Why I chose this character, over that one...

nicstt · August 2016

lx said:

nicstt said:

This is an excellent example of how not to do it in my book. Character looks interesting, but the skin is hidden too much, and the sales 'blurb'... well it's very economical.

http://www.daz3d.com/lolly-for-aiko-7

I must admit the eyes and lips put me off, but I could get past those if the above wasn't also a factor.

***

I'm curious; do PA's get advice on the blurb, what and how much to write?

Some of the blurbs are really unique, and some go into a lot of detail (Emma and Jordi products come to mind) others seem to use a copypaste blurb every time to the point where I have some of them memorised. They don't seem to get spellchecked or otherwise QAd either because there are often mistakes (not by everyone obviously but I do see them quite often.)

I do like that the backgrounds on that product are more visually striking than usual and suit the type of character well.

I feel like trying to note critical things about products here is just going to lead to more PAs thinking it's hate on them, but oh well.

It's not hate, not at all; and I do take your point.

@TwiztedMetal No offence was intended, and please accept my apologies if you have been offended. Welcome to Daz.

I was aiming my comments at Daz in part, sorry Daz, but I felt they dropped the ball with a new PA; it was why I asked the question about what they offer in terms of help and advice. And yes I understand that they are not a huge organisation, but presentation is a vitally important part of what they do.

I started this thread, because I want it to be easier to decide if I should get a product or not. Not everyone will look at the same thing, but any common ground could perhaps be implemented by those PAs that frequent the forum - presuming they think it is worth their while; I understand that time is a factor.

Yup I see a number of errors. Not all PAs have English as their first language which can cause issues; although I know folks where it isn't their first language and one can't tell - unless it's due to its high standard.

(I don't mind proofreading. I returned to education, although doing it for the first time isn't much of a stretch, and I got asked by one of my teachers/professors to proof read someone's dissertation as obviously he couldn't. So I find it fun too. Although doing it while trying to get my own assignments ready was fun.)

@Lyoness (I'm now going to be cheeky)

I could say that Lyoness is a sweet and lovely girl for Genesis 3 Female, and while true, it has been said many times before. However, from my promo renders, you'll notice she has a subtle sophistication that is reflected in her dress style; please don't feel she only likes to dress in that manner though, her last holiday was an adventure series on the amazon river; naturally she dressed appropriately for that; although she felt uncomfortable having such renders displayed for all to see. Convincing her to pose for the bikini shots, was only accomplished as I could demonstrate to her how it helped her bio. As you may now guess, she also has shy streak to her gently adventuress nature.

So please treat her accordingly.

nicstt · August 2016

ChangelingChick said:

nicstt said:

This is an excellent example of how not to do it in my book. Character looks interesting, but the skin is hidden too much, and the sales 'blurb'... well it's very economical.

http://www.daz3d.com/lolly-for-aiko-7

I must admit the eyes and lips put me off, but I could get past those if the above wasn't also a factor.

***

I'm curious; do PA's get advice on the blurb, what and how much to write?

Short answer, not really. But Daz is very helpful when we ask for advice :D I'd like to point out that's TwiztedMetal's first release here at Daz (Welcome!!!). The submission process is very different here than at those other brokerages, and there are a few things that take a little getting used to. The character is an Aiko so I would guess definitely leaning towards the toon style on purpose. TwiztedMetal does a lot of fun and funky makeups/styles for their characters, and they don't stick to toon styles. Most of the ones I've seen by them at another store would fall under realistic with glam options. Lots of fun stuff.

The big thing with the blurbs is it's pretty much *the* last thing we do on a project. We've done the modeling/morphing, textures, JCMs, MCMs, presets a plenty, thumbnails, promos, tips, extras for readmes, videos sometimes... everything until we submit the product, and then we have to write a blurb. Yes, it's an incredibly important thing, buuuut by the time we get to that we're so sick of it we can't think of anything to say :D With the first character I did by myself here, I sat there staring at it for a week and a half trying to think of something to say. Especially when the contents of the product are listed out so neatly below (as a customer, I tend to skip the blurb, go to the list, then look back at the blurb if I need clarification about something). There is also definitely a lot of PAs that are not native English speakers, and that's a factor as well.

