I trying to write a script. I have ideas and even full scenes in my head. I want to write it down in some type of format. Like plot outline or somthing. Any suggestions of outlines or such. Thanks.
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Gathering iDeas
- Thread starter WonderWorks
- Start date
thats a very good method and one that I have used. You should decide the key points of scenes to write on cards eg -
Who:
Where:
Why:
Line:
etc
You can put these on each of the scene cards and fill in the blanks. It helps to tighten it all up. Use a highlighter colour, say yellow for why. Another colour for line, and so forth. This allows you, once done, to stand back and see patterns that you would not have before. It also helps you to reveal your hidden themes/points more. For example, every one of the lines that are highlighted may refer to BOX, and your script is about the concept of box and people being able to connect in the hustle-bustle of metropolis of make-believe. etc
some writers also take an A4 piece of paper for each character and draw charts and graphs depicting their part of the script. On the y axis have say, tension and on the x have comedy.
This allows you to really understand the roles of your characters much more.
Good luck.
Who:
Where:
Why:
Line:
etc
You can put these on each of the scene cards and fill in the blanks. It helps to tighten it all up. Use a highlighter colour, say yellow for why. Another colour for line, and so forth. This allows you, once done, to stand back and see patterns that you would not have before. It also helps you to reveal your hidden themes/points more. For example, every one of the lines that are highlighted may refer to BOX, and your script is about the concept of box and people being able to connect in the hustle-bustle of metropolis of make-believe. etc
some writers also take an A4 piece of paper for each character and draw charts and graphs depicting their part of the script. On the y axis have say, tension and on the x have comedy.
This allows you to really understand the roles of your characters much more.
Good luck.
What works for me...
Once I decide exactly the kind of a screenplay I'm writing (thriller, horror, etc.), I take a digital recorder (I recently picked up 5 of these at Sam's Club for less than $20 apiece) and generally plot out the idea with the recorder. Just the basic idea at this point.
Next, if I have a few ideas for locations, I try like hell to find these locations here locally... If I can't or they don't exist locally... ROAD TRIP. That's right, I drive to these locations... I actually rent a car and go exploring (it's all a deduction anyway). Once at the locations, I walk around with my digital recorder and sometimes a small Mini-DV camera and make verbal and video notes. I basically describe the location in great detail. I look at everything from cracks in the sidewalks to the kind of trash that's littered around... I watch the kind of people that come and go. I make note of what they're wearing... What they drive. Doing this in such a detailed way will almost always give me some new ideas for scenes that I hadn't even considered.
When writing all this stuff down i.e., transcribing from the digital recorder and camcorder is easy... I simply summarize each digitally recorded note or video note in a word processing document. Each new note gets its own paragraph. Mind you, this is before I EVER write a word of the actual screenplay.
Just use your own words... Write it in a way that will cause you to remember it exactly the way you saw it. Transcribing will also JOG some new ideas about your story as well...
At this point, these are simply my own ideas for scenes about the screenplay I want to write. I always carry the digital recorder with me because you never know when simply seeing things happen during your day will create an idea for your script...
Normally, by the time I have all these ideas written down, I will have roughly 8 to 12 pages of scene ideas/notes.
In addition to this I will try to find films within the same genre to see if there's ANYTHING that I can steal... LOL. Not really steal but do something similar in a unique way. For instance, on the current script I'm writing (a horror/thriller) I just watched WRONG TURN. Not exactly the same movie I'm writing... Not by a long shot. But at the beginning of that film... When the couple are rock climbing and the girl jumps off the side of the rock face to get away from the unknown evil, that gave me an idea to do something totally different (but similar) within my own script). Additionally, I can see that the filmmaker(s) of WRONG TURN did something similar that Steven Spielberg did in JAWS. Remember at the beginning of JAWS when the girl and the drunk guy decide to take a midnight swim in the ocean? Remember the girl is in the water and gets attacked and eventually pulled down out of frame? Very high tension and suspenseful. Notice how WRONG TURN did essentially the same thing with the girl that THOUGHT she jumped to safety... They have her in the frame, crawling into it when someone or something grabs her legs and pulls her back out of the frame until the frame is empty... And, that's my point... Take a scene like that that really puts out the tension (makes you feel it) and you know you are witnessing a good scene. Now don't copy it exactly. Put your own spin on it but keep the basics of it so that it too creates tension.
