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2021.06.25-0176 - Writing A Script To Be Translated Writing a script that’s to be translated Foreign languages may be, literally, all Greek to you, in which case don’t rely on auto-translators. They’re increasingly accurate but they miss the nuance of a language, and you could end up being an ‘idiom idiot’. Instead hire a professional translator who’s not only studied that second language but also...

2021.06.24-0175 – Your Written Direction The written direction The script should match the content, and the audience, and the reader and their tone. Let’s go through that!: ·        The script should match the content – it would sound odd to have a script about a modern music festival with formal, business-like language – unless that was part of a deliberate...

2021.06.23-0174 – Proof Reading Proof reading Done your script? Now proof read – read it out to test it out. Yes, if you or someone is going to read it out loud then that’s the process you have got to go through first – to hear it in your ears and not just your head. Check for the things we’ve been talking about: grammar, spelling and flow (so, the pace and the rhythm of the piece). Layout One of...

2021.06.22-0173 – Unintended Scripted Jokes Unintended jokes Ambiguity offers the audience a rich source of humour at the newsreader’s expense. Orchestra musicians at the Royal Opera House are threatening to strike next week, if the management turn down a 10 per cent no-strings pay rise.   Teams of traditional dancers from various parts of Kenya exposed themselves to world scouts’ delegates i...

2021.06.21-0172 – Typo Tragedies Typos I was once left a story to read on-air “ A woman has died after falling from her house ” after a slapdash colleague had meant to write “ horse ”, but the first sentence looked entirely plausible at first glance. It wasn’t until the second line (“ the animal had to be put down ”) that the mistake became obvious (and I had to find the original source material t...

2021.06.20-0171 – Sing-Song Scripts Sing-song scripts Sentences of varying length will help you avoid a sing-song rhythm and incorrect intonation (with the emphasis on the repetition of a beat rather than where it’s meant). That means that longer sentences like this one, are often made up of a series of phrases which can be subtly read as a ‘unit’, as long as the correct intonation is kept. R...

2021.06.19-0170 – Similarly Spelt Words It may be that the writer has incorrectly spelled a word, or that you know from your own experience that your eye-to-mouth co-ordination on some words always catches you out. I am always worried about reading “was arrested by an uninformed police officer” rather than “a uniformed police officer” (or something similar) because I have ‘word-blindness’ when it...

2021.06.18-0169 – Rhyme Time Rhyme-time These are invariably unintended and are only realised when a script comes to be read aloud: Mr Grimes said at the time he didn’t mind the fine,  Defence Counsel Simon Gee said the jury had to set the men free on their not guilty plea. One defendant, a stocky Croatian, yelled no justice was done in this nation. For disturbance in court, the judge said he...

2021.06.17-0168 – Can I Quote You? Quote marks It is rare that you will have a direct quote in a script, news or otherwise, but if you do, it indicates that the words must not be changed. That’s usually for a legal reason: He said he had “absolutely and categorically” no knowledge of the attack on his colleague. Or to distance yourself the reader personally from the words you are about to say: &nb...

2021.06.16-0167 – Problematic Punctuations Punctuation A good script should be properly punctuated… to be read aloud! So that may not stick strictly accurately to the grammar and structure were taught at school, but whatever works to help the reader make sense of the sentence, where to place inflection or where to pause. All the dots and dashes are there for a reason: to help the reader read corre...

2021.06.15-0166 – Problematic Pronunciations Pronunciations Check any word of phrase you are not familiar with, or with which you just know you will trip up over: ·        The engineering company Thales is actually pronounced ‘tar-les’ and not ‘thayles’ ·        The word bombardier is ‘bom-ber-DEER’, but when it refers...

2021.06.14-0165 – Initially Speaking Initialisations Beware of initials of organisations that are said as individual letters: ·        The RMT Union ·        The BBC And initials which are said as words (acronyms) ·        NICE, NATO, AIDS And abbreviations which make no obvious...

Brackets / parenthesis In broadcast scripts, words or phrases in brackets are usually not to be read out loud: ·        A direction to a presenter “(TURN TO CAMERA 1)”, (READ WITH PASSION”) ·        Additional information “(Source: Metropolitan Police)” ·        A guide to pronun...

