Is it me? Or do all writers get super-motivated after watching the Academy Awards? Whether you aspire to write an award-winning screenplay, a great novel that gets adapted into an award-winning screenplay, or to cover the awards via video, print, or tweeting, there’s loads to get motivated from watching the Academy Awards.

The Artist took home awards for Best Feature, Director, and Lead Actor, among others at the Oscars. A beautiful film that, the Academy pointed out, was the only one filmed entirely in Los Angeles, The Artist really celebrated a love of movies … and their origin. Film Independent’s Spirit Awards also honored the film with awards in these categories.

Alexander Payne and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash took home the Adapted Screenplay Oscar for The Descendants, while Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris won for Best Original Screenplay. These two films also picked up the awards in their categories at the Writers Guild of America awards last weekend.

At Film Independent’s Spirit Awards, The Descendants won for Best Screenplay. Best First Screenplay went to Will Reiser, who wrote 50/50.

So, what is it about these films that got everyone so excited? What was it about the writing that allowed them to ruse to the top. And, what can we as writers do to elevate our writing to award-winning levels?

Congratulations to all of this season’s award winners. And best of luck, writers, as you complete your future award-winning screenplays …

It’s the night when the writers come out to play … and to get some well-deserved accolades!

Last night, the Writers Guild of America – WGA West and WGA East – announced the winners of the 2012 Writers Guild Awards for outstanding achievement in writing for screen, television, radio, news, promotional, videogame, and new media writing were announced. Ceremonies were held at both the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles and the B.B. King Blues Club in New York City.

The Descendant's screenwriters Nat Faxon & Jim Rash and Alexander Payne

Midnight in Paris, written by Woody Allen, took home the award for Best Original Screenplay. The award for Best Original Screenplay went to The Descendants, screenplay by Alexander Payne and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash. The film was based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings. Documentary Screenplay was awarded to Better This World, written by Katie Galloway & Kelly Duane de la Vega.

Big TV winners were ABC’s Modern Family, which won for Outstanding Comedy Series and Episode; Showtime’s Homeland, which took home awards for Best New Series and tied for Best Episodic Drama with AMC’s Breaking Bad. Breaking Bad also won the WGA award for Best Drama Series.

Breaking Bad's Vince Gilligan

Drama Series: Breaking Bad, written by Sam Catlin, Vince Gilligan, Peter Gould, Gennifer Hutchison, George Mastras, Thomas Schnauz, and Moira Walley-Beckett.

Comedy Series: Modern Family, written by Cindy Chupack, Paul Corrigan, Abraham Higginbotham, Ben Karlin, Elaine Ko, Carol Leifer, Steven Levitan, Christopher Lloyd, Dan O’Shannon, Jeffrey Richman, Brad Walsh, Ilana Wernick, Bill Wrubel, and Danny Zuker.

New Series: Homeland, written by Henry Bromell, Alexander Cary, Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon, Chip Johannessen, Gideon Raff, and Meredith Stiehm.

Homeland Writers

Tie for Episodic Drama:
“Box Cutter” (Breaking Bad), written by Vince Gilligan and “The Good Soldier” (Homeland), written by Henry Bromell.

Episodic Comedy: “Caught in the Act” (Modern Family), written by Steven Levitan & Jeffrey Richman.

Other winners include …

Long Form Original: HBO’s Cinema Verite, written by David Seltzer.

Long Form – Adapted: HBO’s Too Big to Fail, written by Peter Gould; based on the book written by Andrew Ross Sorkin.

Animation: “Homer the Father” (FOX’s The Simpsons), written by Joel H. Cohen.

Comedy/Variety – Series: Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, Writers: Michael Brumm, Stephen Colbert, Rich Dahm, Paul Dinello, Eric Drysdale, Rob Dubbin, Glenn Eichler, Dan Guterman, Peter Gwinn, Jay Katsir, Barry Julien, Frank Lesser, Opus Moreschi, Tom Purcell, Meredith Scardino, Scott Sherman, and Max Werner.

Outstanding Achievement in Videogame Writing: Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception, written by Amy Hennig.

Outstanding Achievement in Writing – Original New Media: “Episode 1,” “Episode 2,” “Episode 4,” “Episode 5,” “Episode 6” (Aim High), written by Heath Corson & Richie Keen.

