Research is the most important thing in the writing, The more you research, the more you have the data in your mind or the more information about the topic you are supposed to write about, the more you read about the topic, the more you come to know that people want to read, yes you can put your imagination to fire it up.
Yes, research is very important in writing. You know inventors don't just suck thumb to get to invent something. They gather well know facts that work, and then... add their little bit, to make something quite different and what do you know... it makes history with it's ingenious work-ability.