The Screenwriting Process: Where to begin, and how to proceed.

[Cryogenic Filmworks]

How are you guys copyrighting your scripts? poorman's copyright?

I could have some unsealed envelopes stashed around which I had previously sent to myself, which now have a postage seal on them. I see your script. I like it. I replace your coverpage with mine, put the script in one of my envelopes and seal it. Now my envelope seal pre-dates yours. I make a movie using this script, you sue. In court I will win. In the unlikely event that you win, all you get to say is "I WON".

Copyright is now 45$ (just went up from 30$ at the beginning of July). Should you have it copyrighted, and I steal it then the balance is all the way in your favor. I will almost definitely lose and since you have copyrighted it, I will have to pay damages. Always copyright. It's there to protect you.

[SKY 27]

i perfer WGA it way better then LoC

[Justin Kuhn]

Wow, y'all are organized....I like to just come up with some characters I like and let them create the situations. It's easier if I've worked the characters out a bit beforehand, of course--that's why I like writing series or re-using characters.

I admit this "method" takes a while, but I'm not a high-volume writer in the first place.

[donkathon]

Organize everything.
Ive gotten through 4-5 feature length scripts. My problem is I've thrown them all away/deleted them all because I didnt like how they turned out.

[SloMocean]

I suck at writing stories from scratch ... by far my biggest weakness... I probably don't give myself enough time to hash things out and try and make it work before scrapping the idea...

I need to start making a real effort to write just for the sake of writing, even if it's crap ...

Thanks for sharing your workflows... it's good to see how others work through the process

[Beau Goldly]

With the advent of the Internet it makes no sense to waste postage and mail a script to yourself (ever hear of mailing an empty envelope and stuffing it later when someone else comes up with an idea? Crooks abound, laddies). Domain names would be one way (they are date and timestamped for all the world to see).

My scripts have been shared with others (I'm not afraid of my ideas being stolen - like a man accused of murder, if I am in the company of hundreds of people during the time of death, I have an alibi. If everyone knows my script idea for years before someone else comes in and claims it for their own, I have witnesses. They come in real handy during the civil trial) ad naseum.

But, if you must (even though the words you write are "copyrighted" when written) spend the 45 bucks and copyright away. If you believe in your project enough, that's very little money (just don't go out to eat one weekend or give up beer for a week or two).


______________________________
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[OldManWinters]

if you spend $45 on beer during a 2 week period, you should base your screenplay around that! good lord man! ha...

[kalbashir]

just use the Hero's Journey; i'm not kidding

goto http://www.clickok.co.uk/index4.html

[agcohn]

My process has changed dramatically from one scriptto the next, but the best stories have always evolved out of my struggles with other ideas.

I spend a long time thinking about a story, envisioning the characters and key plot points in my mind. Then I try and create a great logline from the idea. If I have to change something in order to make the logline great, then I will. If I can create a good high concept premise for a movie, then that makes writing the script that much easier.

Often I will write a treatment and beat sheet, and then jump into the first draft of the script. Once I have finished the first draft I sit on it for a while, and then I compare it to the logline. Is the movie I have written an adequate rendition of the logline? Is it better, is it worse?

Then (and I have only yet done this once, but need to do it with more of my scripts) I go back to an outline, and reshape my script into a more solid product: refining stuff, developing subplots and characters, heightening the conflicts and obstacles.




I guess the most important thing I do in the process of writing my movies is the imagining of my script as the movie I want it to be, though I have never completely succeeded in writing the movie of my dreams. That is what future revisions are for, and I am never satisfied with my current drafts.

Some people seem to have problems where they write a mediocre movie, and think it's great. I have never really had that problem. If I write a mediocre script, and most will be mediocre at first, I know that it is mediocre. I am very critical of my work. Not to the point where I throw everything out ever 10 days or anything like that, but being critical has always allowed me to develop okay ideas into great ideas.

However, I will admit that some of the stories I originally thought were "great" concepts have really just seemed like cliched, rip-offs several years down the road. That is why I do not like to be that attached to any of my scripts. A writer needs to much more than his ideas, and he or she will always find new ideas for movies. Though some of my scripts might be based on better ideas than some of my later scripts, the later scripts are invariably superior, because they show a much more mature story arc and boast infinitely stronger 2nd acts than my earlier scripts.

[dougspice]

Like others, my process is similar, because it works. However, I do like to take various breaks for "communication" between my ideas.

I almost always start from a key scene or philosophical concept of sorts (the latter works far better, but I take what comes). From there I am spending a fair amount of time germanating on characters for this story/world, researching the world, and basically hooking stories and scenes to the story spine that way. Once I feel like I have real momentum, I start into writing the "treatment" - I use quotes because this treatment is exclusively for my own reference, just a non-stop, basically unformatted list of "things that may happen" which I would never show to anyone else.

Right now my characters are either having their own lives, or they aren't. If they aren't, I stop to work through backstories, motivations, hopes and dreams, and all that. If they are (that is, if my characters are organically coming to life through the treatment) then I'll keep moving along.

This is the big "So what?" moment, usually. I'll review everything I've done and ask myself that question. Is this story unique and interesting? Does it have gravitas? Would anyone else care? Is the answer is no, then of course I'll try to ask for some advice, see if I can find a solution. But if that doesn't work then the whole idea may go in the closet. I have a LOT of ideas in the closet. Sometimes years will pass and I'll suddenly realize exactly what I need to do to make a story completely work. I've rarely experienced a shortfall of ideas, so this isn't a problem for me. For someone working solely as a professional writer, this might be a big problem indeed. I'm sure at some point I'll find out.

The writing? The writing is easy. When I'm in the flow, I can easily knock out 10, 15, even 20 pages a day. Getting a first draft done is rarely a challenge once it's come this far.

Re-writing... well, that's another story.