0163 – All About Alliteration A little alliteration (try saying that out loud!) may occasionally be acceptable, but sometimes several similar sounds spoken aloud sound stupid, while a series of superfluous hissing s and c sounds sound senselessly sibilant. == Audio recording script and show notes (c) 2021 Peter Stewart Through these around-5-minute episodes, you can build your confidence and compe...

0162 – How To Say ‘100’ A copywriter once showed me a script: “ This bed is now only 126.99 that’s down by 259.06! ” And said: “If it’s the price you’re selling it’s ‘a hundred and 26-99’, not ‘one-hundred’, because ‘a-hundred’ sounds cheaper than ‘one-hundred’... And if it’s the saving you want to promote, say ‘one-hundred’ because it sounds bigger.” ==  Through these around-5-minute episodes, y...

0161 – Cut The Number Of Numbers “ The current estimate of £200m is around £50m lower than this time last year ” “ The current estimate of 200-million pounds is around 50-million lower than this time last year ”. England opener Dom Sibley says he should have scored five Test centuries and is "greedy" for "more big runs" in the final two Tests against Pakistan. The 24-year-old former Surrey man ave...

0160 – Put The Best Word On The Beat “The mood between the Prime Minister and the President as gone from bad to worse today, because of the new trade war.” “Police say the body of a man has been found in the remains of city hall that caught fire at the weekend”. “ With radio … people tend to listen with half an ear. So… the first few words of a news item may easily slip by unnoticed. Avoid pu...

0159 – Where To Put The Word You Want To Emphasise As Mervin Block and Joe Durso say [1] , such a construction creates tension and interest. In the English language it’s what we do in conversation:   “I’m going into town to buy some new red shoes” “because I want to buy some new red shoes, I am going into town” “I’m going in to town because some new red shoes is what I want to buy”.   “T...

0158 - Cut Clichés And Keep Familiar Words   Shakespeare often made fun of pompous speech. “ An honest tale speeds best being plainly told .” (Richard III) And when the first English dictionary was published in 1604 (“ A Table Alphabeticall of Hard Usual English Wordes ”) its compiler Robert Cawdrey appealed for plain language: “ Some men seek so far for outlandish English, that they forget a...

0157 - Say Who Says Something, Before Saying What They Said   “It’s the best new podcast mic that has been released in 10 years… that’s what newpodcastmics.com said in a recent review…”. “ Newpodcastmics.com said in a recent review that it’s the best new podcast mic that’s been released in 10 years…” “My YouTube videos are showing growth signs” “My YouTube videos are showing signs of growth”....

0156 – Don’t Use An Introductory Phrase Or Clause “So I can rise up the Apple podcast charts, I’m going to ask you to leave a review” “I’m going to ask you to leave a review so I can rise up the Apple podcast charts” . “In this video you will discover how to make at home – and with only three ingredients and a few minutes in a microwave, and it’ll taste unbelievably great – a chocolate cake in a m...

0155 – Keep W ords Short And Relatable As well as keeping sentences short, keep words short. Most people use short words when they talk in ‘real life’, so if you’re trying to emulate this style then think of doing the same. Clarity is the key, without resorting to baby talk. If you’re used to saying, and people are used to hearing words such as phone, TV, fridge and plane , then why start using te...

0154 – The Easy-Listening Formula American broadcaster Irving E. Fang researched what makes broadcast copy easy or difficult to understand. He devised the Easy Listening Formula , which is based on the length of words in a sentence. The idea is to add up all the syllables in a sentence, then subtract from that the number of words. If the final score is higher than 20, the sentence contains too man...

0153 – Multi-Syllable Sentences The Schools Minister Nick Gibb says allowing students in England to use their mock exam results is an extra safety net for a small group of pupils. This follows a decision by the Scottish government to reinstate grades estimated by teachers because of the complaints that a calibration method had unfairly impacted on disadvantaged students. Nick Gibb said the changes...

0152 – Keep Sentences Short “I have invited her onto the podcast this week in order for you to be able to literally hear for yourself the changes she’s in the process of making” becomes “I’ve invited her so you can you to hear the changes she’s making”.   “Scientific advisers to the government have calculated that a short so-called ‘circuit breaker’ lockdown over the October half-term break c...