Services

Editing and writing come in different shades. Your document may need only light tweaking that won’t affect the structure of your story. At other times, your text will need a more intensive overhaul that could see reordering of parts, and rewriting of some elements.

The following levels of editing and writing are adapted from the Editors’ Association of Canada’s Definitions of Editorial Skills. M.E.S. Editing and Writing Services offers:

Developmental/project editing

• Co-ordinating and editing from proposal to final manuscript stage, integrating input from authors, consultants and reviewers
• Budgeting, hiring, design supervision and project co-ordination could all be part of the job

Substantive (structural) editing

• Clarifying and possibly reorganizing a manuscript for content and structure
• Changes may be suggested to, and negotiated with, the author

Stylistic editing

• Making the meaning clear, getting rid of jargon, and other non-mechanical line-by-line editing
• Could include correcting the reading level, and negotiating changes with the author

Rewriting

• Creating a new document, or parts of it, based on content and research supplied by an author
• May include some research and writing of original material

Original writing

• Writing a complete document to the tone and reading level requested by the client, based on supplied background materials and/or original research

Research

• First-person research done with client-specified sources through face-to-face interviews, or via phone or e-mail
• Secondary research done using Internet sources, public and government libraries, etc.

Copy editing

• Editing for grammar, spelling, punctuation, and other mechanics of style
  
• Checking for consistency in mechanics and facts
• Marking head levels and approximate placement of art
• Notifying designer of unusual production requirements
• Could include writing or editing photo captions and credit lines, writing running heads, obtaining permissions, providing or editing back matter, cover copy, and/or CIP (Canadian Cataloguing in Publication) data
• Could also include negotiating changes with author

Photo research

• Locating appropriate photo/artwork
• Could include getting camera-ready artwork, supervising production of final artwork, obtaining releases, conducting financial
  negotiations with photographers/stock agencies, and preparing labels, captions and sources

Fact-checking

• Substantiating the accuracy of facts in a document by referring to original sources used by the author and/or other sources

Proofreading

• Reading proofs of the edited manuscript
• Galley proofing could include incorporating and/or exercising discretion on author's alterations, highlighting locations of art and page references, and checking computer codes
• Page proofing could include checking adherence to mock-up (rough paste-up), accuracy of running heads, folios, and changes made to type in mock-up, checking page breaks and location of art, and inserting page numbers to table of contents and cross-references, if necessary
• Could also include checking blueprints, colour keys and press proofs, or proofing Web pages online, checking links and formatting