Brendiver's World

So What?

Here's an interesting set of contributor guidelines - from Scuba Diver Australasia magazine. You can find them for yourself at their website.

                   

When a magazine publishes CG it means they are inviting you to write for them, there's no better way of figuring out what they want and how.

                         

Have a read through their CG and ask yourself the following question:

                                                

What are the key messages for me as a photojournalist?

                                                                                                

Read them yet?

                                                                                    

I would suggest the key messages are:

                                                                                     

Where we would like you to cover.

What subjects.

How to propose your ideas.

Typical word count.

We pay!

We may provide you with a commission (your 'ticket' to someone else covering the costs)

What style of writing they are looking for (don't be put off by this, they have a gap between what they ask for and what they publish).

Read back issues to see what has already been covered.

We are looking for characters and quotes.

Someone needs to spell check their own CG!

They need to re-write their CG - "soul of diving," "certain frisson..." " travel as texture." Can anyone tell me what they are on about? If this doesn't guarantee the editor being surrounded by cliched copy I don't know what will.

                                                                                  

And the one I like the most, the "So What?" questions, "Why now, and why in Scuba Diver?" You really need to be in a position to answer these questions prior to any pitch.

                                     

The CG for any publication are there for a reason. However, a common complaint from editors is the number of people who ignore them and do their own thing. Their chance of being published? What do you think?

                                                                   

Keep writing...

                                                                         

Brendan

                                                                                    

I, we, you, they?

David has sent me an interesting question in respect of the 'Sport Diver competition' he is in, the one where one of the post workshop articles from Puerto Galera will be selected for publication by the editor, Mark Evans:

"Brendan When writing articles for diving magazines, are personal accounts unacceptable? I am reading my latest draft and there are definitely a lot of "I"s and "me"s in the article. The book about Travel Writing says that this is a common mistake by beginner travel writers. Apparently only celebrities can get away with this! What do you think? thx DK"

I guess the first thing to say from my perspective is that there are no rules; there are only techniques and practices that work for the target medium. When I say ‘works,’ what I mean is, did the article get published? This really is the bottom line, no matter what you as a reader thinks of it; if an editor decided it was good enough to publish, either with or without editing, then it ‘worked.’

But when you analyse what ‘works’ in different magazines four distinct categories of how to place yourself in the narrative emerge. And if I can emphasise, these are not my rules - they are just my thoughts, and perhaps they are best explained through the use of examples:

I…

In the March 2008’s Scuba Diving, Gil Griffin has an article published called, “Curacao’s Mini Splendored Things.” The predominant style she has used to place herself in the narrative is to refer to the majority of experiences through her own eyes in the present tense, although this would also have worked in the past.

“Even as I gear up…”

“Now that I’m attuned…”

“As I put my right index finger on a spot near the anemone, I wait… I listen very closely to its tiny claws…”

We…

In the October 2007’s Sport Diver, Brooke Morton’s “The Island That Never Sleeps – catch the rush of Puerto Rico,” uses the phrase, “we…” a lot.

“We jump in for a drift dive…”

“We see two hawksbill turtles in 150 foot visibility…”

“Once we arrive at Captain’s Point…”

Note how it’s also described in the present tense – is this an American preference?

 

You…

In the same edition of Sport Diver, Tom Morrisey, their editor at large, has an article called “Pick Your Paradise.”

“…you can see the mountains…”

“Cruising between walls that plummet to perhaps 100 feet below you want to explore each nook and cranny, but the twisting path draws you forward.”

I find this style of writing, where, “you will find…” interspersed with factual anecdotes to describe the environment the closest thing to a press release that you will find in the pages of a magazine. Often referred to as ‘advertorial,’ it’s written in such a way that the author could well have put together the whole piece without leaving their desk (and I am in no way suggesting Tom did). With this technique there’s no sense of ‘being there’ from the author’s perspective.

They…

Good quotes can often mean the difference between an article being viewed as the same old lame, I did, we did, you will see… or a living, multi-dimensional piece of work. Most editors want articles that people the landscape with characters and opinions and the good thing about this technique, you can express opinion without it ever being attributed to you.

