Two forms of form

It’s a TV show. A podcast. A blog post. A slide deck.

If we’re making something, we probably already have a form in mind. We’ve already chosen, and so we crack on with it.

Sometimes it works out beautifully. Other times we find ourselves trudging through the work, or even end up aborting before launch.

To increase our chances of success, and to unearth something really worth working on, it pays to go a layer deeper.

Within that form, what’s the form?

Is the book a coffee table book with pictures, or a pocket-sized guide?

Is the video with talking heads and b-roll, or narrated images?

And in today’s world, there’s also the question of which other forms.

Can this be reformed on Instagram? YouTube? As a PDF? Could it become a live event? Should it?

And on and on. Form within the form within the form.

If we only focus on one form of form, we’ll probably end up doing ourselves a disservice and create something that feels either too flat or too flabby. Going into the form within the form is much more work – it may even mean the first form changes completely – but it’s nearly always worth it.

To help us figure this out, it’s probably worth bringing in the other ‘F’ word: Function. The who’s it for, and the what’s it for.

But that’s something to talk about in another post. Or some other form.