Following his show in Bathurst on Saturday night, Ferguson led a comedy masterclass to teach budding writers the art of being funny.

For him, it was all about helping writers inject a little humour into their work, regardless of what it was.

"Learning the craft of comedy is vital for any writer. If you're writing drama you need a bit of comedy, you need some light to go with the shade," he said.

"I teach people how to write a funny story or how to develop a comic character so that they can write something that has a good chance of being popular."

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Sunday's workshop was attended by a range of people, including authors, stand-up comics and students who were making their own short films.

Ferguson said that their backgrounds didn't matter, nor the medium they wrote in, as the principles of humour are applicable to everything.

When asked if comedy is a difficult skill to teach and to learn, he said it was actually quite the opposite.

"It's remarkably simple, it's just nobody ever teaches it. If more people taught it, they'd realise just how simple comedy is, because when you laugh, most of the time you're laughing at something that's pretty simple," he said

"It's a play on words or an awkward situation. Making people laugh is a simple business, it just takes a lot of thinking because you create laughter by surprising the audience with something they already knew."

The visit to Bathurst was a bit like returning home for Ferguson, who grew up in Blayney.

In addition to his show at Bathurst Memorial Entertainment Centre, which was well received, he caught up with a few friends from the area.