Well, just in time to run off to my first look at today's events at the NYWF, I've finished the first post to my new website: Not A Chance. Part production blog, part chronicle, the website tells you how it all began, and the journey of following a story over 4 years and trying to find that story using video.
For someone who only trained in broadcast journalism and in creative writing, this was a huge challenge. I know how to structure images on paper, but how was it going to work on a screen?
This is something I've learned the hard way. In the Robert Rodriguez school of filmmaking. If you're intrigued, check out the book he wrote on guerrilla filmmaking back in the 90s. Stanley Kubrick was also a proponent of just grabbing the camera and learning. So that is what I've done.
See those of you from NYWF at the festival.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
It Never Rains but it pours
As if it wasn't enough being the official blogger for TINA and the NYWF, launching my new website for the documentary Not A Chance, and having to write a piece for tonight's reading at Hung Parliament as part of the NYWF, here I am trying to rescue my film Life Doesn't Stop.
For those who don't know me, or are just meeting me thanks to TINA and NYWF, I just completed my first short film, a little 30 second animation for the film competition Live and Love. The organisers of the competition just called me one hour ago to tell me that the film I submitted on Tuesday afternoon had been in deliberation until this morning, when they finally decided to reject it because it presented three messages about the Herpes virus which were too complex to explain in 30 seconds. They have allowed me to resubmit the film after a re-edit next week, in time for the judges to see it.
What's the problem you ask? Well, my editor is in Brisbane, I am in Newcastle, the hard drive and the editing software are also in Brisbane. But thanks to PlotBot and the marvels of mobile phones, my editor and I have worked out a way to get this done. I rewrote the script on the online screenwriting software that PlotBot provides, I facebook messaged my flatmate to arrange for Rob (my editor) to pick up my external hard drive and my laptop over the weekend from him and Rob is picking me up on Tuesday from the airport, so I can give him final say on the edit.
Phew!!!
Stay posted, coz I also intended to put the first post on Not A Chance today. The link will be up as soon as it's ready.
For those who don't know me, or are just meeting me thanks to TINA and NYWF, I just completed my first short film, a little 30 second animation for the film competition Live and Love. The organisers of the competition just called me one hour ago to tell me that the film I submitted on Tuesday afternoon had been in deliberation until this morning, when they finally decided to reject it because it presented three messages about the Herpes virus which were too complex to explain in 30 seconds. They have allowed me to resubmit the film after a re-edit next week, in time for the judges to see it.
What's the problem you ask? Well, my editor is in Brisbane, I am in Newcastle, the hard drive and the editing software are also in Brisbane. But thanks to PlotBot and the marvels of mobile phones, my editor and I have worked out a way to get this done. I rewrote the script on the online screenwriting software that PlotBot provides, I facebook messaged my flatmate to arrange for Rob (my editor) to pick up my external hard drive and my laptop over the weekend from him and Rob is picking me up on Tuesday from the airport, so I can give him final say on the edit.
Phew!!!
Stay posted, coz I also intended to put the first post on Not A Chance today. The link will be up as soon as it's ready.
E-books and the like
The National Young Writer's Festival (NYWF) put on a workshop today on how to publish on eBook platforms. At first, I felt a wee bit ripped off because the facilitator was Kate Eltham from Queensland Writers Centre (QWC) and she seemed to be rehashing the material I saw up at The Edge a few months back on the future of the book.
But right when I thought "I'm getting up and outta here", she pulled out a few useful bits, like links to smashwords, the eBook platform and syndication website, how to sell your e-book through the Amazon Kindle store, and what other writers are doing to monetise books that the print publishers reject.
Basically, if you have the right content, the readers will search for it and buy it. No brainer really. Build your own audience. Not a new concept but a very current one. Yaro Starak, my internet guru, has been preaching that for a while in his blog Entrepeneur's Journey. He's making money out of his blog hand over fist.
So, after listening to Yaro talk for a few years now about this, I bit the bullet and joined his BlogMastermind course, which teaches you, surprise - surprise - how to make money blogging. It's a six month course guaranteed to give results, if you follow his instructions to the letter and you do the work. Well, I'm about to begin building my audience peeps. I've got content coming out of me faster than I can type, and it's time someone read it. So, thanks to Kate Eltham for confirming what I had already learnt: print is dead. Go online, because someone, somewhere in the world will like what you're doing.
Stay tuned, folks, coz I will be unveiling the blog for Not A Chance, a documentary I've been working on for the last year, which touches on a topic that's become quite popular: Indian matrimonial sites and the role they play in traditional arranged marriages in the 21st century. The website goes live tomorrow arvie, which means a heck of a lot of work for yours truly, as she blogs her way and schmoozes through NYWF and the rest of TINA.
But right when I thought "I'm getting up and outta here", she pulled out a few useful bits, like links to smashwords, the eBook platform and syndication website, how to sell your e-book through the Amazon Kindle store, and what other writers are doing to monetise books that the print publishers reject.
Basically, if you have the right content, the readers will search for it and buy it. No brainer really. Build your own audience. Not a new concept but a very current one. Yaro Starak, my internet guru, has been preaching that for a while in his blog Entrepeneur's Journey. He's making money out of his blog hand over fist.
