Email Exchange Feedback from a Friend

Hi hi hi 

So (as you know) I'm doing the sex industry, but it's starting to lean towards talking about the nature of work by talking about the sex industry (i dunno i’m p. sure the ultimate statement is gonna be “capitalism is oppression”).  To set the stage for future pieces I am working on a video / short film / audiovideo EXPERIENCE that gives some kind of sense of the nature of sex work  /camming.

I just want feedback on the writing cause your words help me fix the niggly bits... but to give you a sense of what is going to give the writing more context, some of the processes I’m working with are glitches (real ones, not aesthetic ones) in video and audio.  Glitches are a process, a fleeting, personal experience, glitch art is meant to show negative experiences / accidents / imperfection / broken systems as a thing of beauty / a place for intimate, personal experiences.  The italic text is glitched in the audio+video to draw paralells between glitches in technology and glitches in people, and how the glitch is a part of the appeal of camgirls. The video is going to be very textural.

In the link there is an audio file with music + glitching (there’s no yet video) that you can listen to.  It is still a rough // definitely not final.  http://sexindustryworkshop.blogspot.ca/2014/10/the-cumshow-draft-4-w-audio-music.html

(PS: the underlying message of glitch art is also “capitalism is oppression”).

-------

Hi beautiful lady,

I read these carefully and listened to the recording with glitches. I can't wait to see with video; I think it's missing that element right now (obviously) so it'll be a good addition.

I'm not sure how you are with audio technology but the first thing I noticed was that the glitch bits could be WAY more "glitchy." There's a lot of opportunity to make some interesting sound worlds happen, especially since the text you've chosen for this treatment (to me) seems a lot more powerful and sort of distorted. 

This line is my favourite:

 I shut my eyes and rubbed my nipples. I tried not to look too sad or lost or like I had a very fat chin. I tried not to spend too much time in my head, so I could feel the sensation in my nipples as it tingled down and into my cunt. But it didn’t. It stopped in my gut like a lead weight.

I think that the pacing/tone/everything of this excerpt is kind of the ideal for the set. Some of them are there and some of them aren't. I feel that the power of the last couple sentences especially would make a perfect ending or send off - not necessarily this one exactly, but I feel that (for example) this tidbit is a much stronger way to finish the experience than what you have for the end now. "Do you sell your panties?" is still interesting/revealing/encapsulates an attitude and belongs and deserves to be here, but I think you should leave a real storytelling gem for the end. Your strongest or rawest moment should go there. When this experience is over, leave a taste in people's mouths of you, not the men on the other side of the camera. Does that make sense?

I also dearly love:

 I readjusted the camera, trying to find a suitable angle for the movement I was about make. There was no way of knowing. I lowered myself into the bathtub, a disgusting yellow green. I thought of my fleshy rolls and the folds of my body.  How my pale skin must have looked against the yellow.  How the dark brown walls and ceiling made me think of taking a shit in a cave made of packed dirt.

I left out their thought as the conclusion to this idea - I understand what you're going for with these descriptions followed by the hivemind that is the consumer responding in a dissociated way. I think it works, but I think the ones that don't use it are better. I don't know why - obviously it's a good point of continuity but the men are just not near as interesting as you. I'm not sure if that's a problem or not!

I like the tone and language - I can tell it's a rough draft from you. The language is a little square - I've seen you use more evocative language to describe the same things you've written of here (ie, "a disgusting yellow green" is a chance to use more colourful literary devices - metaphors etc. I know that sounds oversimplified but words like sludge or bile would be perfect here - "I lowered myself into the bile bath - yellow, green, both. Disgusting.") I don't know, maybe that's pedantic. I'd love to see more colour with the language though. The ideas are so good, they deserve it.

I hope that's helpful at all!!! Can't wait to see the finished product, my darling genius :)

------ 

later we talked about this / her feedback.  She said she felt the writing went between neutral to negative.  I reexplained the glitch aspect.   She said that after talking to a creative person about their work and finding out all the little secrets about it opens so many more doors and meanings than just experiencing it.