On Nov 13, 2006, at 5:08 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
This is an interesting discussion!
I almost hired a person on the list who clearly is not on the same
page as I,
the composer.
Then this list has served a good purpose: helping to make sure that you
hired someone who is a good match for your needs. One thing that I
think we can all agree on is that it's better for everyone if this is
discussed before the contract is signed and both participants are in
agreement.
Because I am always changing things, and it costs me a fortune, and I
think I
might be a pain to the copyist with all the changes, yes, I pay for
them, I
feel like I doing the copyist a favor by doing these little things
myself & not
bothering him/her.
Well, whether it's a favor or not depends on how you proceed. As I've
indicated in another post, I'm perfectly happy to work with a client
who receives the files and works with them directly. However, if
changes are going to be made it's important to keep a clear and simple
document revision stream so that there's never any confusion about
which version is correct and what has been changed by whom. If you
make changes on one version and I make changes on another version, and
then we pass files back and forth, the permutations multiply and it can
be difficult to keep track of what fixes have been made on what
versions.
I've never had a problem with that on any Finale job, but I've
certainly seen it with editing of non-music documents and it can be a
nightmare. If you are well organized, document your work, and/or
maintain communication with your engraver, then all is well. If you
don't, then the time lost figuring out which version of the file has
what fixes could easily outweigh the time saved because you made a
bunch of little corrections yourself instead of sending them back for
me to do.
I think basic attention to the problem of document proliferation is the
most important thing, but facility with Finale can make a difference,
too. The situation I really want to avoid is where I provide a
finished Finale file, the composer twiddles around with it a bit, then
sends it back to me and says, "Make these new changes, and ... oh, by
the way, I already made some other changes." Then I open up the file
and find he has futzed around with all sorts of settings that are going
to get me in trouble when I try to make the new changes. If I don't
know what's been done, I'd probably rather start from my own final file
and make both sets of changes, but if the composer hasn't documented
the changes that are "already done" then I can't do that.
Happily, I've never had that problem. Of my clients who have wanted
Finale files, one would never attempt to do anything herself anyway;
the other would make minor tweaks, but only when it was almost final
and he always kept track of what he'd done. If it was more than trivial
fixes he preferred to give the file back to me - even if the added step
was more time-consuming than doing it himself - largely due to concerns
over document control.
If ever I were to have a client with a more adventurous attitude toward
editing Finale files himself, I wouldn't refuse to hand over the files,
but I might very well decline any job that asked me to revise files
after he'd played with them.
On the other hand, if I'm never going to see the file again, then I
don't care a whit what you do with them. So long as my part of the job
is definitely done, you can tweak and twiddle all you like and it makes
no difference to me.
mdl
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