A few months back, I wrote about a local filmmaker who entered her short film (awarded at the 40th Houston Short Film Festival) into the New York International Independent Film and Video Festival.
Having worked a bit with her on set, and seeing her finished product,
I realised that she had 'promise'. So, I was inclined to assist her when her next project came up.
She had the germ of an idea, and I, as experienced writer, assisted with the provision of writer skills in the development of a funding proposal.(As well, I had helped with research for possible funding avenues).
This has been my first such collaborative project, as well as hers -me, undertaking the not inconsiderable amount of writing and re-writing of the synopsis (and some research) to put her idea into an acceptable, tight English language 'presentation', while she has been willing to undertake not inconsiderable amounts of research where I felt that the information in the synopsis warranted it. It has been a process of give and take--between her zeal for too much information (as well as my own earlier mistake of this), and visual description, and my constant re-writing upon receipt of her new information, and fact-checking. My initial idea of filling out her idea was attemped and rejected in part, and we came back to her original idea, which has been expanded and smoothed out.
So far, it has worked.We are very close (cross my fingers) to the conclusion of the re-writing, ready to take it and the fuller proposal to a documentary festival hoping to obtain funding for her/our proposed documentary.If she obtains the funding from a visiting international production company, then as part of the deal I would be made the English script writer, and possibly its narrator. She, of course, becomes the director.
We shall see what happens at the festival. I am hoping also to take and present either one or two proposals myself, based on some of my previous journalism work. There may be a chance to pick up work in some other writer/researcher capacity.
I don't know what the chances are, and without having any previous experience of this process, it will be a learning on the job / experiential learning type situation. I suspect we'll have to hustle a bit.
I have spent a lot of time on this - with background research, and travelling to and from meetings with her, and lengthy telephone discussions and e-mailing etc.As I said, if it comes to pass, well... . As she says, if we aren't successful in this, there's always some other festival to apply to for funding. We shall see...
Having worked a bit with her on set, and seeing her finished product,
I realised that she had 'promise'. So, I was inclined to assist her when her next project came up.
She had the germ of an idea, and I, as experienced writer, assisted with the provision of writer skills in the development of a funding proposal.(As well, I had helped with research for possible funding avenues).
This has been my first such collaborative project, as well as hers -me, undertaking the not inconsiderable amount of writing and re-writing of the synopsis (and some research) to put her idea into an acceptable, tight English language 'presentation', while she has been willing to undertake not inconsiderable amounts of research where I felt that the information in the synopsis warranted it. It has been a process of give and take--between her zeal for too much information (as well as my own earlier mistake of this), and visual description, and my constant re-writing upon receipt of her new information, and fact-checking. My initial idea of filling out her idea was attemped and rejected in part, and we came back to her original idea, which has been expanded and smoothed out.
So far, it has worked.We are very close (cross my fingers) to the conclusion of the re-writing, ready to take it and the fuller proposal to a documentary festival hoping to obtain funding for her/our proposed documentary.If she obtains the funding from a visiting international production company, then as part of the deal I would be made the English script writer, and possibly its narrator. She, of course, becomes the director.
We shall see what happens at the festival. I am hoping also to take and present either one or two proposals myself, based on some of my previous journalism work. There may be a chance to pick up work in some other writer/researcher capacity.
I don't know what the chances are, and without having any previous experience of this process, it will be a learning on the job / experiential learning type situation. I suspect we'll have to hustle a bit.
I have spent a lot of time on this - with background research, and travelling to and from meetings with her, and lengthy telephone discussions and e-mailing etc.As I said, if it comes to pass, well... . As she says, if we aren't successful in this, there's always some other festival to apply to for funding. We shall see...
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