How to write a party report
Hiya guys.
We at Hugi get lots of articles every day. Now and then, there is also a party report among them. So far we've gladly accepted and published every party report because this kind of articles is pretty rare. Also, in contrast to news articles or reviews, you can't write themselves unless you have been to that particular party.
Of course these party reports are of very different qualities. Some of them really give you the feeling of being at the party, making you think either "Wow! Why the hell haven't I been there" or "Glad that I have stayed at home", while others elecit a tired yawn rather than admiration.
Therefore, I have decided to write an article to show you how to make your party reports more exciting. Please memorize, these are not rules but suggestions. I'm not saying how you should write your reports but what I, as a reader, would expect from a report. By the way, this is one of the basic guidelines every writer should stick to: Write so that you would be interested in reading the text.
In general, I think a party report should give the reader a detailed overview of what happened at the party. Also, party reports are always subjective; they always show what the author experienced, and hence reports about the same party be very different, depending on whether a normal attender from the scene, a gamer or an organizer have written them.
A party report is not a list the entries and what places they got in the compos or solely your opinion of the productions released at the party. A party report can deal with these things, too, but there are separate party results and reviews articles for it.
A good way to start working on a report is to reflect on everything that happened again in chronological order before actually starting to write. Remember the atmosphere at the party and get the right feeling. Then start writing down your thoughts. Don't care about spelling or good use of vocabulary; it can be completely weird sentences, even only loosely connected words. Ask yourself the following guiding questions and answer them:
- How did I get to the party?
- What was it like when I arrived at the party place?
- How did it look there?
- Who did I meet, talk to, have fun with?
- What was the atmosphere like in general?
- What did I like / not like about the party?
- What did I think about the compos?
- What other special events do I remember?
- Was the party a personal success for me?
After this brainstorm session, you can start really writing the report using the material you've now noted down. It's even better of course if you have written down your impressions right at the party and can now use them.
It's always good to include photos in your report, too. The higher the quality of the photos, the better of course. There are two ways to embedd photos in a party report: Either can you put them in the actual report, or you can make a separate gallery at the end of the report with a few sentences about every photo (see Gainx' Summer Encounter report in this Hugi issue as an example). Always, however, specify who is in the photo in case it shows some particular person.
As for Hugi, our interface supports a theoretically unlimited number of photos. For archive-size reasons it may however happen that we decide not to publish all photos you submit. Still the more photos you send us, the better it is, as this allows us to select the best shots. You don't have to care about the size/resolution of your photo as we'll scale it if necessary.
Okay dudes, that's all I wanted to say. I'm looking forward to your party reports!
-=[ADOK]=-^hUGi^tREBEl^pAl^-=[ROYALFAMiLY]=-