on the topic… let’s do a final review.
You won’t want to do this. That’s OK, it will show in your final work. You’ll fight me on it, but all I can tell is you that it’s worked well for me: write it all out.
Yep. Everything you want to say - make it hit paper. Let your muse fly and see if you can put words to your outline, keeping in mind all the things we’ve talked about. If you can’t, then you have a problem which usually means your story is boring.
And you want to find that out now. Not later when no one watches what you’ve done. You’ll be the first person to be uninspired by what you thought was good!
There’s a lot to writing good dialog - word choice, pacing, not repeating yourself. I’ll go into that in the next post…