Interim blog

I've been very busy mostly not writing screenplays or any of that sort of creative.

Instead I've been doing a different sort of creative, working on a website that will hopefully generate some cash for me (sorry Chris not Voidships) it's a web developer - or indeed any programmer - kind of thing, of absolutely no use to any writer - except (weirdly) it just might be.

I shall explain:

Sometimes programmers have to write code that can import files from other places, but a major probklem can be not actually having a sample file to import - a lack of test data. Well there are tools that can create these kinds of files but most of them are too powerful and too expensive for your mid-range developer. And I did find one online generator that will do this sort of thing but it's not as flexible as I wanted.

So I've been building this thing, and yes it does have relevance to writers because one of the things it does is create character names. Like this:

Mr Jacob Collingwood, Mr Kurt Fisher, Dr Kira Drury, Mrs Brianna Underwood, Mrs Georgina Blake, Mr John Hubbard, Mrs Beryl Smith, Mr Lesley Dahl, Dr Alexander Hubbard, Ms Eliza Moffat

I don't have a huge selection of names yet. And it'll do addresses, social security numbers, email addresses, date of birth, and not just UK - you can select the country (initially just a few). Ultimately there'll be an ethnicity selection for names as well but probably not in the first released version.

Anyway I thought the name generator might come in handy. (Of course you could just use this: http://online-generator.com/ )

More writer-relevant stuff to come soon, I hope.

---

What's on the turntable? Screenwriter UK podcast by Danny Stack and Tim Clague (whoo-hoo) at http://j.mp/q0cjKf 

A Quick Guide to Webseries

This week I have mostly been watching webseries.

I have observed that, with (very) few exceptions, webseries have the following qualities, in order of frequency:

1. Bad scripts.
2. Bad acting.
3. Bad production values.
4. Bad music.

Any combination of the above, but the first two are the winners by a huge margin and generally go together.

I have been doing this as research since I'm writing one.

The exceptions are created by people who already in the industry.

Comedy helps but only if it's actually funny.

---

What's on the turntable? "Man in the Moon" by Yes from "Open Your Eyes"

Busy week

The day job continues unabated. I have the rest of the month to complete it then, who knows, I might have to get a new contract or this one may get extended.

Had a good conference with Chris the Director about our Steampunk project - all about promotion, marketing and the direction we're going with it. Plus talking about the first actual film project associated with it, Winter. A real business meeting - hardly talked creative at all.

I've been working on the back story of the characters in Winter in lots of loving detail - I came to the conclusion that I didn't know enough about them so they came out a bit flat, and the story did not come from them, they were merely fitting into the story.

This is where the big lie comes in: Story is Character. Which is quite true, of course, no doubt about it. But it's just as valid creating the characters to make the story, as the other way around.

Tomorrow the Daughter heads off to Bolivia for 6 weeks. Coincidentally a new talent agency has contacted her to see if she'd like representation (don't worry people, I have thoroughly checked them, they are kosher). When she returns from looking after dangerous animals she will meet with us at the Edinburgh Festival - my first time there, though the rest of the family has been before. I shall be using this trip as research for my script Running.

The TV Drama - Writer's Festival is taking place in Leeds on Wednesday and Thursday, and I shall be there along with many from the scribosphere. I've ordered new business cards which should arrive today - my only business cards were too "production" oriented as opposed to "writer" oriented.

I can only say good things about Vistaprint's business card service, their online design-your-card system is excellent, especially if you have a clue about design (and though I'm no designer, I do understand what I'm doing). And even if you don't it's still easy to use and hand-holds all the way through.

Being a smart-ass I put a QR-code on the back of the business card which links directly through to the scripts on the blog here. This one. (Where did I get it from? bit.ly - more on that another time.)

Also, on Thursday, it's the Boy's appearance in Bugsy Malone. As previously mentioned he doesn't have a big part but he's also playing saxophone in the band. And now has been given several solos - because he's cool. I've not previously mentioned but, when it comes to clothes, he's one of those people that has a natural knack for picking the right combinations and looks good in almost anything. (Jealous, moi?) In a 30s suit complete with trilby and a saxophone, he looks perfect - hopefully we'll have a picture.

Friday? Just work, catching up on the day job with the time I've lost.

---

What's on the turntable? "And the Mouse Police never sleeps" by Jethro Tull from "Heavy Horses"

6000 and Marketing

Marketing is not a dirty word. Without it nobody would know you exist. The person who said that "if you build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to your door" was only partially right - they have to know your mousetrap exists otherwise they won't know where to beat the path.

This is why new writers are told to network and why social networking is considered important. People have to know you exist - it's how you put yourself out there.

Back in April I noted that the number of people looking at my Shooting People profile hit 5000, and now it's just passed 6000. That's a smidge under 100 per week which is pretty good.

I don't use Twitter at present, but I have been reading up on it and studying it, seeing how I can use it (or not). But what I do is blog (like this), and I can also examine the statistics of how many people read my blog.

However I also had this blog tied in to automatically post to my Facebook account. Which means I could not count anyone who read the blog there - because there are no statistics. So, what to do?

I notice that other blogging screenwriters write their blogs and then put a note about it on FB (often via Twitter) with a link to the blog page, which means their blog page count is accurate. So I spent half an hour yesterday finding out how to disable the auto-posting to FB - got there eventually but it wasn't easy - so that I can do the same.

And then there's link shortening using a service like bitly.com. You've probably seen shortened links, but one of the clever things about them is that bitly provides statistics as to how often that link is clicked. So I converted all my major web links into shortened links and replaced them on my various websites and profiles. So now when someone clicks one of those links to go from one page to another of my pages, I'll know about it.

Why bother?

Once you're an established writer it probably matters less - because the access to your potential market  becomes easier and can become more focused. But as someone starting out you need to be communicating to every possible contact you can, so how do you know you're succeeding if you have no way to measure it?

Of course what you really want is someone contacting you and saying "I've read your stuff, would you like to write something for me?" but that becomes more likely if you're contacting more people.

---

What's on the turntable? "September" by Earth, Wind and Fire (let's boogie!)

A couple of weeks ago I got the final feedback on a feature I had sweated blood over, in its 5th major rewrite. This time I knew I'd got it right, I had really got a feel for the theme and the characters, it was all there.

I knew it.

Jez was very apologetic in saying there were serious issues. The US coverage company were businesslike in their damning analysis. Philip Shelley was somewhere in between with his negative appraisal.

Though they all agreed it had something solid at the core, the implementation was something else.

It was about this time I started to realise that perhaps I was not quite as good as I thought I was. Humility is a good thing, it just hurts a bit when you're forced to remove the rose-tinted spectacles. Producing two very good scripts early on gave me the wrong impression.

And I have this web series to write.

I was reading Bill Martell's screen tip and was forced to acknowledge that the flood of the first draft (or even the flood of the fifth draft) is not a replacement for the hard work you actually have to put in to make a script really work.

---

What's on the turntable? "Bridge over Troubled Water" by Simon & Garfunkel