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Your opinion on this, please.
Recently, I was with an editor who was finishing a custom DVD. While reading the splash screen menu, I saw that “conventional” was spelled “conventoinal”. I said “Conventional is misspelled”. The editor said “It’s not misspelled. It’s just a typo” and proceeded to change it.
I don’t want to put thoughts or opinions in your heads so I’m just wondering what you think of this situation and what your reaction would have been.
Steve Wargo
Tempe, Arizona
It’s a dry heat!Sony HDCAM F-900 & HDW-2000/1 deck
5 Final Cut (not quite PRO) systems
Sony HVR-M25 HDV deck
2-Sony EX-1 HD . -
16 Replies
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Well it does seem to be a pretty easy typo to make. Maybe he/she just wanted you to know that he/she does, in fact, know how to spell conventional, and that it was a typo and not a misspelling.
Is this person your employee? If so, I can imagine them not wanting you to think that they cannot spell correctly.
My opinion is, everyone makes mistakes, and a simple switch of the “I” and “O” is going to happen sometimes. That’s why quality control before anything is handed off to a client is important.
At my old place of employment, we as editors, had to sit down with a producer and WATCH everything that went out before a client picked it up. This usually eliminated any small typos or misspellings like this one.
My reaction would have been, “Well, let’s look at everything else while we are here. Regardless whether or not it was a typo or misspelling, this cannot go out to a client like this. So let’s check all of our type just to make sure.” Then I would have them scrub to each super to check any spelling. I wouldn’t make a big deal out of this, but I would make a note that it happened… Just in case this started to become an ongoing problem with this particular editor.
Good lukc! Darn it, see what I mean!
~Bryce
Bryce Leverich
Co-Owner/Creative
Meijin Media LLC
http://www.myspace.com/meijinmedia
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Misspelled vs typo is a moot point. Either terminology suggests a correction is needed. However the semantics suggest that people will sooner admit to a typo than a misspelling. Typo suggests an honest mistake or oversight. Misspelling suggests that someone does not know how to spell.
These are the subtle business communication nuances that turn mole hills into mountains. -
I am the person that they invented the spell checker for. I someone tells me that something is misspelled, I thank them. Even if it’s a typo.
Whether it’s spelled wrong because it’s “misspelled” or because it’s a “typo”, it’s still spelled wrong. IOW, either way it’s misspelled.
Arnie
Post production is not an afterthought!
https://www.arniepix.com/ -
when offered a joke in life, I generally laugh.
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Steve, you would think much less of my writing here, if Ron hadn’t put in an “edit your post” feature:-)
Misspelled implies you didn’t ever know how to spell it, typographical error implies your fingers slipped while keyboarding.
As long as someone catches it in time and corrects it, shouldn’t be a big deal. If you ever had one of those clients that yell out “whoa!” every time you make a momentary litle error typing, even one you know about and are already correcting, you know how painful editing sessions with those folks can be.My best story on this topic; back in the 80’s we were making a promo for the grandstand concerts at the state fair. Headliner band was Hall and Oates. The editor (not me) was a country music fan with only a GED and had never heard of them, and, not seeing any copy, just hearing the announcer track, he just spelled them with the old Chyron as “Hauling Oats”. Our studio graphics capabilities were meager then, and I remember the spot had to be rushed to a better-equipped shop to fix it using a then-expensive paintbox, because he’d put the graphics in live into the middle of a multi-dissolve sequence and it just wasn’t re-doable in time at our shop.
I got to do those edits after that incident.
( I can’t go for that, noooo, no can do…)
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Thanks guys. Remember, the editors comment was “It’s NOT misspelled. It’s a typo”. My feeling is: Typo or not, misspelled is misspelled. It doesn’t matter how you got there. To me, it felt like he was saying “I don’t make mistakes”. If this piece had gone to replication and then distribution (don’t you watch Headlines on Leno on Monday night?), how would the client have felt about the phrase “It’s not misspelled. It’s a typo?”
It wouldn’t have been “Fired”. It would have been “Fried”.
I’m sure that all of us have probably made a couple thousand posts here on the Cow and how many times have we had to follow a post with another post correcting misspelled words because one letter can change the entire meaning of what we’re saying. I’ll bet Ron put the edit feature in so that we could take back the nasty things we say (except Zelin) and correct our TYPOS so we don’t look like we ain’t edumacated.
Steve Wargo
Tempe, Arizona
It’s a dry heat!Sony HDCAM F-900 & HDW-2000/1 deck
5 Final Cut (not quite PRO) systems
Sony HVR-M25 HDV deck
2-Sony EX-1 HD . -
Hah, this is so funny.
Yes there is a difference between Typo and Misspelled. And either way the editor had to fix it.
The response is all about ego. And he’s a tad too sensitive and took it to heart. Is he commonly this defensive? Defensive editor’s can be tough to work with because they can be closed to any criticism.
Either way, funny topic.
RB
Rory Brennan
Editor
New York City -
[Steve Wargo] “My feeling is: Typo or not, misspelled is misspelled.”
I agree. If it’s not spelled correctly, it’s misspelled. The nuance of why it’s misspelled- ignorance or operator error- doesn’t change that.
And then there’s the additional error of the wrong word being spelled correctly, but still not being correct. Two instead of too. It’s instead of its. Hear instead of here.
Arnie
Post production is not an afterthought!
https://www.arniepix.com/ -
Steve,
The implication I get from your editor is very different from your take. I think he was implying that he knew better, but that he made a simple mistake. In other words, the implication is: “Jeeze, I know how to spell, I’m not ignorant, silly me.”
Meanwhile, it probably would never have happened if you weren’t standing over him with your magnum, your stopwatch, and your calculator.
David
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los AngelesPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Apple Final Cut Pro, Business & Marketing, and Indie Film & Documentary forums.
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[David Roth Weiss] “if you weren’t standing over him with your magnum, your stopwatch, and your calculator.”
I wasn’t standing over him. I walked in later to QC the job.
How did you know I had a magnum? You do mean a .357 and not a bottle of fine wine, right?
Steve Wargo
Tempe, Arizona
It’s a dry heat!Sony HDCAM F-900 & HDW-2000/1 deck
5 Final Cut (not quite PRO) systems
Sony HVR-M25 HDV deck
2-Sony EX-1 HD .
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