By Rachel Crick

Is it possible to find a word or a short phrase that describes what we do as storytellers, without using the word storytelling? A recent discussion yielded the word narrative as a possible substitute, though there were concerns that “narrative” might come across as too academic. Those involved in the conversation who come from cultures outside of the United States expressed how difficult it is to find a word that accurately translates the meaning of the phrase “storytelling” in their native tongue.

Photo by Rachel Crick

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For the inexperienced producer, film or video production can easily become a laborious and frustration-filled undertaking. You’ve got a great story to tell or an excellent message to share, but you have no idea where to begin.  Several questions are running through your head: Is my script good? Do I have the right performers? Am I using the right audio and video equipment? Am I shooting enough material?

You’re soon facing mounting expenses and much more work than you could have prepared for. And your hair is fast becoming gray! But, that’s the nature of production. Whether you’re working alone or in a group, producing something substantial can often stretch you beyond your limitations. Regardless, you’ve still got an amazing story or message to share. So, what’s the best way to communicate it effectively with limited resources, time and money? A powerful video slideshow may be the way to go.

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Though we exist in a time of great media upheaval, where the Internet has made available so much story for so little effort, millions are still drawn to long-form traditional narratives. We still go to the cinema, the bookstore, the concert, the play, the big game, the event. Though so much power can be packed into a media snack – a tweet, a blog post, a text message, a sentence, a word, or even an acronym (LMAO anyone?) – we still sit down for super-sized media meals. Something must be inspiring us to pull up that chair and sup from the old media table. Inspiration seems to be the answer. What is the importance of inspiration to storytelling? In our digital world – full of bombardment from massive narrative abstraction and fragmentation, where so much story content is being communicated in so many bits and bytes and packets like bullets from a fiber-optic Gatling gun – we still find time to stick the old media morphine drip in. This happens when we do something so archaic as watch an hour-long drama on network television, spend nine innings at the baseball stadium, or, gasp, read an entire Harry Potter book cover-to-cover. Read more…

Joe Lambert, in his Digital Storytelling Cookbook, discusses the “olden days” of epigrammatic storytelling (meaning, the sharing of little stories with folksy proverbs at the end – which, if you’re Frank Capra, you build into entire movies, right?)

Lambert goes on to discuss why it’s so hard to tell stories nowadays:

“…we are bombarded with millions of indigestible, literally unmemorable, story fragments every time we pick up a phone, bump into a friend, watch TV, listen to the radio, read a book or a newspaper, or browse the Web. We cannot process these into epigrams, recite and retain them, and so they become a jumble of fragments that actually inhibit our ability to construct a coherent story.” Read more…