This is probably the hardest part of the whole process, not because public domain works are of no interest to people any longer, but because most of the really good ones have been done to death, like Frankenstein, Dracula, Alice In Wonderland, Sherlock Holmes and others. Coming up with a new twist for these classic public domain works may be a little hard, unless you have an absolutely twisted imagination.

You are probably best off looking for pieces that are known, but haven't been done to death. There have been many old classic movies from back in the 20s and 30s that were done once and never done again. You might want to look into some of these.

Your best source for public domain material is probably the biography, especially if it was somebody from the late 1800s or early 1900s. Many of these people were barely touched on in both literature and film. Think about it. How many movies on the Wright Brothers have you seen?

Now, I know what you are thinking. So what? Who wants to read about the Wright Brothers now when we have 767s and jets that can break the sound barrier? Well, tell that to all the people who flocked to see "The Aviator" with Leonardo DiCaprio as Howard Hughes. There are many fascinating figures in history who you can either write about, make a movie on, create a comic book for, or simply release an already public domain work on this person.

And therein lies the problem that almost everyone runs into when trying to decide not only what public domain piece to use but how to use it. Remember, just because a public domain piece is art, literature, or whatever form it may happen to be in, doesn't mean that it has to stay in that form. Sometimes having too many choices makes it difficult to decide just what to do with the piece of work.

Unfortunately, this is a problem that plagues not only people who deal with public domain works but also people who create brand new pieces of literature or film. There is never any guarantee that the work is going to be commercially successful. If you are looking for guarantees and the sure fire "public work masterpiece" that is going to make you a ton of money, you are in the wrong business. As with anything else, deciding on a public domain piece of work and then deciding how to present it, is a risk. But the rewards for a successful choice and reproduction method can be quite substantial.

If you think not, just take a look at the works of Walt Disney. His characters were ALL based on public domain works. His source was the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. This was a man with a vision and knew he could do something with these characters. With a little modernization, he turned them into the classics that we love today.

If you don't have a library near you and have Internet access, you can find plenty of public domain information online if you just know where to look.

One word of caution though, and this is very important. If you go to a site online that claims to have public domain works or information and the title of the site is "Joe's Little Odds And Ends" you might want to be careful about accepting what Joe has to say about what may or may not be a public domain work. No offense to Joe, but you just have no way of knowing if he is an expert. This is why, in this series, I am not going to give you any list on public domain works, because I am NO expert on this. Copyright notices lapse and are applied for all the time and there is no way anybody can keep up with it on a daily basis. That's why, if you want to find out if something is public domain or not, you go right to the sources. And there are several reputable ones.

University Of Michigan - This is probably one of the best places online to go to find public domain works of modern English collections. There is a lot of information at this site and it's easy to get lost. So take your time. If you have problems finding your way around, email them. They're very helpful.

Bartleby - This is another big one online. Bartleby has a ton of works that are in the public domain, including the American Heritage Book of English Usage, Grays Anatomy (sound familiar?), World Factbook, and so much more. Too much to go into here. Bartleby is a virtual gold mine of public domain works.

Ibiblio - This site has a treasure chest of public domain works including art, geography, biographies, (how many life stories have been made into movies or books?) language, literature, natural science, reference, religion, and the list goes on and on. Most people who want to do life stories of somebody will come to Ibiblio for their materials.

Authorama - This site specializes in books by a number of authors whose works are in the public domain. These books include those written by authors like Hans Christian Anderson, Aristotle, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Lewis Carroll (who authored Alice In Wonderland), Charles Dickens (which explains all the Christmas Carol clones of the past 50 years or so), Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Ralph Waldo Emerson, the Grimm Brothers, Mary Shelley (author of Frankenstein, and yes it's public domain) and the list goes on and on.

Are the lights starting to come on? Do you see now how many people actually use public domain works to create some of the masterpieces of our era? All it takes is a little imagination.