Outstanding Achievement in Writing – Derivative New Media: “A New Day,” “Family Matters,” “Neighborly Advice,” “Step Mom,” “Everything Dies” (The Walking Dead), teleplay by John Esposito, story by John Esposito and Greg Nicotero.

For a complete list of winners, go to the WGA website.

Post your March Goals on Write On! Online and be entered in the monthly drawing to win an iScript. (An iScript is a professionally recorded audio version of a screenplay or novel read by professional readers, similar to an audiobook.)

Post March Goals in the comment section below. Thanks! Write On!

Write On! The Quest to get Published
by freelance writer Danica Davidson

I’ve been telling stories as far back as I can remember and even as a child I knew I wanted to be a professional novelist. However, it’s one thing to think about being a professional novelist, and it’s another to make it happen.  I’m doing what I can to turn my dream into a reality.  Likewise, there are steps other writers can take, along with me, to make things happen.

1. Set a goal. Right now, my main goal is to publish my Young Adult novel.  I’d like to concentrate on writing YA and adult books, starting with YA. I’m querying agents, but I’ve decided to branch out beyond that with such things as networking and building my résumé. What’s your goal? Freelance? Novels? Memoirs? (Post your annual goals on Write On Online.)

2. Add to your résumé. The more you can show that you’ve written professionally, the more it helps. I’m a professional freelance writer. This does the job of paying my bills, letting me do something I enjoy, and getting my name out there.  I work on my freelancing every single day (yes, this includes weekends and holidays) writing three to seven articles, all of which are published.  I’ve published a few hundred articles now in more than thirty publications, including MTV News, MTV Geek, Booklist, Ms., Publishers Weekly, and About.com.  I also had an interesting job where I wrote the English version of Japanese books published in America.

3. Get yourself covered. The first place to cover my novel-writing was the Burbank Leader, and that was when I was in Middle School. Back then, I was finishing novels and had the same dream as I do now. After the Burbank Leader, the Los Angeles Times covered me as an up-and-coming writer. Both of these happened after teachers who’d read my work called the newspapers and suggested they contact me. Sometimes you can get people to help you out, and sometimes you have to do it on your own. Which leads us to the next part of the list . . .

4. Self-promote. Now that I am out of school, I write to various publications, describing what I’ve done and what I want to do, hoping they might be able to cover me.  Self-promotion is admittedly awkward, but it’s something writers have to do. Sheila Bender interviewed me for her online literary magazine Writing It Real, asking me questions about how I started and where I am today. Chuck Sambuchino let me write a guest column about my writing for his Guide to Literary Agents site, which gets around 100,000 readers a month. I’m also writing posts on other people’s writing-related blogs, such as Write On! Online. Figure out ways to get your name in print and people talking about your writing.

5. Do social networking. I’m on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. You meet more people or get a following on social networks.

6. Join writers groups—and/or websites. I’m not part of any physical writing groups, but I have joined some online. These sites include She Writes, YALITCHAT, JacketFlap, WEbook, Writer’s Digest Community, and the Write On Facebook Page.  But there are plenty more out there. I often post links to my latest articles on these places and do what I can to network and meet more people in the business.

7. Have your own website. There are website builders out there for people like me who need them or you can just create a blog.  On my website I have links to more than 200 articles I’ve published, sample pages from one of the Japanese books I rewrote, and of course information on my novels.

8. Hustle. I’d like to spend all my time writing. Yet doing that does not get me out there. And anyone who wants to be a professional writer has to get out there and hustle. I do my fiction writing, but I also get in my freelance, my social networking, my publicity, and my querying. That’s what I try to do every day.

* * *

Freelance writer Danica Davidson has published a few hundred articles on numerous topics, some of which are linked at her website. She is currently seeking publication for her Young Adult novel.

Today, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced the nominations for the 84th Annual Oscars.

Original Screenplay
Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist
Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig, Bridesmaids
J.C. Chandor, Margin Call
Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris
Asghar Farhadi, A Separation

Adapted Screenplay
Nat Faxon, Alexander Payne and Jim Rash, The Descendants
John Logan, Hugo
George Clooney, Grant Heslov and Beau Willimon, The Ides of March
Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin and Stan Chervin, Moneyball
Peter Straughan and Bridget O’Connor, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Half of these were among the Best Picture nominees: The Artist, The Descendants, Hugo, Midnight in Paris, and Moneyball. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, The Help, The Tree of Life, and War Horse round out the nominations.

