Write Lightning is a blog from writer Deb Thompson.
Everyone is welcome here.
(Some links or topics may not be completely kid-appropriate.)
Everyone is welcome here.
(Some links or topics may not be completely kid-appropriate.)
Thu, Apr 23 2009
Sssssssss...is this thing on?
I was watching a few minutes of an old episode of Stargate SG1 the other evening and noticed something. It was one of those things that only sinks in when you're not really engaged in the plot itself and you watch, and listen, in a way that distances you from a very unemotional place. Teal'C was speaking to someone from a remote location. I realized that his speech had been altered in such a way that it sounded a lot like our speech would here and now, if we were talking on a two-way radio or regular land line. It's the sound that is often missing from our cell conversations. I believe it's called "sidetone". (I love the science fiction genre, but my lack of science savvy is the reason I've never written more in that genre.) I realized that the technical aspects of the show were being geared to our present-day thinking and perceptions. Talking over a radio, or similar device, in some future universe would be at least as clear as the sound on our current-day cell phones, wouldn't it? Maybe I'm wrong. I'm not good at thinking either mechanically or technically. This was just an odd moment that reached out to be and got processed by some part of my brain that thought it heard something incongruous. It reminded me once again how much fiction, including science fiction, is always more about the time in which it's written than the time about which it's written.
posted at: 08:33 | category: /Writing Life | link to this entry
I was watching a few minutes of an old episode of Stargate SG1 the other evening and noticed something. It was one of those things that only sinks in when you're not really engaged in the plot itself and you watch, and listen, in a way that distances you from a very unemotional place. Teal'C was speaking to someone from a remote location. I realized that his speech had been altered in such a way that it sounded a lot like our speech would here and now, if we were talking on a two-way radio or regular land line. It's the sound that is often missing from our cell conversations. I believe it's called "sidetone". (I love the science fiction genre, but my lack of science savvy is the reason I've never written more in that genre.) I realized that the technical aspects of the show were being geared to our present-day thinking and perceptions. Talking over a radio, or similar device, in some future universe would be at least as clear as the sound on our current-day cell phones, wouldn't it? Maybe I'm wrong. I'm not good at thinking either mechanically or technically. This was just an odd moment that reached out to be and got processed by some part of my brain that thought it heard something incongruous. It reminded me once again how much fiction, including science fiction, is always more about the time in which it's written than the time about which it's written.
posted at: 08:33 | category: /Writing Life | link to this entry
