I’ve gotten quite a few complements on some video work I’ve done lately (I’m not proud enough to link to my pieces here.) But the complements are not well-placed nor deserved. I dislike getting complements on my work because the givers of the complements are usually not experts in the field, nor do they know anything about the basics or be able to pull off a project themselves in that genre. The credibility of ideas is usually based on the background of the speaker of that idea.

My neighbor’s daughter’s friend’s nephew telling me

Hey! That’s such an awesome website you made!

means nothing to me. What can I do but say “Thanks, glad you like it.”

Today, I looked at a website I designed in 2004, the year I graduated from the University. The person who requested the site explained how she wanted it laid out, what the text would say, what pictures she wanted, etc. I used the WYSIWYG interface in Dreamweaver to build the site using tables. It was what she wanted. She was happy with it – more than happy. She sent it to people in her field for ideas and critiques. They were mostly supportive of her site. They thought it was “pretty.”

Today I opened the site in Firefox for the first time. It looks awful. Atrocious. I’m starting over and re-designing the site from scratch – it’s that bad.

When I get a complement about a video it’s usually something like

Your sense of music and rhythm really comes across. That must be because of your dance experience.

And it’s usually coming from someone who knows nothing about video production or editing. Most people feel that their only thing in common with me is knowing what dance is. I’ve never understood that – I’m not even a dancer any more! If the comment had come from a leader in the field, it would probably have a ‘but.’ I’d love to get comments during my regular day that went something like this

I really like the colors you chose – they really communicate the brand message – but I think you could have done something differently with the navigation bar – having it at the bottom is like forcing users to read the page content before going anywhere else. Moving it above the fold might help users keep track of where they are a little easier. I think the colors could be blended a little better behind this image – I’m seeing a border that doesn’t look like it should be there.

Someone who knows what they’re talking about will see room for improvement. The idiots I hear from daily see everything I do through rose-colored glasses. I try to see the things I do as they are and recommend improvements to myself, but there’s no way I can be as objective, and I become known as a perfectionist.

The comment about video editing sparks an idea of comparison for me. There are two people who produce the majority of videos that this particular person sees in this context. Myself, and one other person. There is a fundamental difference in the way we produce things. I lay the audio track first. All the video is synchronized with the song, like a music video. The other person adds music last, and it’s such an afterthought that it has no relation to the program content at all. Music is added ’so it’s not too boring’ or to tie together sloppily mismatched dialogue or voice over clips.

The best part is: nobody knows that it’s not quite right. They know what they like and either they like it or they don’t like it. Just because they happen to like what I do doesn’t mean I’m worthy of complement. In fact, if I am doing what they want, I probably used the quickest, easiest, most obvious and least well-thought-out solution there is. If one of my co-workers, who doesn’t have experience in the field they’re commenting on, likes my work, it probably means that I have FAILED in finding the most effective solution to the problem.

Just don’t give me complements unless you know what you’re talking about. There’s my thoughts for the day.