There was a lot of crossover between the Academy, Spirit, and Writers Guild Award writing nominees.

For Film Independent’s Spirit Awards, The Artist and The Descendants were nominated for best screenplay, along with Footnote (Joseph Cedar), Win Win (Tom McCarthy), and Beginners (Mike Mills) were nominated for Best Screenplay.

Plus, Best First Screenplay nominees are Margin Call, as well as Another Earth (Mike Cahill, Brit Marling), Terri (Patrick deWitt), Cedar Rapids (Phil Johnston), and 50/50 (Will Reiser).

The Writers Guild of America Awards Original Screenplay nominees are 50/50, Bridesmaids, Midnight in Paris, and Win Win, as well as Young Adult, (Diablo Cody).

Adapted Screenplay nominees are The Descendants, Hugo, and Moneyball, along with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Steven Zaillian) and The Help (Tate Taylor). Check out all the WGA Award nominees.

Did you see this year’s best writing nominees? What do you think? Who will win?

It’s that time of the year … when writers say goodbye to their families and friends, and spend  the next 30 days writing a 50,000-word novel for National Novel Writing Month.

Some people find it invigorating, others may think it’s silly to take on such a massive project. I say, if NaNoWriMo motivates you to write, use it as the excellent tool that it is! Plus, you can be a NaNo Rebel and write something other than fiction. You can do the Poem-a-Day challenge. You can choose to write 50,000 words and mix and match fiction, non-fiction, essays, blog posts, etc. You can even write a novel in December if November doesn’t work out for you. The point is to always challenge yourself and consistently be writing.

For those taking the challenge, best of luck … and post your user url in the comments, so Write On! Members can connect!

Remember, writing is supposed to be fun. Enjoy the journey. And let your words take you wherever they want to go! Write on!

Topic: Today is Bad Poetry Day. You have two choices: Write a bad poem. Or write any poem without caring whether it’s good or bad. Just express yourself … and have fun!

Post your poem in the comments or on Facebook. Write On!

The next LA Mediabistro Mixer is tonight, August 9, from 7pm – 9pm at Lola’s, 945 N. Fairfax Avenue in West Hollywood. RSVP here.

For networking tips, read the Write On Q&A with my Mediabistro co-host Michelle Thatcher.

For even more networking tips, check out Anne Hilbert’s networking columns on the Campus Explorer Blog.

LA Media Peeps, hope to see you tonight. Write on!

On August 2nd and 3rd in New York, the #140edu conference will be broadcast on ustream, starting at 6am Pacific/9am Eastern.

Watch the 140 Education Conference: Education in the State of Now.

Review the #140edu schedule.

Note: I will be leading a panel with Kristen Durken, Ethan Bodnar and Lineea Keys on Wednesday, August 3rd at 11:30 am Pacific. We will be discussing the “Is College Worth It Debate?” from the view of members of the Net generation.

Thanks to everyone who sent in their bio in 140 characters or less.

And the winners are:

- Jeremie Guy: When trouble comes I cover it with Ink. When failure arrives I bury it with paper. When doubt threatens, my writing conquers.

- Jan Militello: Former Corporate Librarian. Full-time Screenwriter. Dedicated Hiker /Biker/Yogi. Loyal Friend. Ecstatic Grandmother. Accidental Vegan.

- Dylan Kenin: Actor, Activist, Athlete, Addict, Action Hero (& Villain), Accepting > Angry, Writer, Rock Star (in my own mind), Nature Lover, Yogi, Poet

Each winner will receive their choice of one of these three books from Michael Wiese Productions.

1. Memo from the Story Dept.: Secrets of Structure and Character
by Christopher Vogler and David McKenna

2. Riding the Alligator: Strategies for a Career in Screenplay Writing by Pen Densham

3. The Coffee Break Screenwriter: Writing Your Script Ten Minutes at a Time by Pilar Alessandra

The Write On Summer Goals Challenge is going on now. Go to Write On Online for more information. Write On!