This report from the Journalism Strategies conference first appeared at TheTyee.ca

As tear gas and horse manure wafted up from another day of protests downtown, we gathered on the verdant slopes of Mount Royal, in an old stone building at McGill University. With the free press and democracy apparently competing to see which could crumble fastest, we felt a certain urgency.

From Halifax’s Kelly Toughill came the idea of a tax refund for newspaper and magazine subscriptions. With a little help from Revenue Canada, might you be more likely to pay for Canadian journalism?

From Gatineau’s Cathy Edwards came the idea of commandeering the CBC’s old transmission towers before they’re dismantled, handing them to community broadcasters — and even renting out space to phone companies.

I pitched the idea of a referendum on stabilizing CBC funding. Let’s ask Canadians once and for all if the public broadcaster should be guaranteed a certain budget. If the “No” side wins, successive governments may continue to hack and slash at their discretion.

Journalism Strategies

“What I wanted to do was have a focused conversation about how we could use public policy to support forms of journalism that support citizenship,” says Journalism Strategies organizer Christine Crowther. A former CBC videojournalist (like me), Crowther is now pursuing a PhD in Communication Studies at McGill.

“The only way we were going to succeed in putting this on the public agenda was by drawing a diverse group of people into conversation with each other,” she says. That meant putting hard-nosed newsroom journos in small rooms with academics and activists. It didn’t always go smoothly.

Click here to continue reading at TheTyee.ca

If you’ve been looking for a way to incorporate documentary technique into your work, or you have a film idea you’re developing, I’ll be giving a weekend class in May you might like to attend. Details below.

First, a bit of news. Last week the DOXA documentary film festival announced that our film “Renaissance Man” has been invited to screen as part of the lineup in May. Needless to say, I’m pretty stoked. Here’s the writeup from the festival program:

“In the world of 17th-century lute music, Matthew Wadsworth is a star. But few of his listeners would guess his other passion: jumping motorcycles. That’s because Matt is blind. From the Mojave Desert to Montreal to Manchester, this episodic documentary follows Matt and his motorcycle coach, Micky Dymond, as they train to set a world record. What drives them? How far will they push it? With the first two parts uploaded to YouTube as part of a distribution experiment, DOXA is proud to offer the world premiere of part three of Renaissance Man. Filmmakers Evan Crowe, Kai Nagata, and Candice Vallantin will present the work and offer up their own experiences of creating an international story, with no equipment, no distributor, and no money: a process a little akin to blind motorcycle jumping itself.”

Matt & Micky in Hesperia, California

If you can make it to the screening, that’s Friday, May 11 at 5pm at the Pacific Cinémathèque in Vancouver.

Tickets are free and will be given out on a first-come, first-served basis. If you like, you can RSVP on Facebook so we have an idea how many will be there. (Click here for the event page.)

We’ll be unveiling something else large and exciting at the screening itself.

So how do you do it? How do you take a little idea and wind up a year later at a big festival? One thing’s for sure — there’s no way we could have shot the film without the support of our friends. Friendship is the basic building block of this entire project and we’re extremely grateful.

But there are other tricks and techniques — other theories and skills that can help you make a little go a long way. We’ll be talking about some of these ideas at the screening, and I’ll be going into more depth during a weekend “D.I.Y. Documentary” course at the Tyee offices in Vancouver, May 19th and 20th.

Maybe you’re a journalist who’s being asked to shoot video. Maybe you work at a non-profit or an educational institution that’s trying to jazz up its website. Maybe you put together campaigns. Or maybe you have a story and you’re ready to go, but the scope and scale has you a little daunted. This course is designed to get you un-daunted.

That’s my shameless plug. You can sign up through the Tyee by clicking here. While you’re at it, check out some of the other classes being offered this spring. There’s all kinds of cool stuff on offer and the proceeds all help support independent journalism.