All posts by Joe Wallace

advice, editorial, social networking

Wanna Be Headhunted?

Joe-Wallace-Vinyl-Collector-and-authorby Joe Wallace

I’ve got a super-busy schedule these days; my writing gigs have increased exponentially, I’m enrolled in the Recording Arts program at Tribeca Flashpoint Media Academy here in Chicago, and I’m working the post-production end of my short film, 45 RPM.

So naturally, I have absolutely no time whatsoever to consider the gig that was offered to me today via e-mail; a digital managing editor slot for a startup near me.

I didn’t apply for this gig–far from it–it came to me in my inbox today from a creative placement agency. I didn’t have to wonder how they found me, as I’ve got a little strategy to help me track where my random e-mails come from and how I’ve been discovered on the Internet.

My resume site for my work in multi-media has a site-specific e-mail address. So does my writing-specific resume site. Ditto for my vinyl blog Turntabling.net and my filmmaking blog Now-Sound.com.

The headhunter found me, oddly enough, via my multimedia resume page. So it’s likely the headhunter did a keyword search for a set of specific terms and my site wound up in the page one or page two results.

If you want to be discovered this way, there are plenty of ways to do it–mine includes having a resume page that’s been online at the same address for a very long time, using SEO-optimized resume writing techniques, along with plenty of images also with SEO optimized filenames. But none of this is my point, really.

If you really want to open up some additional freelance options for yourself, I strongly suggest you check out the creative temp agencies in your market. They can be an important source of income for a creative freelancer. Some of my highest profile and best-paying work has come from agencies, and I did some good work for these household name-type companies.

If you’re frustrated with a lack of work, a creative temp agency might just open up some new income potential for you. I have no time whatsoever to consider the position e-mailed to me today, but maybe YOU do.

Joe Wallace is a writer, editor, indie filmmaker, multi-media artist and time management fanatic. He has many projects going at once, and has finally realized he’s not truly happy unless he’s beating deadlines, rushing for trains, calculating the amount of remaining natural light, editing video, and planning his next recording session all within the same day. He blogs about filmmaking at Now-Sound.com.

advice, editorial

Team Collaboration For Creative Freelancers

Filmmaking Film production freelance sound designby Joe Wallace

Over the summer, I decided I wasn’t busy enough and enrolled in the Recording Arts for Film program at Tribeca Flashpoint Media Academy. The program began this week with orientation and on Day Two, we got right into things with a team-building exercise designed to help people understand just what they are getting into at the schoolhouse.

I am certainly not the only non-traditional (read, “older”) student there, but as we divided up into teams it was clear that the experienced students were spread around the room, giving us ample opportunity to make choices about how to proceed with the first team building exercise–a video project that required a quick bit of writing, some video capture, sound design and editing.

I’ve got boatloads of experience in these areas, but rather than dive right in and start organizing the team I was assigned to, I thought it might be slightly less egotistical–and a lot more educational–to simply wait for someone else to volunteer to take charge, take direction from them, and watch the team dynamic evolve.

And did it ever! We made some of the classic newcomer mistakes–letting one person take the lead (not me) for writing, directing, and producing and then sorting out the mayhem when that started to go awry. What was really great was watching the youngest team members–some right out of high school–begin to find their leadership legs when it was clear that nobody was going to jump in to save the day. (Not that they expected someone to do that, mind you….)

If a more experienced student had herded the group down the “right” path, none of that would have gotten to happen. It would have been easy to say, “You do THAT because you have experience with THIS, and you go take care of A and B in the script while WE undo problem C and D.”

Instead, the group evolved and team leadership roles developed organically–you could literally see the changes in attitude start to happen as the problems got fixed, the issues worked out, and the players finding their collaborative legs.

When you’re on a freelance creative team with many newcomers and new-to-the-field people, there’s a time to steer the ship with more experienced hands, and there’s a time to let people stretch beyond their comfort zones. The trick is knowing which is which. Leading a team of creatives–freelance or not–means finding the balance for the benefit of both the project and those working it.

Tribeca is a media arts academy, and while some might not see the relevance in any of this to the freelance life, I should point out that they tell you in orientation that a great many jobs waiting for those who graduate this two-year program are freelance by nature rather than staff positions. So for me, at least, this adds a whole new dimension to my work and my writing about the freelance life. Expect more multi-media musings from me here as they relate to freelance work, the coursework I’m involved with at Tribeca, and etc.

–Joe Wallace

advice, blogging, editorial, social networking

Back From Chicon 7 In Chicago Illinois

Worldcon Chicon 7 Chicagoby Joe Wallace

I am a book nerd, it is true. I do have quite a background of sci-fi nerdiness too, so it was only logical that I’d attend Chicon 7 and cover it from a writer/producers/freelancer perspective. I didn’t go to the show thinking I’d find a ton of material for freelancers who specialize in non-fiction writing, but surprisingly enough, I did uncover quite a few resources and seminars non-fiction writers can get useful takeaways from.

Chicon/Worldcon, for those of you who aren’t familiar, is a science fiction convention that is held in a different major city every year. From Helsinki to San Antonio, there are cities the world over vying to host this show that features some of the legends of science fiction. This year’s luminaries included Ben Bova, George R.R. Martin (most recently famous for Game of Thrones now that it’s hit a cable audience) and Joe Haldeman. Neil Gaiman was there to accept a Hugo award for his work on Doctor Who, so you get the idea of how large this convention gets…

I discovered plenty of seminars and panel discussions aimed at working writers, artists, and other creatives; some of the most enlightening sessions covered raising money on Kickstarter, e-publishing, and social media. For a convention that would seem to appeal more to a consumer of books rather than a writer of them, this show offered plenty for the pro or would-be pros in our midst.

