One aspect I particularly enjoy about writing is the research. It can be exhausting and stressful devouring pages of text, or searching websites for specific answers to questions, but ultimately I find research is invaluable. It's not only informative for the viewers, but also brings depth and believability to the situation and characters of any story.
No writer is an expert at much beyond their own jobs (this is why nearly all of Stephen King's protagonists are authors!) so if your characters are doctors, scientists, undertakers or deep-sea divers, you're going to need some basic information on how these people operate.
Welcome to the internet. It's quite simply a revolution for writers everywhere. I can't believe writers would have to visit libraries all the time in the past (although libraries are still invaluable for more in-depth knowledge).
For my Pilot script Spiral, I have been doing a lot of research - mainly relating to elements not actually required for the story directly, but the "world" my story takes place in needs to be fully-realized. Spiral takes place after a devastating event that could be described as post-apocalyptic, so immediately you need to start brainstorming the repercussions of such an event.
There are hundreds of films, books and TV shows that have dealt with the end of the world (to varying degrees of success) so it was very helpful to take a look at other "end of the world scenarios" to see what worked, and what didn't.
Of course, there is also a budgetary concern with depicting such a massive event and making it work for TV. So I had to be imaginative with exactly how such a potentially expensive premise could work for UK television. Some books have amazingly inventive and involving premises set in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, but most would take a Hollywood-sized budget to bring to life.
I also have some medical aspects to my story, particularly involving first-aid procedures and amnesia. Now, I could wing it and use my limited knowledge of first aid based on a few courses I've attended in the past and remembering dialogue from Casualty and ER... but it's amazing what actual research into things can bring.
God I love Wikipedia. This is a new find for me on the internet, and it has proven to be fantastic value. I used to rely on Google Search to find out things, but you're usually faced with thousands of websites spread across hundreds of websites. I don't have the time to read them all, and it would take days anyway, so Wikipedia is great for getting a more defined encyclopedic overview of whatever topic you search for. However, be warned: Wikipedia, and all things wiki, are written by users... so there's the chance some information is incorrect. But, personally, I've never found anything glaringly wrong or misleading.
