Guest blog: translating your book to the screen
One of my writing colleagues in Calgary, Alberta (Anne Gafiuk of What’s in a Story?) recently attended the Alberta’s Write Stuff: Books and Screens workshop, hosted by the Alberta Media Production Industries Association. Here she is as my guest blogger!
By Anne Gafiuk
About sixty people attended the workshop, including ten hosts/organizers/panellists. Quite a mix of individuals: playwrights, screenplay writers, producers, writers, novelists. Why were they all there? To have their book or story make it onto the small or big screen. Some, like me, were sitting, watching, and learning. Others were there to offer support. And let’s not forget most of us were there to network. I made copious notes during the three-hour workshop and was relieved I hadn’t been selected as one of the four “pitchers.” I was exhausted “just” being an observer!
The panels, made up of award-winning producers, stressed the length of time it takes from concept to completion. It could be years! The timing might not be right for some themes, they say. The key: have a producer lined up. Make sure it is someone who loves the project as much as you do….someone who is like-minded, someone who will invest the time and effort into the project. Do research as to what a producer produces. The history and reputation of the writer, filmmaker, and producer also are major players. (Yikes! I am an unknown!) And go out to forge relationships. Opportunity, preparation, and luck, too, play important roles. “Do not give up!” they advise.
The time arrived for the four pitches. The audience had a certain energy. A chair, the ‘hot seat’, was placed in front of us – virtual strangers – and next to the four panellists…all wearing dark clothing of various hues of black. Was this an omen?
The first person to pitch was eaten alive for her presentation but the panel seemed to like her story…had she only just told it. The second admitted to being “scared shitless.” He was amusing, initially, and then his nerves got the best of him. The panel liked his main character but told him he needed to rehearse the pitch to know his story inside and out. The third, shy and quiet, spoke to the outline provided by the organizers at registration, but also had been listening and learning. The panel was not so hard on him. They asked questions. The fourth, again, having the experience of the first three, wowed the panel. He delivered! All four individuals then received ’constructive criticism’ and a congratulations for their benefit and for us in the audience.
While all this was going on, I couldn’t help but think of Dragon’s Den or So You Think You Have Talent. I was so happy not to have been up there. Then I realized: missing from all of the pitches was a visual…the movie poster or the book cover we were asked to create. No one had one…and the teacher in me knows to always have a visual!
We were then given business cards and agency literature from Alberta Film, Canada Media Fund, as well as the Harold Greenberg Fund for more information.
The main take-aways:
- Be concise, clear, and appealing. Try to capture ‘the pitch’ in 30- 60 seconds.
- ‘The Pitch’ is all about the story. And both had better be great!
- Make your characters ‘real’.
- Make sure the story is topical, as it could take between 2-4 years to bring the project to fruition.
- Make eye contact with the panel.
- Rehearse ‘the pitch’. Time it. Run it past friends and family. Ask them to be brutally honest and have them ask questions.
- Know your story inside out and backwards.
- Come ‘ready to play’.
- Create a relationship within the first three minutes of ‘the pitch’,
- Never apologize.
- Wear black!
The workshop gave me a great appreciation of what goes on ‘behind the scenes’ to bring text to the screen. More knowledge…and that can’t hurt. Now what do I do? Work on my story, add some spit and polish….put myself out there and meet more people. Oh, and also get my name known by doing things like this guest blogging thing. (And wear black, apparently!).
Anne Gafiuk has loved to write for as long as she can remember. She was an elementary school teacher for almost fifteen years, then started freelancing part-time while a full-time mom. She has become very interested in vintage aircraft, the people involved with them and their history, through her current book project. She has also unearthed correspondence by WWII airmen to their loved ones and is on a mission to find more as she wants to put together an article and possibly a book based on letters during the Second World War. Please contact her if you have any pieces of mail to be shared at anne@whatsinastory.ca.
Canada’s History Magazine Mention
It was really exciting (and flattering!) to see this write-up in the Feb-March 2012 issue of Canada’s History Magazine (formerly The Beaver). Thanks so much to the Canada’s History team, who have supported me and my projects, and consistently put out a high-quality publication about this country’s heritage.
How to track people down – past and present!
I’ve had several people contact me recently who are trying to track down long-lost flying buddies or people related to a particular era or area of aviation (for interviews, research, etc). Here are some general tips on how to do this online, as well as aviation-specific resources.