If you have never attended a genre-specific convention such as Worldcon (science fiction), HorrorHound Weekend (horror, naturally) or a related program, you might just be missing out on some interesting perspective on the craft and networking opportunities.

I attended Worldcon (AKA Chicon 7) looking for things to write about for Freelance-Zone.com but soon discovered some interesting opportunities as a filmmaker and script writer seeing as how there was an ongoing film festival featuring some high-concept sci-fi material, new projects by up-and-coming hopefuls, and Chicago indie filmmakers trying to make their mark on the scene. There was a whole lot of writing and filming talk going on–very inspirational.

So it was a show full of surprises. Yes, the standard sci-fi convention features were all there including people in costume, raucous after-con parties, and a dealer’s room crammed full of t-shirts and books. But there were plenty of hidden treasures to discover too–freelancers should give serious thought to finding a convention to attend and getting some new angles on their work they might not have thought of before.

Conventions are great networking tools for obvious business reasons, but they also get you out and about among people you wouldn’t otherwise meet–that’s the value of these events for me; the chance to look at what I do in a different way, through different filters, and thinking of new angles for future development.

–Joe Wallace

advice

Today’s Writing Tip: “For Whom Are You Voting?”

sig2010 As we start the Republican National Convention and move into the Democratic Convention next week, many people will be asking each other which candidate they prefer.

Technically, the right way to do this is to say, “Whom are you voting for?” because the sentence has a direct object. Or, you can say or write, “For whom are you voting?” This phrasing is correct; however, I don’t like it. I think it sounds stuffy.

Sometimes the only really important thing about grammar is to know the rules so that you can understand when you are breaking them. In conversation, I would opt for the more casual, “Who are you voting for?” And if I were writing a dialogue in a fictional narrative or quoting someone in a blog post, I would still use the informal version.

But if I were writing for a serious website, of course I would choose the official version. We are seeing more of a trend toward casual speech and writing as part of a desire to move forward in the modern world. Just as we wouldn’t say, “Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?”, it sounds stilted and uptight to answer the phone by saying, “It is I” or “For whom are you voting?” I’m going to declare this to be a style issue in conversation and when we are quoting dialogue, but I know that many people will disagree.

Of course you can always circumvent the problem, as I did in the beginning of this piece, by saying, “Which candidate do you prefer?” And the answer in this particular election may be “neither.”

Sigrid Macdonald is the author of three books, including Be Your Own Editor http://tinyurl.com/7wnk5se and two erotic short stories, which she wrote under the pen name Tiffanie Good. Silver Publishing just released “The Pink Triangle,” a tale of friendship, lust, and betrayal. You can view her story here: http://tinyurl.com/6v65rgr

blogging

Engadget Reports Microsoft Patents Contextual Ads in E-Books

Joe-Wallace-Vinyl-Collector-and-authorThis certainly could inspire a couple dozen pages worth of commentary, snark, doomsaying, and other ranty gibberish, but instead, I’ll settle for a very George Takei-inspired “Oh MY” and let it go at that.

What is all the fuss potentially about? A report by techy blog Engadget from early August 2012 about the notion of inserting contextual ads in eBooks that seems to just now be getting a bit of traction in the circles I read via Twitter and elsewhere.

Author William Gibson’s Twitter posts mentioned this in passing with a link to the Engadget ad, and after reading it, I can’t say it’s sunny skies on the horizon IF such a notion actually catches on in the marketplace…but it’s early days for the concept, so it could be a lot of hot air and hand-wringing over nothing. A damp squib, as writer Stephen King would say. What do YOU think?

Read the entire article about Microsoft’s patent on contextual ads in e-books by Jon Fingas at Engadget.

Joe Wallace is a writer, editor, and social media manager. Lately he’s also been writing screenplays, directing the short film 45 RPM, and eating a lot of Thai food. He’s studying sound design and post-production for film at Tribeca Flashpoint Media Academy starting in September and planning his next move on the big screen–a feature-length documentary about independent publishing. Contact him: jwallace@freelance-zone.com

advice, editorial

Today’s Writing Tip: Using Your Spellcheck

sig2010

Previously I’ve written about the drawbacks of the spellcheck device in Word, Yahoo or Gmail, or Outlook Express.

There are many disadvantages to relying on a spellcheck, starting with the fact that it doesn’t always recognize homonyms, and it will frequently miss a typo if the word is spelled correctly. For example, the grammatically incorrect sentence, “I went to give him a huge” was not flagged by my Outlook or in Word.

However, despite all its frailties, it’s critical to use a spellcheck for e-mails, articles, blogs, and, in particular, manuscripts. Why wouldn’t you take advantage of that? It’s like doing complicated math in your head instead of pushing a few buttons on a calculator. I may know how to do a square root, but if a machine can do it for me and I know that it will be accurate, I would be foolish not to take advantage of the wonders of the 21st century.

The spellcheck is nothing like a calculator because it doesn’t have a 100% accuracy rate if you pump in all the right numbers like a calculator. But spellcheck will recognize a large number of misspelled words and flag all kinds of grammatical problems.

If you are writing a manuscript and submitting it to an editor, the editor determines his or her price estimate for your project based on how many hours the project will take. And if it’s not spellchecked, it will take a lot longer to do than a manuscript that has been checked. Deliver a clean product.

Enable the automatic spell-checking on your e-mail program and always push F7 when you finish an article or manuscript. It really makes a difference.

Sigrid Macdonald is the author of three books, including Be Your Own Editor http://tinyurl.com/7wnk5se and two erotic short stories, which she wrote under the pen name Tiffanie Good. Silver Publishing just released “The Pink Triangle,” a tale of friendship, lust, and betrayal. You can view her story here: http://tinyurl.com/6v65rgr