The storyteller. Final script + renders
The Storyteller (script)
Audience: 15+
Author: Andrei Obraztsov
Genre: Comedy, Short Film
Page count: 13
1. Creating Idea
I started my script with an idea that was based on a real story from my life, only remade for the British audience, because if you tell this story in the way it was in reality, you will get a lot of misunderstandings. After I came up with the idea, I made a plan for it using Milanote, where I painted all the most basic aspects of the script, such as Characters, Plot, Location, and others. In the future, I used this plan not to change my script several times, but to leave it as it was originally intended. I can say that I successfully coped with this. Below you can see my plan.
2. Research
It is not enough just to have a plan to write a script, you also need to be able to write it , which I could not say about myself at the beginning of my journey. So I started research to understand how to write a script correctly. First, I started with the structure. I took the script of one of my favorite movies ( The Truman Show) and analyzed it to understand all the fundamental aspects of writing the script and this is what I learned from it.
From this page of the script, which contains almost everything that is in the script, I found out everything that I needed. For example:
The scene begins with a description of where it is and what time of day it is. Also it is written with capital letters. For example, INT. MIKE'S ROOM. MORNING.
Action takes full page when dialogues only half page.
Characters name always in capital letters.
Font and text size are Courier New, 12 size.
It is all because with this structure 1 page of script will take approximately 1 minute to shot.
However, this was not enough and I did some more research. One of my problems when writing the script was a misunderstanding with the action lines , I seemed to understand what should be there, but on the other hand I made a lot of mistakes when writing it. For example, I could write something that we will never know from the story itself. So I looked at the script of the movie Reserviour Dogs, namely the beginning of this movie , which contains a very long dialogue in a diner at the beginning, just like my script, where almost all the action takes place in a pub. Below you can see two pages from script.
On these pages, you can see that the actions in it are painted, only those that were in the film itself, which the viewer himself could watch. So I changed my script a little bit and removed some of the errors that were incorrectly described.
My next research was taken from the writers of the PIXAR Studio , whose animation projects are now known all over the world. I watched a few of their lessons to make sure I was doing everything right. Among the lessons were Idea Creation, character creation, and internal and external character design. Below you can find all of this materials.
From the reviewed materials , I took a few basic ideas that the authors convey. First, it's that it's easier to create an idea with words, and what if this or this happens . As an example, this can be suitable for any movie that is not even from the PIXAR Studio . The Truman show, whose script I used to analyze the structure of script writing, also has a similar idea. In a movie, it works so that if a character lives all his life in a TV show where he is the only real one , and all his surroundings are just actors and scenery. Second, the character had to be easily associated with the viewer , for this purpose it is necessary that the character behaved like a person, had human emotions, needs, dreams , and so on. Without this, the character can turn out to be nothing , it is also important that the characters are not idealists, otherwise they can be very boring. And finally, the internal and external features of the character, where it was told that externally and internally the characters may differ. As an example, a character can look like a superhero, and his thoughts are villainous.
My last research, which I would like to mention, was done at the end of writing the script, when I was faced with the problem of how to finish the script. To do this, I looked at several scripts, but it is impossible to say that the same style is used there. And there are many ways to finish the script. For example, you can just capitalize THE END in the middle of the last line as in Zootopia , or you can just leave the last scene without any additions as in the movie Knives Out. However, for my script, I used Fade to black, which also means the end of the script.
By the way, to write the script , I also watched a short film that takes place in a pub and is also a Comedy. I liked the idea of this film in many ways, as well as good dialogues and a good picture for a not very expensive film. From this film, I drew inspiration about how my film should work . Reading my script, you may be able to find some similarities, although they are almost imperceptible.
Sources:
3.APP SOFTWARE: FINAL DRAFT 11
I used the Final draft 11 app to write my script, as this app is very popular, has good reviews, and many well-known screenwriters work in this program. The only problem with this app is the price of $ 249, but if you are a student, then in this case, you can buy the app for $ 129, which of course is still expensive for such an app. In any case, going to an official site, you can get 30 days of free test to understand whether you need the program or not, which is actually what I did, since other applications that I used, such as the browser Celtx, have many restrictions and did not look very convenient for me personally, so my choice in the direction of Final Draft 11 was obvious.
