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Services » Editing, Copyediting, & Proofing Examples

Editing

Editing is the heavyweight and may involve more substantial changes such as eliminating passive voice, ensuring a clear flow of ideas (including layout usability), rewriting sections of text without changing the author's voice, eliminating excessive wordiness, and reorganizing the document.

Below are two editing examples. Example 1 is too wordy and there is no introduction while Example 2 is confusing for the reader from a combination of passive voice and, again, excessive wordiness.

Example 1 is too wordy with no introduction.

Before: Original Text

UNIT I
CHAPTER I
PERSONALITY: "WHO AM I"

The mind, psyche, controls economics, whether it is micro or macro; whether it is in your personal lifestyle, it is in running a large corpration, or running a government. The mind, which depicts your personality, controls your economics, hereafter referred to as your lifestyle finances. It can be about your personal life or about how you make a living; how you esablish a lifestyle for self and your family.

The study of your personality from a psychological perspective is based on many theories, but to get a workable understanding of your personality, this book will explore the day-to-day activities that can be defined through your internal and external responses to various activities in your life from birth to death.

After: Editing and Reorganizing for Flow

INTRODUCTION

Whether your psyche is in working for a large corporation, running a government, blue-collar work, or healthcare, your mind controls both the micro and macro economics in your personal lifestyle and in business. Your mind depicts your personalty, your personal life, how you make a living, and how you establish a lifestyle for yourself and your family—hereafter referred to as your lifestyle finances.

To reach a workable understanding of your personality, this book will explore the day-to-day activities definable through your internal and external responses to various in your life from birth to death.

Example 2 is passive and too wordy which can be confusing for the reader.

Original Text Edited for Clarity and Active Voice Reason(s) for Altering Text
The perceptions you have are based on your value system, moral character you developed, your attitude about people, places and social lifestyles. Your perceptions are based on your value system, the moral character you developed, and your attitude about people, places, and social lifestyles. Your perceptions and social lifestyles tightens, clarifies, and grammatically concludes the sequence
If you identified positive and negative traits about yourself, you should be thinking about what would be an ideal concept you would like to see in yourself and what others see in you. If you identified positive and negative traits about yourself, think about the ideal you which you and others would like to see in yourself. Makes the sentence active and not passive
Then, can you meet those ideals. Can you meet those ideals? Tightens the sentence and punctuates it properly
It is not up to the "other person to determine what the ideal person in you would be. Only you can determine that –it is your responsibility. It is not up to the other person to determine who you are as an ideal person. Only you can determine that—it is your responsibility. Removes the verb, be from the end of the sentence making it active and not passive

Copyediting

Copyediting encompasses checking for spelling and grammatical errors, examining for proper word use, eliminating the use of passive voice, and repairing inconsistencies. It may also include notations about text flow.

The following is a representative sample of typical copyediting:

Original Text Edited Text Reason(s)for Altering Text
The values we learned as a child are in conflict or in congruence with the outer world; a society with a mirage of similar and dissimilar behaviors. The values we learned as children are either in conflict or in congruence with the outer world; a society with a mélange of similar and dissimilar behaviors. Maintaining pronoun agreement—we indicates plural requiring more than one child, children

Use of either emphasizes the contrast between conflict and congruence

Mélange replaces mirage
  • Mirage indicates something is unreal or imagined
  • Mélange indicates a mix
There are struggles with urges and drives that become stronger and different from the protected world of home. When there are conflicts with social values; it is a conflict of inner forces which leads to behavior that defines how you act, react, interact; then how you take control of your behavior that further defines you personality. We experience struggles with urges and drives that become stronger and different from the protected world of "home". When there are conflicts with social  values, it is a conflict of inner forces which leads to behavior that defines how you act, react, interact, and then  how you take control of your behavior that further defines your personality. We experience personalizes the sentence encouraging the reader to empathize with its content

Extra space between social and values is eliminated

Incorrect use of semicolons:
  • Replaced with a comma to denote a slight break in the sentence
  • Replaced with ", and" to indicate a related series
  • Extra space between then and how eliminated
  • Improper use of pronoun, you

Proofing

Proofing is concerned with the final text. Examining it for formatting and typographical errors (typos).

Proofing is one of my stronger skills as, even when reading for fun, I still read every single word…and I keep running across typos in the books I read. It makes me so nuts, that I end up sending corrections to the publishers…

An example of the correction files I create are below. I use a large red style for the letters/words missing and a crossed-out gray for the incorrect letters/words.

Table 1. Example of Proofreading Chart

Page Paragraph Line CorrectionRule
61 10 2 …lead her out of the bathroom  
65 12 1 My, my, my. It's sequential.
73 3 2 …to want, to need, to repeat, over and over again. This could just be personal prejudice…
77 5 7 …debutante that who didn't know how to shoot. Who is used to talk about a person; that is used to talk about a thing.
88 5 1 …said Paige was in a trauma and we had… The trauma is a definite state of being; a is used only with indefinite articles, i.e., a book, a movie, a (any) trauma. Paige's trauma is very definite.
221 6 3 If you're gonna do recognizance reconnaissance for me… Recognizance is used in law or is an obsolete word for recognize.

Reconnaissance is used by the military and engineers to explore an area. It is also from an old French verb meaning to recognize.
335 Last Last …so she wouldn't loose her cool… Loose refers to something that is not compact or not dense in structure.

Lose refers to failing to keep or not keeping track of something.


Table 2. Random selection of corrections (without page, paragraph, or line indicators).

junkyard is one word  
Fences need repaired.  
…by a hand's width… Width is possessed by hand.
hoofves Misspelling
…never forgotten… Forgotten is generally used with the variations of have
…she'll chew you're ass for sure. Your is possessive; you're is a contraction of you are
Oh, my Ggod! God is not capitalized if not being used as a proper name

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