Loyiso Maqoma, a graduate of the SEDIBA Spark program, has been signed as a new resident scriptwriter on SABC3's soapie Isidingo.
SEDIBA is a scriptwriting training and development programme funded and managed by the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF).
Maqoma’s journey began when he was a student at the University of Fort Hare where he realized that Accounting was not his calling. He started writing stories and decided to apply to a film school.
In 2006, he was accepted at SASWA (South African Screenwriting Association), now the SA Script Institution, where he enrolled for a learnership programme that resulted in him being accepted for an internship with the production company, Videovision Entertainment.
He then submitted an application for development funding to the National Film and Video Foundation, and consequently received an invitation to the entry level Sediba scriptwriting training programme called SPARK.
In 2007 the NFVF launched the short film contest and Loyiso was assigned to be the trainee script editor on two short films, functioning as a script editor while he was learning the tools of the trade.
When the second round of the SABC/SEDIBA mini series script development collaboration commenced in November 2007, Loyiso joined the creative team to continue his training on When We Were Black 2, a sequel to Khalo Matabane’s SAFTA award-winning mini series.
Maqoma also started story lining for Isidingo during this time. Impressed by his work, the Head Writer and Producers of the show appointed him as a permanent writer.
“Being appointed resident writer at Isidingo is certainly the biggest milestone in my writing career thus far. In conjunction with my responsibilities here, I’m also a trainee script editor on a project commissioned by the SABC, being developed under SEDIBA”, says Maqoba.
Maqoma feels that writing has to fundamentally be a calling, not just a hobby or something one enjoys to do, especially in the sphere of film and television. “It’s a tough industry and consequently one that is not easily broken into. The journey is therefore guaranteed to be fairly arduous, and requires the tenacity, resilience and commitment that come with knowing that something is one’s purpose.”
“Being at Isidingo is not only a great privilege but a great challenge. My immediate aim therefore is to familiarize myself with the conventions that drive daily drama, make useful creative contributions to the process, help push these boundaries further and challenge them in cases where I feel this needs to be done so that I’m effectively able to contribute to the quality for which Isidingo has received much acclaim,” says Maqoma.
The aim of the NFVF is to ensure that projects that go through their Advanced Screenwriting Training Programme get the attention of producers, sales agents and co-production partners locally and internationally.
Through these programs Sediba aims to increase the pool of professional writers and script editors and the production of professional scripts in the international market place.
Aspiring script writers can apply to the NFVF. Applicants must supply a synopsis, a treatment or a screenplay, preferably a properly formatted script, together with a development funding application form and a CV to the NFVF.
Details of how to go about doing this are available on the NFVF website:
www.nfvf.co.za.
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