TEACHING &
LECTURING &
Story Crash Courses
IF YOU WANT YOUR STORIES TO FLY,
YOU NEED TO BUILD THEIR WINGS
What teaching services do you provide?
Teaching: With years of industry experience, a comprehensive knowledge of story, and a Working With Children Check, I can provide your faculty with a lesson plan that will teach your students the fundamental building blocks to create great works of fiction. Get in touch to learn more.
Lecturing: This is a service I provide not only for students, but for teachers, film production companies, branding agencies, or anyone else who is frothing to learn the core tenets of story craft. If you would like a one hour story session (or longer upon request) that covers basic story structure, get in touch. Let me know if you’d like the seminar tailored to a specific topic—eg. theme, character, or musical narrative. Get in touch to learn more.
Story Crash: Story Crash is an interactive, gamified story experience that allows participants to swing back and forth between the writer’s room and the audience seat, as they collaboratively construct a narrative, confer over the best story choices, and then immediately hear their choices read out by professional voice actors. Story Crash is a coalescence of my skills as a writer, a teacher, and a voice over artist, and it can be adjusted for any age group upon request. Get in touch to learn more.
“Fabian has been inspiring young writers at Story Studios Australia for over three years. He never fails to bring his world-class imagination, passion for story, and respectful nature to his sessions. As a Story Mentor, Fabian is always approachable, fun and insightful. Young writers lucky enough to be in Fabian’s sessions are privy to his incredible story knowledge, wit, and graciousness, and all the same can be said in relation to his colleagues!”
- Bonnie McRae, Creative Director at Story Studios Australia
When you enjoy other people’s stories, it’s a delight. When other people enjoy your stories - that’s the best feeling in the world.
However, a premise is only as good as its execution. You might have the confidence and energy to write your script. You might have a great hook, a knack for dialogue, and a flair for set-pieces; but your brilliant ideas will go overlooked if your story structure ain’t tight.
Structure makes your stories more accessible to a wider audience, while still allowing you the freedom to express your unique flair. Story structure teaches you how to swim. Where you swim is up to you.
Mastering the core story beats, and how they connect to character and theme, will make you a sharper and more prolific writer, regardless of your chosen medium. If you’re ready to level up, I can teach you, your class, or your production company the basic tenets of narrative.
Shut up nerd, I don’t want to follow rules, and I don’t care what other people like. I want to write the way I like to write.
Then that’s what you should do! No one’s making you learn story structure. A writer should write whatever makes them happy. But for many writers, working with a fluent knowledge of story structure is what makes them happy.
Story structure is like religion, or ayahuasca, or pickleball, it’s something that just calls out to certain people.
(I myself don’t dabble in religion or ayahuasca or pickleball, as I have heeded the call of a different master; and if you’ve scrolled this far down the page, perhaps you have too.)
Will story structure make my story formulaic?
Only in the literal sense that you’re using a formula. What you do with that formula is up to you. There’s still individualism and artistry required if you wish to make something good.
Two people working off the same cake recipe will invariably bake, stack, and decorate two very different cakes.
Why do people like story structure so much?
It’s simply how we’ve been conditioned. While our urge to seek and tell stories is primal, I believe our desire for those stories to be structured is more of a cultural thing; but it’s still something that’s hardwired into our modern brains. If you don’t believe me, try telling an anecdote without any structure, and see how many people both follow and enjoy it.
There’s lots of stories that don’t have story structure.
Yeah, heaps.
Some of them are commercially and critically adored.
Some of them are. Many of them are not.
That doesn’t mean they’re bad.
No, it doesn’t, and art simply can’t be measured in that way, it’s all extremely subjective. Incidentally, I too am capable of enjoying (and creating) non-structured stuff.
But structure is my main crush. Crushcture.
Can a non-linear story still have story structure?
Deliciously so.
Which screenwriting guru is the best one?
Honestly, most of them use many of the same metrics but with different lingo. There are other minor differences too, but I think it’s deeply weird how some writers choose only one screenwriting book like it’s a football team. It should be more like a buffet, where you get to pick and choose the bits you like.
What are your qualifications?
I have 10+ years of industry experience, and a Master of Screenwriting from the University of Melbourne, where I received the Master of Screenwriting Award, in addition to the inexplicably redundant Master of Screenwriting Outstanding Achievement in Screenwriting Award. I am also a Story Mentor at Story Studios Australia, where I have taught young writers from 8 to 18 the various tenets of storycraft.
Can I hire you?
You certainly can! Get in touch with me and let me know if you need me for teaching, lecturing, a story crash, or scripting and story development services.