4. Randers in Source Filmmaker.
Source Filmmaker is free animation app in Steam. The only thing is that this program was created to create animated videos or posters on game themes. I have worked in this program many times and decided to make a couple of renders of what my script looks like in my vision, since I can't draw storyboards at all.
From left to right. Oscar, Harry, George, Leo
Elliot came
On these renders, you can see the color saturation, the approximate appearance of the characters and their clothes ( Unfortunately, the models from the workshop in this program are limited), a fairly accurate view of the pub where the characters sit. But the main idea of these vendors is different. As you can see on the first render there are 4 characters, their faces are more happy and interested than on the second. Since in the story, when the fifth character Elliot comes, he begins to behave like a not very good person, which negatively affects the characters, except for George, who in two situations pays more attention to drinking than pretending to be involved in a conversation. In my opinion, in my script - data renders were made if not necessarily, then at least desirable, since here the person who will read the script will visually understand what is happening.
Final Result of Script.
The differences between the pre-final version and this one are minimal. Also, I did not remove obscene words from the script, as they are necessary for the plot and readers will be easier to understand the characters. For example, in the final it was impossible to do without it. Just as I wrote earlier, I have big problems with dialogues, as they are still not very realistic as I would like. However, the biggest problem in the course of writing the script turned out to be that already in the second week of writing I lost interest. The reason for this I see is that, the story is already very old for me, which occurred during my training at school. This story I have already told many times and also wrote on it more essay on school exams. You can say that I lost interest in this story. I chose this particular story because I wanted to write a story as soon as possible, so that it was about 20 pages, but over time, I realized that this was a mistake on my part. I think the best idea would be to write a more original script, which I have plenty of ideas for, and I hope I will write about this next time, although on the other hand, my ideas are currently more suitable for a full-length film than for a short film. In any case this script has helped me a lot and I'm sure it will help me in the future
Reflection.
I can say that when writing this script, I was able to learn at least the correct structure of writing the script. I also learned a lot of small features when writing. For example, I understand how it is easiest to come up with a story, how to create characters correctly, how they should look and how they should behave. I can say that now I have a pretty good understanding of what scripts should contain and what shouldn't be there. On the other hand, I understand that if I write only one script, I will not be able to become an expert in writing scripts, so I have a lot of work to do in the future to improve my skills. First of all, these are obviously dialogues, I have to make my characters talk more realistically than is shown in my script. To do this, I think you need to watch more different movies and TV series in the original voice acting in English and begin to understand different varieties of language, dialects, accents, and so on.
If we talk about the problem that I encountered in writing the script, because what I did not always write about what I know. As a result, this led to problems with time and I spent several days writing one page, since I did not fully understand what the character should say in this dialogue in order to show his or her opinion. Perhaps someone will also think that I wrote the script for one scene because of laziness, but this is not true
If we talk about what I want to improve in the future. The first thing is to write something more original in my performance. Second, improve the quality of dialogues. Third, I would like to be completely immersed in the story from the beginning to the end, and not lose interest in the story in the middle. Fourth, learn how to draw storyboards, since at the moment, my drawing skills are slightly less than their complete absence. Finally, I would like to spend my time writing the script more rationally.
References:
Scriptsplug (2020) The Truman Show script [Online] scriptslug.com
Available from: https://www.scriptslug.com/assets/uploads/scripts/the-truman-show-1998.pdf [Accessed 12/03/2020]
Scriptsplug (2020) Knives Out script [Online] scriptslug.com
Available from: https://www.scriptslug.com/assets/uploads/scripts/knives-out-2019.pdf [Accessed 12/03/2020]
Scriptsplug (2020) Zootopia script[Online] scriptslug.com
Available from: https://www.scriptslug.com/assets/uploads/scripts/zootopia-2016.pdf [Accessed 12/03/2020]
IMSDb (2020) Reservoir Dogs script [Online] imsdb.com
Available from: https://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Reservoir-Dogs.html [Accessed 12/03/2020]
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