ENDA Episode 23→ The time when the Endless Apprentice learned the importance of listening to critics (Part 4)

The perks of listening to critics tend to be high, even if it sometimes looks like we are sacrificing something in our work.

One case I remember was during a Scriptwriting course. We were supposed to write the script for a short film story from the beginning to the end of the course. One of those stories at the end will be selected to be filmed in the next course of “AV Project”.

One of my classmates started her story with a good premise, but during the feedback sessions with the teacher (who was a TV screenwriter), she started to deviate little by little from the story she wanted to tell: shortening the story for example, due to following every instruction without questioning.

Fortunately, she took a stand in the last weeks and told the teacher that she would not shorten the time duration of her script, even if it meant renouncing the possibility of being selected for the finals.

Additionally, she will keep hearing the feedback and will apply the changes that would help her improve her story, but not deviate from the intention she wanted to transmit. In other words, she was open to improving her writing, but not changing the message she wanted to convey as an author.

In the end, she was not selected due to the extension of her script, but she approved the course and had the story she wanted to tell.

The second case was during the shooting of a 3 episode web series I was doing with two other friends for a New Media course.

Our first chapter was criticized by our classmates and teacher as being more of a video clip than an actual episode. It hurt a bit, because of all the complications we had for the shooting in a certain location, but they were not wrong.

However, before we could process everything, the laptop where we have all the shooting and the project was stolen, leaving us back at square one. It was a major setback, but it help us to finally “listen” all the things that we have done wrong in the first chapter: story, pacing, rhythm, etc. But also the details that were worth saving: the cinematography for example.

We had to restart everything: new scripts, new shooting plans, a new social media strategy, and a new approach. In the end, even if our story still needed lots of improvements the project that seemed to have more problems ended up being the more successful in the class. Because we start listening to the critics.

And there are more examples out there.

The conclusion is that any aspiring artist can “hear” critics in their jobs, but knowing how to “listen” and working with them, is something only professional artists can or are willing to work on.

How have you experienced listening to critics?