My personal favorite style is Ansiko's on http://www.daz3d.com/antarctica-expedition-the-encampment-sled-and-poses and http://www.daz3d.com/antarctica-expedition-the-ship . They went into a nice explanation of the basis of the product in the promos (and it probably didn't hurt that the story of Shackleton's expedition is one of my favorites ever). But, not everyone bases their stuff on cool stories like that. So we're stuck with... "She's got freckles!! Lots of 'em! And makeup... did I mention makeup?" Ok, over simplification, but that's what it feels like.

I think when doing the blurb, it can be helpful to take a step back; perhaps even (like when proof-reading) leave the project alone for a day or two. We tend to notice things when we're looking at something that isn't so immediate. I expect that taking a step back from something that may have taken weeks or months can be tough.

pds · August 2016

Having worked as a copywriter as well as a magazine editor, I can fully appreciate the challenges facing both the PAs and the team at Daz (imagine editing 40,000+ words per issue, most of which were written by non-native English speakers...it's a labor-intensive and iterative process to do it right). Obviously, the blurbs here are shorter than magazine articles, but that gets offset by the volume of them each month. And frankly, the more you reread something, the less likely it is that you will spot errors because your brain is naturally good at filling in missing info/details. It's one of the reasons larger publications have teams of editors, often with different roles (line editor, copy editor, etc.) and yet, even with such teams, errors still creep through. As much as I would get frustrated at times literally rewriting entire articles so they made sense to our readership, I would remind myself that our contributing writers were doing a much better job than I could were the roles reversed (I only speak bits and phrases in a few other languages, but certainly couldn't write an article in another language). And yes, for foreign language writers there are tools for auto-conversion...but they typically fail miserably with nuanced sentences and idiomatic expressions.

So, this is all to say that I agree that copy errors are annoying when they crop up and the goal of any professional publication should be to correct all errors before publication, but the reality is that doing so is nearly impossible, particularly when on a deadline and resources are limited. I feel Daz's pain on this, but it might surprise them to discover that there are many people (myself included) who would be happy to help, if for no other reason than our passion for this art form.

As for the brevity "issue," again, I agree with what others have said in that I prefer reading at least some amount of description concerning the product in the blurb before jumping down to the nuts and bolts. However, for me, I would rather not read a fictional account, no matter how well written, for two reasons: 1) I prefer to get my inspiration from the promo images without the PA's interpretation of the backstory, and 2) I find it more helpful to read a brief product summary that explains the product's key selling points (handcrafted Zbrush morphs, detailed skin created from photographic references, IRay/3Delight support, articulation, rigging, etc.) rather than parsing the sometimes lengthy "What's Included" section--at least as a first pass. But that's just me.

For PAs who find it difficult to write their blurbs at the end of the production cycle, perhaps you might consider writing at least an initial draft at the beginning of the development instead, when your creative juices are still flowing and you haven't hit burnout on the product. And as others have commented, the blurbs don't need to be long, but I think they do serve as an important selling point for your product, articulating the things that may not be obvious in the promo images.

Just my 25¢, lol.

lx_2807502 · August 2016

I think there are quite a few people who would be happy to help with proofreading product descriptions, etc. I'd happily do so, and others have already offered too. I think for people like us it's not "you made a mistake here!" but "ahh this needs fixing and I can't fix it!"

I agree for myself personally I mostly look to the blurb as a summary of the key features that make the product special. If she has custom toes then I'd like that highlighted because I'll probably miss it in the massive file list below. If she went on vacation last year and caught a crab that turned out to be a chef which inspired her to-- well some might be after that but personally I'd rather make my own personalities for characters. I do like it (this is admittedly more for outfits and environments) when there are notes about research used to make things accurate, etc.

Serene Night · August 2016

I think a good editor can read and edit copy very quickly when I worked a designer my editors were dynamos at reading and editing copy. A good editor would provide consistency which is badly needed to the descriptions such as the presence of gens,'legacy materials etc amd standardize naming conventions.

Typos in these products occur more often than I think should for an professional outfit daz's size. In particular I find the errors names in my installers create errors in my runtime and a lack of consistency in the names of products can make them hard to find. Those things a good editor could remedy.

Lyoness · August 2016

pds said:

Having worked as a copywriter as well as a magazine editor, I can fully appreciate the challenges facing both the PAs and the team at Daz (imagine editing 40,000+ words per issue, most of which were written by non-native English speakers...it's a labor-intensive and iterative process to do it right). Obviously, the blurbs here are shorter than magazine articles, but that gets offset by the volume of them each month. And frankly, the more you reread something, the less likely it is that you will spot errors because your brain is naturally good at filling in missing info/details. It's one of the reasons larger publications have teams of editors, often with different roles (line editor, copy editor, etc.) and yet, even with such teams, errors still creep through. As much as I would get frustrated at times literally rewriting entire articles so they made sense to our readership, I would remind myself that our contributing writers were doing a much better job than I could were the roles reversed (I only speak bits and phrases in a few other languages, but certainly couldn't write an article in another language). And yes, for foreign language writers there are tools for auto-conversion...but they typically fail miserably with nuanced sentences and idiomatic expressions.