So, after listening to Yaro talk for a few years now about this, I bit the bullet and joined his BlogMastermind course, which teaches you, surprise - surprise - how to make money blogging. It's a six month course guaranteed to give results, if you follow his instructions to the letter and you do the work. Well, I'm about to begin building my audience peeps. I've got content coming out of me faster than I can type, and it's time someone read it. So, thanks to Kate Eltham for confirming what I had already learnt: print is dead. Go online, because someone, somewhere in the world will like what you're doing.
Stay tuned, folks, coz I will be unveiling the blog for Not A Chance, a documentary I've been working on for the last year, which touches on a topic that's become quite popular: Indian matrimonial sites and the role they play in traditional arranged marriages in the 21st century. The website goes live tomorrow arvie, which means a heck of a lot of work for yours truly, as she blogs her way and schmoozes through NYWF and the rest of TINA.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Newcastle TINA and NYWF
Well, here I am, on the ground in Newcastle, after enduring the delays of Virgin Blue, the extortionate cab fare from Newcastle airport into town, and the non-stop gabbing from a roommate at the Backpackers by the Beach where I am staying.
I had a hard time finding somewhere to eat after 9:30 pm in this town, I tell you. There is variety there but it all closes early. It opens early too, which is a relief, because my internal body clock woke 7 and 1/2 hours after I fell asleep at midnight. Why midnight you ask? Well, after not finding anything vaguely open on Hunter Street in Newcastle, I walked for a mile or more until I found Darby St, Newcastle's answer to Newtown, West End and Fitzroy. Admittedly, it is more West End than Newtown, but it's cool, it has a funky vibe and the punters are not just yobbos out for a lager, like the louts on Hunter Street.
A totally awesome Turkish dude made me the nicest vegetarian pide this side of the Hawkesbury River. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I couldn't eat wheat. At that time of the night my only other alternative would have been Maccas. So not an option.
Instead, I tucked into this pide which was so delicious it would make your mouth melt, not the cheese. He then introduced me to random artists and musicians from Newcastle who were popping in for their fix of pide from him. It lifted my spirits all right. He followed this up by giving me two freshly baked loaves of Turkish bread for my breakfast the next morning saying he had to support starving artists. Gotta love him. Bless his heart. Also couldn't really say, I don't eat wheat man. So I accepted his gift and passed it on to other starving artists this morning.
One of those was the infamous Kludi Hines, masquerading as Brendan Lindsay to pass incognito through the crowds at TINA. After all, Kludi became quite the celebrity at TINA last year....
So after a fortifying latte in bland but cheap cafe, I made my way into central Newcastle to try and cobble together some sort of routine. I signed up for Power Yoga on their $20 for ten days special and found the closest ALDI.
For those not in the know, ALDI has the cheapest Fair Trade Organic coffee on the market. At $4.99 you can't go wrong. I'm usually a Blackstar (independent roastery in Brisbane) fan, but with only the NEIS scheme to support me at present and the help of OZCO to further my writing business, I can't be as choosy as I'd like. Just political and healthy.
The other cheap thing there is the oatmeal, because despite the brekky having been cheap, I'm not going to fork out $10 every morning for eggs and bacon. (a) It is fattening and (b) I'm short on cash at present.
So there you have it peeps, my first post for TINA.
I will be checking in and microblogging from the iPhone later today, so stay posted.
I had a hard time finding somewhere to eat after 9:30 pm in this town, I tell you. There is variety there but it all closes early. It opens early too, which is a relief, because my internal body clock woke 7 and 1/2 hours after I fell asleep at midnight. Why midnight you ask? Well, after not finding anything vaguely open on Hunter Street in Newcastle, I walked for a mile or more until I found Darby St, Newcastle's answer to Newtown, West End and Fitzroy. Admittedly, it is more West End than Newtown, but it's cool, it has a funky vibe and the punters are not just yobbos out for a lager, like the louts on Hunter Street.
A totally awesome Turkish dude made me the nicest vegetarian pide this side of the Hawkesbury River. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I couldn't eat wheat. At that time of the night my only other alternative would have been Maccas. So not an option.
Instead, I tucked into this pide which was so delicious it would make your mouth melt, not the cheese. He then introduced me to random artists and musicians from Newcastle who were popping in for their fix of pide from him. It lifted my spirits all right. He followed this up by giving me two freshly baked loaves of Turkish bread for my breakfast the next morning saying he had to support starving artists. Gotta love him. Bless his heart. Also couldn't really say, I don't eat wheat man. So I accepted his gift and passed it on to other starving artists this morning.
One of those was the infamous Kludi Hines, masquerading as Brendan Lindsay to pass incognito through the crowds at TINA. After all, Kludi became quite the celebrity at TINA last year....
So after a fortifying latte in bland but cheap cafe, I made my way into central Newcastle to try and cobble together some sort of routine. I signed up for Power Yoga on their $20 for ten days special and found the closest ALDI.
For those not in the know, ALDI has the cheapest Fair Trade Organic coffee on the market. At $4.99 you can't go wrong. I'm usually a Blackstar (independent roastery in Brisbane) fan, but with only the NEIS scheme to support me at present and the help of OZCO to further my writing business, I can't be as choosy as I'd like. Just political and healthy.
The other cheap thing there is the oatmeal, because despite the brekky having been cheap, I'm not going to fork out $10 every morning for eggs and bacon. (a) It is fattening and (b) I'm short on cash at present.
So there you have it peeps, my first post for TINA.
I will be checking in and microblogging from the iPhone later today, so stay posted.
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