General:
1. Input the person’s name into Google (www.google.com) or some other search engine. It may sound obvious, but it’s always my first step and I usually try different things: putting quotation marks around the person’s name (“Pierre Berton” for example), to limit results, trying out nicknames, adding other keywords that might help (a place or thing you associate with them: Canada, Lancaster, etc).
2. If you know what city or province he/she lives in, you might be able to track a phone number and/or address through www.whitepages.ca (in Canada) or www.whitepages.com (in the US). www.411.ca and www.411.com are similar sites.
Aviation-Specific:
1. Email the Canadian Aviation Historical Society’s treasurer. She can check our database for a name, and if he/she is a member, can forward your contact info (because of privacy laws we can’t give you any of his/her contact info directly). 
2. Email the editor of the CAHS newsletter (cahs.newsletter@gmail.com) and ask to put a request for info in the upcoming edition. If your would-be-contact reads it, he/she can get in touch with you – or maybe someone else will know how to get a hold of him/her.
3. Email the editor of the CAHS Journal to put in a similar request.
3. If he/she used to work for Air Canada or one of its affiliates (Pacific Western Airlines, etc) then you could contact the editors of the Netletter through the AC Family Network http://www.acfamily.net for possible contact details (or a note in their newsletter).
4. If he/she may be a member of the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (which has thousands of members), they might be able to help you out: http://www.copanational.org/
Happy hunting (and please add any of your tips in the comments below)!
Deep Research
I’ve been contacted recently by several people embarking on their own writing projects, many of them involving historical research. I love it – the detective work, the chase – but it can be tricky, even after having ethical considerations and methodologies pounded into me for my degrees in history. Being part terrier helps, but for the rest of it, here are few resources I recommend:
1. The Craft of Research by Wayne C. Booth. A great place to start if you’re new to research, or want a refresher.
2. The Joy of Writing by Pierre Berton. This memoir/how-to book by one of Canada’s most popular historical writers is sure to give you the inside story on tips and pitfalls, as well as inspiration to keep going.
3. The Voice of the Past by Paul Thompson. If you’re doing interviews or oral histories, this could be useful.
These are great for the beginner, novice, or professional and won’t bog you down with too much technical jargon or theory. If you’re looking for more info on delving into research issues (evaluating sources, working with First Nations communities, etc), though, feel free to contact me.
In the meantime, back to my piles of books on the histories of the Yukon, Northwest Territories, sovereignty, aviation, and the like! Gotta love it!
Holing up in a room of one’s own
I’m very fortunate to have my very own office in which to work, because I can’t take distraction or noise. I admire people who can work in libraries or coffee shops, but for me those are places to do interviews, read newspapers, or pillage books as quickly as possible before retreating to my (well-lit) cave.
Currently, my little home office is taken over by piles of research for my book on northern aviation history. I have a stack from the Edmonton Public Library, the University of Alberta libraries, and the Alberta Aviation Museum. Then there’s another pile Joe McBryan of Buffalo Airways kindly lent me (that I would not have found through my usual research channels), and of highlighted and tabbed copies of The Roundel given to me by fellow researcher John Chalmers. My pile of archival documents is pretty thin, though, because through the magic of technology most of these (numbering in the 1000s) are stored digitally on my network drive.
My cat isn’t pleased I’ve taken over his chair with yet another pile, but you need to be a bit selfish as a writer. Sometimes you’re just absent-minded or immersed in your work. I was reading a lecture this morning Pierre Berton gave in 1994 as part of the Margaret Laurence Writers’ Trust series (published this year as A Writer’s Life). In it he says:
“I can hardly wait to get to the typewriter in the mornings. I like it so much. I really find it a marvellous vocation. It is hard on those around me. I’m very bad at parties if I’m working on a book, because I’m working on the book at the party, in my head, and I don’t hear what people say. I insult all sorts of close friends by my silence. It’s hard on my wife …because I hide myself in my office. I have to write, and I should be out, you know, gamboling with grandchildren on my knee…”
While he certainly had a public persona he could turn on when he wanted to, he once told everyone he was going to Mexico for an extended period. But he actually stayed home, disconnected the phone, and wrote the first draft of The National Dream.
I won’t pretend I’m off to Mexico, and won’t even go as far as blacking out my Facebook and Twitter accounts (yet), but don’t be surprised if phone calls go unanswered once in a while…
[Note: It's hard to see in the first photo, but I've just bought myself an amazing neck-saving device - a book stand. This one can even handle Larry Milberry's Air Transport in Canada volumes, so you know it's sturdy! I would highly recommend it for anyone who does a lot of note-taking]
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