So, this is all to say that I agree that copy errors are annoying when they crop up and the goal of any professional publication should be to correct all errors before publication, but the reality is that doing so is nearly impossible, particularly when on a deadline and resources are limited. I feel Daz's pain on this, but it might surprise them to discover that there are many people (myself included) who would be happy to help, if for no other reason than our passion for this art form.

As for the brevity "issue," again, I agree with what others have said in that I prefer reading at least some amount of description concerning the product in the blurb before jumping down to the nuts and bolts. However, for me, I would rather not read a fictional account, no matter how well written, for two reasons: 1) I prefer to get my inspiration from the promo images without the PA's interpretation of the backstory, and 2) I find it more helpful to read a brief product summary that explains the product's key selling points (handcrafted Zbrush morphs, detailed skin created from photographic references, IRay/3Delight support, articulation, rigging, etc.) rather than parsing the sometimes lengthy "What's Included" section--at least as a first pass. But that's just me.

For PAs who find it difficult to write their blurbs at the end of the production cycle, perhaps you might consider writing at least an initial draft at the beginning of the development instead, when your creative juices are still flowing and you haven't hit burnout on the product. And as others have commented, the blurbs don't need to be long, but I think they do serve as an important selling point for your product, articulating the things that may not be obvious in the promo images.

Just my 25¢, lol.

Great comment! and I agree with the no story description (sorry nicstt). Ocassionally, I do make notes to myself during painting of what to say in the description. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't. It's kind of a crap shoot. I know that I spend time focusing on the what's included section. I want you to know EVERYTHING that I did for that set. Special LIE makeup? oh yes... I'm going to make note of that. I actually have an easier time with all the technical aspects that are included... how many makeups, eye colors, presets, blah blah blah that included.... it's the fluffy stuff that I have little interest in writing. A pretty and seductive girl. An elegant girl with a dark side. etc. So I just grab a thesaurus and go to town with the pretty descriptions.

3Diva · August 2016

nicstt said:

lx said:

nicstt said:

This is an excellent example of how not to do it in my book. Character looks interesting, but the skin is hidden too much, and the sales 'blurb'... well it's very economical.

http://www.daz3d.com/lolly-for-aiko-7

I must admit the eyes and lips put me off, but I could get past those if the above wasn't also a factor.

***

I'm curious; do PA's get advice on the blurb, what and how much to write?

Some of the blurbs are really unique, and some go into a lot of detail (Emma and Jordi products come to mind) others seem to use a copypaste blurb every time to the point where I have some of them memorised. They don't seem to get spellchecked or otherwise QAd either because there are often mistakes (not by everyone obviously but I do see them quite often.)

I do like that the backgrounds on that product are more visually striking than usual and suit the type of character well.

I feel like trying to note critical things about products here is just going to lead to more PAs thinking it's hate on them, but oh well.

@Lyoness (I'm now going to be cheeky)

I could say that Lyoness is a sweet and lovely girl for Genesis 3 Female, and while true, it has been said many times before. However, from my promo renders, you'll notice she has a subtle sophistication that is reflected in her dress style; please don't feel she only likes to dress in that manner though, her last holiday was an adventure series on the amazon river; naturally she dressed appropriately for that; although she felt uncomfortable having such renders displayed for all to see. Convincing her to pose for the bikini shots, was only accomplished as I could demonstrate to her how it helped her bio. As you may now guess, she also has shy streak to her gently adventuress nature.

So please treat her accordingly.

I think the blurb is lovely! You have a great imagination! :)

Personally though, I don't take the time to read the blurbs if they are too long ... know I suck. If it's longer than 3 or 4 sentances I usaully skip it. lol I don't really like the "story" blurbs either as they tend to "color" the product too much and put it too much in a box (even if just in my own mind). If the character's creator goes on about what type of personality the character has then that may, subconcously, limit what I do with her and the type of renders I user her for. However leaving her "open to interpretation" is often a safe bet and will make me more interested in a character. If you tell me she's a sweet and shy little wall flower I might start seeing her like that and chose not to render her in battle scenes, sexy scenes, confident super-heroine scenes, etc. I'd rather let my own imagination decide what kind of personality she has. :) That's just my preference though, I'm sure other people probably love the story blurbs.

lx_2807502 · August 2016

Personally I just want the blurb to say "this is what's in the file list below that you should be paying attention to because it's different and one of the reasons you want this character." Because at a glance most of the lists look the same so it's easy to miss things.

