Introduction
When you are performing on stage, your mind is totally occupied with delivering your act or presentation. It is virtually impossible to think about performance improvement until after you have finished your act. Even then, it can be difficult to recall every single detail that occurred as you were performing.
When the adrenaline is flowing, it can also be difficult at times to really know how well you really did on the stage. This is especially true when you are focused on presenting new, and untested comedy material.
Even if you record your act every time, what are you supposed to do if the laughter from the audience doesn't come across as well as it seemed to when you were on stage?
Comedy Evaluator Pro provides you with a serious advantage over most comedy entertainers or speakers that incorporate comedy into presentations. With this tool you can quickly, easily, accurately and objectively evaluate your performance and know exactly where to make adjustments in each minute of your act or presentation for maximum laughter impact.
In other words, there is no guess work involved about how well you did or did not do on stage when you use Comedy Evaluator Pro to evaluate your performances.
Also, you don't need an optimal recording of your act or performance to get the accurate results you need to make killer improvements right away (see below).
If you are truly serious about using Comedy Evaluator Pro for act or presentation improvement purposes, the following initial recommendations are provided:
Background
There are basically only 2 things that occur when you are on stage to generate laughter from an audience:
Each of these events is easily and accurately measurable using Comedy Evaluator Pro. From measuring the duration of each of these events as they occurred during your performance, it is possible to get a wealth of information from the analysis generated by the software in the Performance Evaluation Report.
Note: You should also be aware that to simply review your recorded performance for what worked and what didn't does not provide you the data you need to make changes to your act or presentation that will result in the biggest laughs possible.
Unless you have a microphone dedicated to recording the audience, your personal audio or video recording will rarely capture the decibel level (intensity) of the laughter that the audience produced when you performed.
In other words, you can actually have a better performance than your audio or video recording reveals from a simple review. This is NOT an issue when using Comedy Evaluator Pro. Why?
Because the audible intensity of the laughter you produce on stage is directly related to the duration of laughter.
As long as you can hear the audience laughing, cheering and applauding on your recorded performance, you are automatically measuring the intensity of the laughter produced when you are conducting a performance evaluation.
By using Comedy Evaluator Pro, you only need to measure the length of the laughter from your recorded performance in order to know the intensity of each laugh you generated on stage.
In other words, the quality of the audio on your audio or video recording device does not have to be optimal in order to accurately and objectively measure how well you did on stage.
You simply need to be able to hear when the audience started laughing and when they stopped laughing in order to get the accurate performance evaluation data you need to work to improve your act or performance.
Here's what you need to know to get the best possible use of the software and to improve your act or presentation in the shortest time possible.
Your Overall PAR Score
Your PAR Score represents the overall percentage of your act that produced laughing, cheering and/or applause (PAR). It is your primary overall performance indicator. If you were given an letter grade (like in school) for your performance, here's what it would look like:
Essentially, it is now possible to grade the laughter impact of your entire act and grade the laughter impact of each individual minute of your act as well. If you are averaging 18 seconds or more for each minute you are on stage, you are producing headliner quality laughter, whether you have ever headlined or not.
One of the most significant advantages of using this software is that it proves your impact on stage based on factual results for a performance that has already occurred. If you maintain an overall PAR Score of 30 or above, you are performing at headliner level - without question. You don't need the opinion of an agent, booker, comedy club manager or have any TV credits to know what level you are killing at on stage. All is told with your PAR Score.
Laughs Per Minute
Using the Laughs Per Minute data, you can actually determine exactly which minutes of your material to add punchlines to or which minutes require shortened set-up lines. Here is the basic evaluation criteria:
1. If you are getting 4-6 laughs per minute from your material, but your Seconds Per Minute results are low for any particular minute (or minutes), you should consider rewriting your material that is producing low PAR Scores. Your low laugh per minute material is not providing the impact you desire.
2. If you are not getting 4-6 laughs per minute and your Seconds Per Minute results are low, you should consider adding punchlines to your existing material.
3. If you are getting 4-6 laughs or more per minute and your PAR Scores are 30 or above, you are working at headliner level when you reach this level of performance.
