On Realtime

Writing realtime is so totally different from what you learn in school. I've always known I wanted to go into captioning, so I was always doing everything I could to "write realtime." But it wasn't until I shadowed a class and imagined someone reading my product that I really understood what it was all about. If you're not watching the screen, you're not doing realtime. And I didn't train for that at all. I always stared at a point on the wall. It's great for focus, but it's no way to realtime.

Transitioning from that has been really difficult. It's a whole new layer. Not just the mechanics of dividing your attention, which I've talked about before, but developing the instinctual knowledge of when to paraphrase, when to drop things that aren't vital, when to correct a mistake and when to just let it stand.

I've been focusing on getting names down, even if it means dropping a little of what comes after the name. If the anchor says, "And now here's Bryan Edwards reporting in on the carnage from Syria," it's better to write "Bryan Edwards from Syria" than "And now the carnage from Syria." It's a tough switch. The whole realtime thing is all about figuring out what the most important thing is to get through. I can't believe I never realized that until I shadowed that class, but I think I'm starting to get the hang of it.