The other thing I just remembered is that a lot of template description blurbs tend to make every girl perfect for everything. While that's a great intention and one of the reasons many of us buy characters, reading over and over that every girl is a sexy seductress, and a cute girl next door, and the neighbour's boyfriend's vet becomes a bit laughable and completely meaningless once you've read it a few times. Then again it seems like pretty standard marketing so I guess many customers expect that sort of 'look use her for all these roles' thing to be there. Who knows.

Just my opinion!

nicstt · August 2016

Lyoness said:

pds said:

Having worked as a copywriter as well as a magazine editor, I can fully appreciate the challenges facing both the PAs and the team at Daz (imagine editing 40,000+ words per issue, most of which were written by non-native English speakers...it's a labor-intensive and iterative process to do it right). Obviously, the blurbs here are shorter than magazine articles, but that gets offset by the volume of them each month. And frankly, the more you reread something, the less likely it is that you will spot errors because your brain is naturally good at filling in missing info/details. It's one of the reasons larger publications have teams of editors, often with different roles (line editor, copy editor, etc.) and yet, even with such teams, errors still creep through. As much as I would get frustrated at times literally rewriting entire articles so they made sense to our readership, I would remind myself that our contributing writers were doing a much better job than I could were the roles reversed (I only speak bits and phrases in a few other languages, but certainly couldn't write an article in another language). And yes, for foreign language writers there are tools for auto-conversion...but they typically fail miserably with nuanced sentences and idiomatic expressions.

So, this is all to say that I agree that copy errors are annoying when they crop up and the goal of any professional publication should be to correct all errors before publication, but the reality is that doing so is nearly impossible, particularly when on a deadline and resources are limited. I feel Daz's pain on this, but it might surprise them to discover that there are many people (myself included) who would be happy to help, if for no other reason than our passion for this art form.

As for the brevity "issue," again, I agree with what others have said in that I prefer reading at least some amount of description concerning the product in the blurb before jumping down to the nuts and bolts. However, for me, I would rather not read a fictional account, no matter how well written, for two reasons: 1) I prefer to get my inspiration from the promo images without the PA's interpretation of the backstory, and 2) I find it more helpful to read a brief product summary that explains the product's key selling points (handcrafted Zbrush morphs, detailed skin created from photographic references, IRay/3Delight support, articulation, rigging, etc.) rather than parsing the sometimes lengthy "What's Included" section--at least as a first pass. But that's just me.

For PAs who find it difficult to write their blurbs at the end of the production cycle, perhaps you might consider writing at least an initial draft at the beginning of the development instead, when your creative juices are still flowing and you haven't hit burnout on the product. And as others have commented, the blurbs don't need to be long, but I think they do serve as an important selling point for your product, articulating the things that may not be obvious in the promo images.

Just my 25¢, lol.

Great comment! and I agree with the no story description (sorry nicstt). Ocassionally, I do make notes to myself during painting of what to say in the description. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't. It's kind of a crap shoot. I know that I spend time focusing on the what's included section. I want you to know EVERYTHING that I did for that set. Special LIE makeup? oh yes... I'm going to make note of that. I actually have an easier time with all the technical aspects that are included... how many makeups, eye colors, presets, blah blah blah that included.... it's the fluffy stuff that I have little interest in writing. A pretty and seductive girl. An elegant girl with a dark side. etc. So I just grab a thesaurus and go to town with the pretty descriptions.

Ha! No I get it; a story might actually stop someone as it doesn't fit with theirs. :)

***

I agree, I want useful info; key points as it is easy to miss stuff in the images. Especially as the images or many of them, are their to encourage me to buy, not always tell/show me what is there.

IceDragonArt · August 2016

I personally love the little stories some of them come with. Honestly, I have so much stuff that there is no way I am going to remember that Lucy is the adventerous sort and Susy is an elegant model. Or whatever. I will have forgotten what story goes with whom by the time I get halfway down my (admittedly ridiculously huge) list of characters. I do like a good description as well.

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