Because the number of laughs are recorded for each minute, you can determine if your set-ups are too long for any individual minute of your act. Less laughs per minute means that you are spending too much time talking and not getting the audience response you deserve.
The minimum number of laughs per minute you should be getting from your performance is 4 (unless you are consistently getting 10-15 second laughs).
In any minute you are getting less than 4 laughs, you can easily determine which minutes of your act that you need to reduce set-up lines and/or add punchlines to your material in order to increase the Laughs Per Minute values.
Seconds Per Laugh
This is the most critical data you need to know in order to pinpoint exactly what sections of your act need the most improvement first.
The Seconds Per Laugh data tells you exactly how much impact your punchlines really have and can help you to easily identify exactly which lines in your act need editing or need to be rewritten altogether.
The Seconds Per Laugh data can also tell you which parts of your act you need to relocate for bigger laughs.
Ultimately, you want every punchline to produce large amounts of laughter. In reality, some parts of your act will produce longer (and more intense) laughter than other parts. But here's what you need to know:
You want the biggest laughs in your act at the end of your individual bits (and at the end of your act). If the biggest laughs are at the beginning of the bit, your overall laughter impact for the rest of the bit will be reduced.
In other words, use your Seconds Per Laugh data to help you reorganize your material so that the biggest laughs in your bits are at the end of your bits. This will give you the maximum laughter impact you can achieve.
If you have a printed copy of your act, formatted using the Killer Stand-up Comedy System, you can associate your comedy material to pinpoint which parts of your act are getting the best and worst laughs in any given minute.
It is recommended that the printed copy of your act be edited word for word to match exactly what was presented on stage. Otherwise, you will be making changes to your printed act that doesn't actually reflect what was said or performed on stage.
Here's how to do get the most out of a performance evaluation:
1. Press Play on your recording device and press the Start Performance Timer button (You are not doing a complete performance evaluation for this process).
2. As you listen to your recorded act, make a mark on the paper with your written act where laughs occur (this step is not required if you are using the Killer Stand-up Comedy System format).
3. Keep an eye on the Performance Timer - you will want to draw a line across your printed act at the end of 1 minute, 2 minutes and so on until your act is finished.
4. Now perform a complete performance evaluation on the same recording of your act. Print the Performance Evaluation Report.
Now you can do a thorough, laugh by laugh comparison of your written act with the actual performance values (Seconds Per Laugh) that you achieved on the Performance Evaluation Report. With this information, you can focus specifically on the material in your act that needs the most improvement now.
This single process can allow you to make significant improvements in only 3 or 4 performances - even less in some cases, without having to revamp your entire act each time it doesn't give you the results you desire.
Note: To have a killer act on stage (over PAR of 30 or above), you will only use 100 words or less each minute that you perform and get a minimum of 4 laughs per minute. Each word you use talking is time that the audience is not laughing. Eliminate redundant lines, redundant words or unnecessary lines from your act for greater impact on stage.
You may also wish to consider rearranging your material for greater overall impact. With Comedy Evaluator Pro, it is very easy to determine the actual results of your editing or material rearrangement efforts. You want the biggest laughs at the end of your bits and at the end of your act.
Here's the bottom line: You need to be getting a minimum of 4-6 laughs per minute, every minute you are on stage to be killing at headliner level as comedian or comedy entertainer. Your material needs to generate 18 or more seconds of laughter each minute that you are on stage.
Seconds of Laughter Each Minute
If you are not getting an average of 18 seconds per minute of laughter on average for every minute you are on stage, there is room for improvement. So closely evaluate every minute in your act that produces less than 18 seconds of laughter. With this new version of Comedy Evaluator Pro, this is easier than ever.
Your PAR Score is directly related to your Seconds of Laughter Each Minute. Each will go up proportionally as your act or performance improves.
You should consider rewriting or discarding all comedy material that is not giving you the results you desire.
You can't know what needs to be improved until you evaluate it. Your act is no different. Comedy Evaluator Pro is designed to help you objectively evaluate your act or presentation in order to achieve maximum laughter impact on stage. Comedy Evaluator Pro gives you a serious edge over other performers and speakers who merely use trial and error alone to get the results they desire on stage.
Additional performing evaluation secrets are also available in the Interactive Performing Guide available at KillerStandup.com.