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What are the main differences between writing for the visual media and writing for print?

For example, how is writing for a documentary different from writing a feature for a magazine?

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Question added by Deleted user
Date Posted: 2013/04/21
Hossam Abbas
by Hossam Abbas , General Manager , Bingo Global

Amazing question, really.
As a huge documentaries fan I can tell that writing for a documentary is the toughest job in media, it carries an amazingly deep research, a good knowledge of cinematic techniques and camera shooting techniques since you will be writing the script in 3 columns format, one for time, one for camera shot, the third for voice over.
Try this document, it will really help http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/programme_doc_documentary_script.pdf

Good resource Hossam.
I will bookmark this too for myself :) Yes the difference is huge as the mediums differ.

Nila Eslit
by Nila Eslit , Content Writer for Fitness web , George Allen

The main difference is in the presentation of the material.  In the visual media, the writer supports his/her story with images; while in print, he or she should be able to describe the story in a way that allows readers as if they themselves have seen the picture.

Raphael Linus Dulay
by Raphael Linus Dulay , Creative Head , Xpert Solutions

Writing Visual Media - need to tell the story or  your idea in limited words but effectively supporting the images presented

 Writing in print - you got the whole magazine or book to tell your story 

 

difficulties varies for both

 

Visual media - you should be able to create a story in few words

Print - you got lots of pages to fill which is really hard to do and need to be a good story teller in general order to create a smooth transistion of your story from the beginning-twist-ending.

 

Eijaz Ibrahim Pardhan
by Eijaz Ibrahim Pardhan , Senior SEO Executive , JBS

Writing for the visual media is like spreading your words online to everyone , on the other hand writing for the print media is writing for magazine, newspapers and even publishing a book. Both are helpful but visual media writing is more effective.

Writing for both visual media and print require a lot of research; however, the main difference between the two is that visual media highly relies on the images/ videos and any other visual support that complements the story-telling.

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