From the founder of Biography Studio
Biography Studio is designed to be straightforward to use. But if you have just started your project and want to understand how everything fits together before you begin, this is the guide.
Your project lives in My Projects
When you log in, you land on your My Projects page. This is your home base. Each project you have started appears here as a card, showing your current progress and the status of each chapter. Click into a project and you reach your Book Overview, where your chapters are laid out by pathway.
You can move between chapters in any order. There is no requirement to finish one before starting another. Some people work through all their Starter questions across every chapter first to build momentum before going deeper anywhere. Others prefer to work through one chapter at a time. Either approach works.
Get a feel for the whole project before you start writing
The most useful thing you can do on your first session is not to start writing. It is to look around. Open every chapter in turn. At the top of each one is a short orientation statement that describes what that chapter covers and how to think about it. Read those. Then skim through the questions inside, both the Starter and the Go Deeper groups. You are not committing to anything. You are getting a feel for the shape of the whole project before you begin.
Then, before you settle into any one chapter properly, do a quick first pass. Open each chapter and answer one or two questions in it, however roughly. Treat these as practice answers. Assume you will answer them properly later when you reach that chapter in earnest. The point is not to produce finished writing. The point is to get used to the system and, more importantly, to feel what each chapter is for.
This matters because of something that happens almost universally if you do not do it. You sit down in the first chapter, full of energy, and you start answering a question about your childhood home. Halfway through, you find yourself writing about your father, and then about a holiday you took with him, and then about something that happened years later that the holiday reminded you of. You have just used your best material on the wrong question. Each of those threads has a chapter built for it, with its own specific questions designed to reach the particular layer of memory where that material lives. The Biography Studio framework works by precision. A question about your father will produce something different, and richer, than a passing mention of him in a question about somewhere you used to live. If you do not yet know that the question about your father is coming, you cannot leave the room for it. The orientation pass is what tells you what is coming, so you can stay inside the scope of the question in front of you and trust that everything else has its proper place. Nothing has to be finished on first pass either. Every chapter stays editable until you choose to submit it, and even after that, your biographer’s polished version comes back to you for one more round of refinement before you mark it as ready. The orientation pass is map-making, not commitment.
A note on the questions before you begin
You are in charge of how much you answer. The questions are here to help you find the memories worth recording, not to be a checklist. Skip anything that does not apply, anything that does not interest you, anything that takes you somewhere you do not want to go. A short chapter answered with care is worth more than a long one answered out of obligation.
A note on how the questions are organised. Each chapter has Starter questions and Go Deeper questions. Starter questions are intentionally broad. They are the ones most people will have something to say about, and they are a useful place to begin if you are not sure where to start. They are not the most important questions and they are not required. Go Deeper questions are organised into themed groups, more specific, more personal. Some groups will be exactly where your story lives. Others will not apply at all.
The split is there to help you navigate, not to set an order or a priority. Answer what you want to answer in either tab, and ignore the rest.
Writing your answers in the Writing Studio
Click any chapter card and you enter the Writing Studio. This is where your answers are created.
Each chapter has three tabs at the top. Starter contains the foundation questions for that chapter, the ones most people will have something to say about. Go Deeper contains themed question groups for when you want to explore further. Review and Submit is where you check your answers and submit the chapter when you are ready.
You can answer questions by typing directly into the text box, or by clicking the Voice button to speak your answer aloud. Your words appear on screen as you speak. Both approaches produce exactly the same result. Use whichever feels more natural.
Your answers save automatically every time you stop typing. You can leave at any time and return to where you left off. There are no deadlines and your project does not expire.
Each chapter also has space for one photograph, added from the Review and Submit tab when you are ready.
Submitting a chapter
When you are happy with a chapter, go to the Review and Submit tab. You will be able to read through everything one more time before submitting.
At the point of submission you choose whether you would like your answers edited by your biographer. If you choose editing, your answers are shaped into clean, readable prose while preserving everything specific to you. If you prefer your words exactly as written, that option is there too.
Once submitted, the chapter is locked. The Starter and Go Deeper tabs close, and your Review and Submit tab becomes Original Answers, where you can always go back and read what you originally wrote.
You can submit chapters individually as you finish them. There is no need to wait until the whole book is done.
Reading your polished chapter
If you asked for editing, your biographer reviews the chapter and returns a polished version, usually within 24 to 48 working hours. You will receive an email when it is ready.
The polished chapter appears in a new Edited Answers tab in the Writing Studio. Read it through. You can refine any answer directly, and if you change your mind about a tweak, revert to your biographer’s version with a single click.
At the bottom of the chapter is a wrap-up card. Add a photograph for the chapter, tick the two checks (you have read the chapter and you are happy with the content, and you have double-checked names, places, and dates), and mark the chapter as ready. You can come back and unmark it at any point if you want to make further changes.
Final checks
When every chapter is marked as ready, you will be invited to a short final-checks step. This is where you choose your cover photo, confirm your book title and author name, and give one final approval. We then typeset your book preview as a PDF and email you when it is ready to review.
Reviewing your proof
When your proof is ready, read it through carefully, paying particular attention to names, places, and any specific details. If you spot anything that needs correcting, you can return to the review panel, make your changes, and regenerate the proof.
Once you are happy, you give final approval and your book goes to print.
Help is always available
Every page of the platform has a Help button in the top bar. Click it at any time for a reference guide to whatever you are currently looking at, whether that is the project dashboard, the writing studio, or the proof approval page. The voice input button also has its own help guide for anyone who wants more detail on getting the best results from speaking their answers.
If you encounter a formatting issue in your proof copy that you cannot resolve yourself, there is a reporting tool on the dashboard that sends the details directly to the Biography Studio team.
The most important thing
The platform is designed to stay out of your way. The questions are what matter. Find a quiet half hour, open a chapter, and begin. Everything else is there when you need it.
If you want to understand more about how to get the most from your answers before you start, this guide is worth reading first: How to Get the Best Answers from Your Biography Studio Project