Basics of Description

If you remember anything at all about this lesson remember this.

This is probably the most important thing to know when it comes to describing things clearly.

If you can do this well you should be able to describe anything you need to describe and put the idea of that thing very clearly in another person’s mind.

So this is it.

OK.

We’re going to look at these four very simple sentences and we’re going to look at why it’s bad.

And then we’re going to talk about how we can make it really clear the first sentence of a description is really really important.

If you say the basic details of something much much later when you’re describing it then people will be lost from the beginning.

Right.

So we need to know how to say the most important simple details first like the foundation of a house.

Then we can build on that by adding things to it.

For example if we’re telling a story if you just say and I was so scared because the horse jumped right over the fence and nearly crushed me.

People will say what horse What fence what’s happening here.

But if we set the scene we say set the scene where when what Who what’s going on here then people have a clear picture of OK you’re here.

It was this time.

I know you know what how big the horse was and why you were in this place.

Then you can say how you felt then you can explain more details about what happened right then you can talk about your ideas or whatever but you have to have that thing at the beginning.

OK.

So let’s look at these four sentences and talk about how we can do this how we can set the scene and give the basic details first in our description.

So number one I have a car.

It’s a Ford.

Ford is a brand of car.

I think you probably know that it has four doors.

It is yellow.

It is yellow.

It has a good stereo the stereo is stereo.

By the way if you don’t know is the sound system in the car or when you have two speakers left and on the right.

OK.

This is not good right.

Because so many sentences and each sentence only has really one piece of information.

One thing to know so it’s not very good.

It’s better if we use one sentence maybe two to say all the basic details we need at the beginning of a description.

I would recommend you use one sentence.

So rule number one use one sentence at the beginning of a description.

Use one very clear sentence.

Rule number two is use more than one adjective.

More than one adjective.

I’m going to write a D.J.

That’s a J.

More than one adjective when you’re describing something in front of your main noun OK.

So just to be clear adjectives things like yellow.

Right.

And we can make other adjectives to make it clear what we’re talking about.

We can use more than one but we also need to know what our main noun is.

So we have to choose a main noun and then put three or four adjectives in front of that to make it really really clear what we’re talking about and to give the other person a very clear picture.

OK.

So more than one adjective and three have a main noun.

OK.

So we use one sentence we use more than one adjective and we have a main noun.

Let’s look at how we can do that with these sentences.

OK.

So which of these can we turn into or use as adjectives for the main noun.

And which is the main noun.

Well this sentence is not really necessary.

So we can cancel it if Ford is R may noun because Ford is a kind of car right.

So if we say Ford is our main noun we don’t need that and maybe we can even add more information.

Let’s say this this Ford is from let’s say it’s from 1998 right.

Let’s say it’s nineteen ninety eight.

That’s an adjective.

1998 can be used as an adjective can be yellow.

Obviously yellow is an adjective for doors.

Can that be made into an adjective.

Yes.

If you have something like a five year old child write a five year old child or five year old girl for example or 32 page book all you’re doing there is adding a hyphen it’s a hyphen.

It’s called a hyphen.

H y p h e n h y p yet.

And you’re making it into an adjective.

A 42 hyphen page book a five hyphen year hyphen old girl five year old girl.

You’re making new adjectives so all we have to do to make this an adjective is take.

S Because adjectives can not be plural can have yellows for example and we make it for hyphen door for door.

So let’s see what we can do.

May noun for adjective nineteen 1998 for door adjective yellow adjectives so we’re gonna use three adjectives here in front of the main note we could do four but let’s use three for now and then in the same sentence we’re going to put with them we’re going to add something about the stereo we can do the same thing with in sometimes if we want to say the location but this is all going to be one sentence so let’s try this I have a yellow four door 1998 Ford and if we wanted to say what type of car it is maybe an SUV or a van or a truck if it’s a special type of vehicle then that’s your new main noun it’s a yellow Ford or 98 98 Ford SUV now SUV is the main noun and Ford becomes like an adjective it’s used as an adjective.

But let’s just say Ford for now I have a yellow Ford or a 1998 Ford with a good stereo look at this one sentence and we have so much information a yellow very clear four door OK.

Got it.

Nineteen ninety eight OK.

Kind of old Ford brand.

Got it with a good stereo I have a very clear picture now in my mind I didn’t need to make many sentences a nice say it right at the beginning so now I can say something else about it now maybe I can tell a story about my 1998 car my 1998 Ford right I can tell a story because you started with this clear picture in your mind the story will now make sense.

So whatever we add after it it’s going to make more sense because the first sentence was extremely clear.

OK.

This is the main idea.

This is the most important thing to learn about description if you can do this.

Choose your main noun.

Have several adjectives.

Two three four sometimes five if you can turn some things into adjectives like four door and you can use nouns as adjectives like 1998 and Ford if we want to say SUV if you can do that then you become a lot more powerful with your descriptions and then you can add more stuff after it in the same sentence with a good stereo.

Now let’s see if we can do this with a real picture.

We’re going to take a picture and we’re going to talk about how we can describe it clearly as part of a kind of story or the beginning of a story.