Coffee With David

In a previous blog I discussed a problem I faced with my writing. Events of the year have lead me to start dictating my poetry, stories, and novels. This method has been working very well and I can hear the speech patterns and vocal traits that my characters have as my voice takes on those traits. But, what to do with the dictation? Do I transcribe it myself, which will take up a lot of time? Do I hire someone to transcribe it? Do I buy software to transcribe for me while I go to work on another story?

These questions I posed in a previous blog. Since then, while dictating, I discovered that what I needed to do was transcribe it myself. While this may take a lot of time—as one hour of transcription covers less words than one hour of dictation—I realized while I was dictating that no computer could pick up on the voice change and the significance of that change between the characters. It would take a thinking person to transcribe it—catch the spelling of the speech and fill in holes the characteristics of the speech description that I may not have described in the dictation.

I could hire someone, and obviously that is an expensive venture, I would be totally reliant on their ability to understand, transcribe and fill in the holes. This maybe something I want to reconsider in the future, but as of now I consider it too much of a risky dependence. As a result, I have decided that the best recourse would be to transcribe everything myself—at least for the moment.

Please visit www.davidalanlucas.com for more information on the articles, blogs, non-fiction books, stories, novels, and poetry I write.