Sunday, March 20, 2011

TRAVEL WRITING AND PHOTOGRAPHY .... PLUS SCREEN WRITING!


MARCH NEWS FLASH!
Enrol at http://www.thecreativehub.net.nz/

We're busy organising new courses for the coming months and have details to share about two coming up in April and May. If you've dreamt of becoming a travel writer – writing about your home town for overseas readers or heading off on assignment – or if you’ve been thinking that screen writing would suit your style and voice, maybe now’s the time to act!

Travel Writing and Photography Course (6 weeks)
Tutors: Yvonne van Dongen, former NZ Herald Travel Editor, and Greta Anderson, award-winning photographer

Anyone new to Auckland can tell you that this city is as exotic to a New Yorker, a Porteño or a Parisian as an Aucklander finds the Big Apple, Buenos Aires or Paris. If you’re an aspiring travel writer wondering how and where to get started, perhaps there’s no need to save for an air ticket first. Learn to evoke the sights and smells of your home town, of the Pacific, the Americas, Africa, Asia or Europe. This course is designed to introduce you to the skills required by expert travel writers, to help you craft your experiences into stories that can be published and to gain an insight into how the travel industry works and what an editor is looking for. In addition, the course features two travel photography workshops – what sort of pictures are travel editors looking for and what should you know if you take your own camera on assignment?

Tutor Yvonne van Dongen is one of New Zealand's most respected travel writers and editors. As Travel Editor of the New Zealand Herald and, subsequently, of onHoliday Magazine, she has won numerous awards for her travel writing, including Best Tourism and Travel Column in the Qantas Media Awards. Greta Anderson is a multi-award-winning photographer who has worked for publications as diverse as Wallpaper, the Australian Financial Review, NZ Herald and onHoliday magazine and has lectured in photography at Elam, Unitec and the Sydney College of the Arts. Yvonne and Greta have worked together before and are looking forward to sharing their knowledge with up-and-coming writers.

Dates: Tuesdays 6–9pm (12, 19, 26 April & 3 May); Saturdays 2pm (10 & 17 May)
Enroll at http://www.thecreativehub.net.nz/
Location: Creative Hub waterfront rooms, Maritime Museum, Princes Wharf

Introduction To Screen Writing (6 weeks)
Tutor: Alan Brash, former screen writer, ‘Shortland Street’

Have you ever seen a TV show or gone to a movie and thought ‘I could write better than that?’ Even before Peter Jackson created Middle Earth Downunder, New Zealand was well established on the world film-making map. At the same time, local TV series like Shortland Street, Outrageous Fortune, and Bro’ Town were showcasing Kiwi screen story-telling to households night after night. But what makes these scripts strong enough for funding bodies or studios to pour millions into their production? Where do the scripts come from, and how do they get written? If you have a burning desire to turn an idea into a script for the screen, or you just want to find out the basics, then Introduction to Screenwriting could be for you.

Over six weeks, film and TV veteran, Alan Brash, will take you through the fundamentals required to write short films, features, and TV series. Learn about basic script structure templates; become familiar with the language and medium-specific rules of screenwriting; learn what’s required to write drama in any form, and what makes a screenplay different from writing prose or plays. Find out how to recognise subtext and why you need it in your writing. Learn what makes characters feel authentic and engaging. Discover the purpose of dialogue and how to effectively write everything in a scene that’s not dialogue.

Alan Brash has taught screenwriting at Unitec (for their Bachelor of Performing & Screen Arts), South Seas Film & Television School, and Auckland University’s Centre for Continuing Education. He has worked in numerous aspects of the NZ film & TV industry, going back to the early 1990’s. He has worked as a development executive at two of NZ’s leading production companies. He created the TV3 dramedy The Strip for The Gibson Group, and has written numerous episodes of Shortland Street. His directorial debut, the short film Be Careful…, played at the Show Me Shorts Film Festival in 2010, and his spec feature script Tail Spin was a finalist in the 2008 PAGE Awards. As well as being an active film and TV writer and producer, he regularly consults on other writers’ film & TV scripts.

The course will be a mixture of: tips, explanations and information from Alan; illustrations from successful short and feature films & TV programs, and in-class exercises and discussion. You don’t need to come to the class with story ideas, though there will be some opportunity for feedback about any ideas you do have if you wish to share them.

Dates: Tuesday 31st May, 6pm to 8pm and subsequent Tuesdays
Enrol at http://www.thecreativehub.net.nz/
Location: Creative Hub waterfront rooms, Maritime Museum, Princes Wharf

Photo above by Stephen Clamp.

No comments: