Blog Improvement Plan (Part 4)
Purpose (1 of 2)
A reader (actually probably the only reader) asked what the purpose of the Prodigal Altar Boy blog. The instructions for the final paper in the capstone course were:
Submit a two- to three-page paper providing a brief rationale of the following components used in the creation and development of your Blog:
- Purpose
- Design
- Content
- Audience (part 1)
- Audience (part 2)
That brings us to purpose. The excerpts from the paper address the class assignment, which was to take peer and instructor comments on my blog and outline changes I will make based on the comments. The paper stands on its own. I took all the comments to heart and made changes based on the comments. When I wrap up this series, I will give you the comments verbatim as well as the instructor’s comments on the paper and the final grade.
The blog is a metaphor, and I did not realize that until the class was over. By putting my stamp on the blog, the observations from my classmates (thank you all) became observations on my life, and the changes for the blog imply similar changes for my life. At the end of the series, I will talk about some of those changes.
Purpose
The Prodigal Altar Boy blog is part of a multi-faceted marketing approach for my documentary about Father Thomas J. Quinlan (“TQ”). The flexibility of the web log format allows the blog’s focus to change with the production milestones of the film. The film is currently in principal photography, which means I have begun filming the basic elements of the movie. The blog will focus on that portion of production, covering completed locations shoots, the background of the subjects, equipment used, and if possible, short clips from the shoots.
At the end of principal photography, the film moves into post-production and the blog will emphasize the editing process and other elements of post-production, to include scoring, color correction, sound sweetening and titles. Rough cuts, music samples and examples of edited footage with various music beds will be blog content for this phase of production.
The screening/distribution phase of the documentary is a marketing push to raise awareness of the film with potential screening venues as well as distributors. While this phase has more of a marketing bent, in reality, the subtext of the blog from inception, is marketing to attract the niche of people interested in the film from the standpoints of subject matter, film festival potential, educational potential and revenue through distribution.