I, We, you, they…

Where the article has a mix of all of the above styles. I don’t think there is a problem with either one of these being the lead, with other styles being secondary, but when they are all present in equal measure, your article is likely to be a confusing read and would probably not get accepted – too much work for the editor to repair it to meet their needs.

There’s no one style that I think is best, I have my own preferences, but ultimately it’s not my preference that matters is it? There’s only one person I need to please, to make sure my copy is in their preferred style, and that’s the editor.

David, I hope this answers your question?

Keep writing...

Brendan

   

Free Beer!

Following on from the post about free dive trips, what about free beer?

How does 24 bottles of Cobra lager sound?

If you look hard enough you'll find there are numerous opportunities to get published and you never know where these might lead.

We'd just finished a meal at a city centre restaurant and on the way out I did my usual trick (I love reading other people's stuff) - I picked up a pile of free magazines from the rack at the entrance.

One of them, Urban Life, had an interesting section in its back pages called "Food for thought." This is how it goes, you write a 200 word review about a restaurant and they give you a case of premium beer!

I put together a quick review on the restaurant we'd just been to, and here's the thing to bear in mind, it was in the style of the magazine. I've done hotel, bar and restaurant reviews for DIVER before, but this was for a magazine with a completely different readership. And so I dug out a review by the editorial team - it didn't matter what the review was for, a film, concert, the latest fashion. What was important was to write the restaurant review in the same style. The other thing to bear in mind is that by writing a review about a place which stocks the freebie, its publication has marketing potential for the freebie's advertising team.

Next month it was published, and I picked up my case of beer from the magazine's offices.

I was interested in how I managed to get published so quickly, so I gave the editor a call, "loads of people tell me they will do reviews for me, but they never get round to them," he said. "I'm continually being let down, you haven't been to any other restaurants have you?"

I politely explained how I had enough "work" elsewhere. But here's a thing, the same group that owns this freebie has numerous other titles, and one of the bigger ones has just done a feature on diving in the Red Sea. I can almost guarantee the conversation at the editorial office (it will be one big open plan space) went something like this:

Editor of big newspaper: "I've got an offer for a trip to the Red Sea to cover it's diving, any of you do scuba?"

Staff writer: "Yeh, I do, when is it?"

Editor of big magazine: "June sometime."

Staff writer: "No, can't do it, it's my sister's wedding."

Editor of freebie: "I've got someone who does restaurant reviews for me, good as gold, always delivers copy on time, in our style and to the word count."

Editor of big magazine: "Excellent, send me their details..."

Budding journalist - two months later, somewhere in the Red Sea: "Hi my name is..... I'm one of the freelancers from the XXX group here to do an article on your diving...."

Trust me - that is how it could work out for you. The media world is full of freelancers, and as a diver, you have niche skills. Take every opportunity to write 'stuff,' as you never know where it will lead. And if nothing else, doing this will help build up your clip file, which will prove your writing doesn't suck and just maybe someone will be willing to pay you for it.

Keep writing....

Brendan 

The BEST travel writing 'how to...' book

I'm often asked if there are any guides on how to write. Well, there are, and there are loads of writing courses at colleges / night school etc.

As well as these there are the 'Make a fortune out of travel writing' type programmes that seem to be awfully popular in the USA.

Believe me - you won't make much at all, unless your name is Bill Bryson.

The best you can hope for most of the time is to do a little bit more than break even (and have some really cool adventures along the way of course, which is why we do it).

For my money, the best way of learning the craft is to write, write a lot, write about everything and anything, ask for feedback from friends who aren't afraid to hurt your feelings and:

Buy this book (and no, I'm not getting a kickback from Amazon, although I think there is some way of doing so on a blog??).

The Lonely Planet Guide to Travel Writing

I've read about 10 plus books on travel writing (which is really what most dive magazine stuff tends to be about) and most of them are rubbish.

The test of whether the authors are any good (and this goes for those get rich quick programmes) is to Google them.

Most of the book's authors haven't written anything of note, it's a bit like taking advice on pensions from a 12 year old who is great at maths.

But this book comes with some serious credentials, and even after 12 years of self teach in this world, I've learnt a lot from its pages.

Mine was a second hand version for about $10, and even that can be offset against my income tax! But that's another meaty subject in itself, for another time.

Keep writing....

Brendan