Get Your Words Out, Otter App, Voice to text

[flonnebonne]

So I’ve pledged to write 350 days out of the 365 days in 2020 for https://getyourwordsout.dreamwidth.org/.

...it’s been fun, so far? I’ve been writing purely orally, using Voice to text technology, mainly using the free Otter app, which also transcribes your words pretty well along with recording your voice. It creates a dynamic transcription that you can edit later on, and click on specific words to jump to that place in the recording. Kind of like a Ted talk transcript. It’s not that accurate when you are writing weird fantastical sentences with place names and character names that you made up yourself, and sentence structures that are, well, kind of nonsensical because you’re stumbling around trying to figure things out in your story world, but it’s good enough for a mangy first draft that you’re going to throw out anyway.

The first nice thing about writing with my voice is that I can do it anywhere, like when I’m walking my dog. Right now I am using my phone’s voice input (not Otter, just iOS) to write this entry while riding on a noisy bus. I’m just using the earbuds with microphone that came with my iPhone SE. It’s pretty accurate all things considered.

The other nice thing about riding with my voice is that I don’t destroy my back, shoulders and neck so much, although it’s still not perfect because I have to look at my phone sometimes. This is actually the main reason why I am investing so many brain cells and trying to learn how to become a more auditory thinker. This is actually the main reason why I am investing so many brain cells and trying to learn how to become a more auditory thinker.

For my second draft, I’ll probably have to use a paid program like Dragon, which I have never been able to get the hang of, but now that I have so much back pain in my life, but better time to learn?

I’m thinking in future of projecting a big screen on my ceiling and “writing“ while lying on a bed, dictating my orders to my machine servant. But who is the servant and who is the master really?

Comments

[sub_divided]

Oh that's cool, I wonder whether your style will change if you switch to writing everything in dictation. There are some authors who write really conversationally, and I've read writing advice that it's a good idea to sound everything out before you commit to it. Anyway, good luck!!

[flonnebonne]

Yes, dictation definitely changes my writing style! I actually do talk to myself and sound out my plots more when I’m dictating rather than typing or writing by hand. It’s very freeing!

Another thing is that it’s a lot easier for me to dredge up unique descriptive words when I’m typing or handwriting than when I’m talking. but it’s not necessarily a bad thing that it’s hard for me to access these words when I dictate. I tend to get overly wordy and over-edited nowadays when I type.

[sub_divided]

It makes sense. I suppose it makes your writing a lot more accessible to non-readers. Depending on the age range you're targeting, it could be an excellent thing :)

[flonnebonne]

True! And if I want to put in some harder words, I can do that later, since I am planning on going back to do a second draft and re-recording everything. Right now my recordings/transcripts are full of lots of weird errors and times when I say stuff to a random person on the street or talk to my dog or whatever. I’m just trying to get my ideas out at this point, so that’s fine. I really don’t look too much at what I write yet, and don’t care if the transcription is all that accurate because I can always listen to the recordings again later. Of course this means that a lot of what I write is doesn’t quite make sense, but at least I am getting through and seeing a little bit of what the ending of the book is supposed to look like and actually figuring out what the characters want in life. I could never get to this point before because I would get all hung up on the issues in my prose rather than getting anywhere with my plotting and characterization. So it’s a good step forward!