Anyway, so watch other films and find scenes that you can exploit in your screenplay... Magnify the hell out of them. Keep the essential idea of the scene but put in a new character, new location, dialogue, etc. Make it different. Try to change it to something we've never seen before yet keeping the focus of the scene.
Then of course, write those ideas down as well. One new paragraph per idea.
Once you have 45 to 75 ideas for scenes, you might actually be ready to start writing... Assuming you have already created the bulk of your main characters...
Good luck!
filmy
WonderWorks said:
Once I decide exactly the kind of a screenplay I'm writing (thriller, horror, etc.), I take a digital recorder (I recently picked up 5 of these at Sam's Club for less than $20 apiece) and generally plot out the idea with the recorder. Just the basic idea at this point.
Next, if I have a few ideas for locations, I try like hell to find these locations here locally... If I can't or they don't exist locally... ROAD TRIP. That's right, I drive to these locations... I actually rent a car and go exploring (it's all a deduction anyway). Once at the locations, I walk around with my digital recorder and sometimes a small Mini-DV camera and make verbal and video notes. I basically describe the location in great detail. I look at everything from cracks in the sidewalks to the kind of trash that's littered around... I watch the kind of people that come and go. I make note of what they're wearing... What they drive. Doing this in such a detailed way will almost always give me some new ideas for scenes that I hadn't even considered.
When writing all this stuff down i.e., transcribing from the digital recorder and camcorder is easy... I simply summarize each digitally recorded note or video note in a word processing document. Each new note gets its own paragraph. Mind you, this is before I EVER write a word of the actual screenplay.
Just use your own words... Write it in a way that will cause you to remember it exactly the way you saw it. Transcribing will also JOG some new ideas about your story as well...
At this point, these are simply my own ideas for scenes about the screenplay I want to write. I always carry the digital recorder with me because you never know when simply seeing things happen during your day will create an idea for your script...
Normally, by the time I have all these ideas written down, I will have roughly 8 to 12 pages of scene ideas/notes.
In addition to this I will try to find films within the same genre to see if there's ANYTHING that I can steal... LOL. Not really steal but do something similar in a unique way. For instance, on the current script I'm writing (a horror/thriller) I just watched WRONG TURN. Not exactly the same movie I'm writing... Not by a long shot. But at the beginning of that film... When the couple are rock climbing and the girl jumps off the side of the rock face to get away from the unknown evil, that gave me an idea to do something totally different (but similar) within my own script). Additionally, I can see that the filmmaker(s) of WRONG TURN did something similar that Steven Spielberg did in JAWS. Remember at the beginning of JAWS when the girl and the drunk guy decide to take a midnight swim in the ocean? Remember the girl is in the water and gets attacked and eventually pulled down out of frame? Very high tension and suspenseful. Notice how WRONG TURN did essentially the same thing with the girl that THOUGHT she jumped to safety... They have her in the frame, crawling into it when someone or something grabs her legs and pulls her back out of the frame until the frame is empty... And, that's my point... Take a scene like that that really puts out the tension (makes you feel it) and you know you are witnessing a good scene. Now don't copy it exactly. Put your own spin on it but keep the basics of it so that it too creates tension.
Anyway, so watch other films and find scenes that you can exploit in your screenplay... Magnify the hell out of them. Keep the essential idea of the scene but put in a new character, new location, dialogue, etc. Make it different. Try to change it to something we've never seen before yet keeping the focus of the scene.
Then of course, write those ideas down as well. One new paragraph per idea.
Once you have 45 to 75 ideas for scenes, you might actually be ready to start writing... Assuming you have already created the bulk of your main characters...
Good luck!
filmy
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excellent idea on the recorder filmy. I use that for my degree - research, possible arguments, that kind of thing. It really does help. It allows you to, after a while of recording, sit down with your ideas for a solid hour and collect all the disparate moments and agglutinate them into an impressive whole.
Thanks alot. All these ideas sound perfect. It's just what i needed
Sean P. Farrell
High School Student
Brooklyn, New York
Sean P. Farrell
High School Student
Brooklyn, New York
1. Chatting at bar - John (hero) and his friend Bob sit at a bar and talk. John shares his dreams of owning a coffee shop with Bob. Bob's sad because his girlfriend broke up with him.
2. Rise and shine - John wakes up the next morning in bed and there's a few messages on his answering machine, he checks them and one of the messages is from his mother. She wants him to call because she is worried about him
3. Headlines - John drinks coffee in the kitchen and reads the morning paper. Headlines read "WHEN IT RAINS IT POURS - longest period of rain in over a century".
4. Shower - John showers and brushes his teeth.
5. Car - John in his car. His cars a pile of junk. He has trouble starting it.
6. Cubicle - John slugishly types away at his computer.
7. Lunch - John has lunch with Bob and Dillon at a hamburger joint and talk about how work sucks.
------------------------
The above is a silly example of what I call a scene outline.
It's the first thing I do when I am preparing a screenplay.
I don't include any dialogue.
Give each scene a number/bullet and a cool little title. It's easier to find them later when you're moving scenesaround.
AVOID using index cards like the plague! They were great "before" there were computers but now it doesn't make any sense to do. I'd rather cut and paste scenes on an outline than shuffle 60-100 index cards. If you want 'Productivity", throw the index cards in the trash (just my opinion).
If you have a great scene in mind but not sure where to put it, just get it down with the others.
After your done you can cut and paste the scenes to where they fit best.
Using this method is like acting like GOD. You can look down over your entire screenplay all at once.
Once your happy with how it all flows, open up Final Draft or Movie Magic and start writing.
What I LOVE to do is after I wrote a scene from the scene oultine into the screenplay is BOLD that scene in the outline so that I know it's done. Once you have a bunch of scenes bolded in the outline you will start to get excited because you can see your progress and how far along your coming.
If you get to a "boring" scene that you dread writing or you just are not sure what to write, skip it! I tend to save the boring scenes for last (It's called Island Hopping).
Before you attempt to write a scene outline practice doing it with one of your favorite movies. Here's a scene outline/study I wrote for the movie GoodFellas, to give you an idea of what they should look like.
I included some dialogue in this Goodfellas outline and the grammer/speling is terrible, as I was pausing and playing the movie as I wrote.
http://www.towniesmovie.com/goodfellas.rtf
(this file will be deleted within a month)
I highly recommend the scene outline method. Give it a try! Good luck.
2. Rise and shine - John wakes up the next morning in bed and there's a few messages on his answering machine, he checks them and one of the messages is from his mother. She wants him to call because she is worried about him
3. Headlines - John drinks coffee in the kitchen and reads the morning paper. Headlines read "WHEN IT RAINS IT POURS - longest period of rain in over a century".
4. Shower - John showers and brushes his teeth.
5. Car - John in his car. His cars a pile of junk. He has trouble starting it.
6. Cubicle - John slugishly types away at his computer.
7. Lunch - John has lunch with Bob and Dillon at a hamburger joint and talk about how work sucks.
------------------------
The above is a silly example of what I call a scene outline.
It's the first thing I do when I am preparing a screenplay.
I don't include any dialogue.
Give each scene a number/bullet and a cool little title. It's easier to find them later when you're moving scenesaround.
AVOID using index cards like the plague! They were great "before" there were computers but now it doesn't make any sense to do. I'd rather cut and paste scenes on an outline than shuffle 60-100 index cards. If you want 'Productivity", throw the index cards in the trash (just my opinion).
If you have a great scene in mind but not sure where to put it, just get it down with the others.
After your done you can cut and paste the scenes to where they fit best.
Using this method is like acting like GOD. You can look down over your entire screenplay all at once.
Once your happy with how it all flows, open up Final Draft or Movie Magic and start writing.
What I LOVE to do is after I wrote a scene from the scene oultine into the screenplay is BOLD that scene in the outline so that I know it's done. Once you have a bunch of scenes bolded in the outline you will start to get excited because you can see your progress and how far along your coming.
If you get to a "boring" scene that you dread writing or you just are not sure what to write, skip it! I tend to save the boring scenes for last (It's called Island Hopping).
Before you attempt to write a scene outline practice doing it with one of your favorite movies. Here's a scene outline/study I wrote for the movie GoodFellas, to give you an idea of what they should look like.
I included some dialogue in this Goodfellas outline and the grammer/speling is terrible, as I was pausing and playing the movie as I wrote.
http://www.towniesmovie.com/goodfellas.rtf
(this file will be deleted within a month)
I highly recommend the scene outline method. Give it a try! Good luck.
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