screenwriting
Latest
Amazon's screenwriting tool lets you easily share scripts
We all have at least one great story to tell, and Amazon's free screenplay writing software is intended to help you spin that tale. Like other screenwriting tools, Amazon Storywriter auto-formats your work to the required industry standard, with the added benefit of letting you submit your script directly to Amazon Studios if you think you've created the next Prime Video original. Before you get to that point, though, you might want a second opinion. Which is why Amazon's added a new quick-sharing feature to Storywriter that lets you easily put your script in front of reliable critics (aka Mom and Dad).
Firefox creator writes an unofficial, on-point episode of 'Silicon Valley'
Many in the tech sphere will tell you that HBO's Silicon Valley is sometimes too accurate in its send-up of the San Francisco Bay Area's frequently ridiculous startup culture. But how good would it be if someone who actually came from the industry wrote an episode? You're about to find out. Firefox co-creator Blake Ross has posted an unofficial Silicon Valley screenplay that starts where the second season finished, and it's clearly the result of someone who's witnessed startup shenanigans first-hand. Richard has to hire his own CEO replacement, and grapples with the prospect of open-sourcing Pied Piper's code.
Review: Final Draft 9, the world's most popular screenwriting software plays catch up
Final Draft is without a doubt the industry's leading software for screenwriting. It is used in virtually every writer's room across Hollywood and endorsed by such heavyweights as James Cameron, Tom Hanks and JJ Abrams. However, the reason the software rose to the top spot in the film world is that for years there were no better alternatives. That's changed a lot in the last five or so years, with plenty of cheaper and more feature-rich alternatives popping up on the Mac platform. As a matter of fact, many in the industry had started to complain that Final Draft was showing its age and it needed to do some serious catching up. And "catching up" is indeed what the company has done with the latest major release of Final Draft -- Final Draft 9. How'd they do? Read on. New Mac-Only Features While there are plenty of good scriptwriting software alternatives now available on the Mac, the reason Final Draft has such a strong hold on the industry is because it's a strong cross-platform app, with versions for OS X and Windows. But it seems like the company realized it was going to have to give a little more love to the Mac side of things this time around given all the advances its Mac competitors have made in the four years since the last major version of Final Draft was released. The most noticeable change you'll see in Final Draft 9 is that it now supports the MacBook Pro's Retina display. This is huge to those writers with a Retina MBP because Final Draft 8 frankly looked like a pixelated mess on Apple's latest notebooks. In addition to supported Retina text, all the buttons and menu items have also been Retina-ized. Other Mac love added to Final Draft 9 includes full-screen support, full Mavericks support and support for OS X 10.9's dictation. Unfortunately, Final Draft 9 doesn't support iCloud's Documents in the Cloud, nor does it support OS X's versioning. New Cross-platform Features Moving beyond the Mac-only features, Final Draft 9 adds plenty of enhancements for both Mac and Windows. The new Character Navigator now lets you add character arc beats in each scene and it also adds non-speaking characters to the Navigator, which helps you keep track of all characters in a script. The ScriptNotes Navigator has an all-new look and now allows users to sort their notes by color, name or type. Another nice feature is Character Highlighting, which highlights each character's dialogue with a different color in the script. This makes it easier for actors and others to keep track of dialogue during table reads. A huge boon is also the ability to watermark scripts in printing and saving to PDF. For every script you print or share as a PDF, you can add a unique watermark to it identifying the person who the script is being given to. This means it's easy to track down who leaked the script if it appears online. Final Draft 9 also includes a host of other, smaller new features including improved spell checkers, thesaurus enhancements, the ability to custom-order Character Lists, Revision page color support and more. Cost and Verdict At a US$249.99 price tag, one may think that the relatively limited major new features for a piece of flagship screenwriting software aren't worth the price, but as usual with any piece of professional software, it's all the little changes taken as a whole that give major updates their worth. With that in mind, I think Final Draft 9 is a no-brainer for any Mac user in the business of writing screenplays. If you own a Retina MacBook Pro, Final Draft 9 is worth buying just for the Retina display support alone. But even if you don't need the Retina support, Final Draft 9 is a decent upgrade that helps the aging software catch up to the younger upstarts -- and for that, it is worth it. Until the end of January, customers can buy the full version of Final Draft 9 for $199.99 on the Mac App Store or via Final Draft's online store. That's 20 percent off of the normal $249.99 price tag. Users of Final Draft 8 can buy the Final Draft 9 upgrade for $79.99 on Final Draft's online store (the upgrade price goes back up to $99.99 on February 1st). A note on buying Final Draft 9: If you don't qualify for upgrade pricing, seriously consider buying the full version of Final Draft 9 through the Mac App Store. Final Draft is notorious for having an annoying and archaic registration process if you buy a version requiring that you enter the serial number each time you install it. You'll save yourself a lot of time and some big headaches if you bypass the serial number all together and get it through the Mac App Store.
Amazon Storybuilder beta puts your screenplay ideas in the cloud
Aspiring screenwriters don't have many great choices for simple, purpose-built apps: What exists is frequently expensive, overkill or both. Amazon may shake things up with its new Storybuilder beta, though. The free web app lets auteurs outline movie and TV screenplays using a virtual corkboard accessible from any device with a modern browser; if you think of a clever plot twist while on your phone, you can drop it in. Writers can add images, notes and tags, and they can invite critiques from other readers. Storybuilder won't replace a full set of scriptwriting tools, but it and the existing Storyteller app may get the ball rolling on your next big drama.
Final Draft Writer comes to the iPad
Last month I told you about Final Draft Reader, an iPad app from the makers of Final Draft that allows users to view and make notes on their Final Draft scripts on the iPad. Of course, the number one response we got to the story was, "That's awesome, but where's the Final Draft for iPad that allows us to write scripts?" As of today, it's here. Enter Final Draft Writer. Final Draft Writer is Final Draft brought to the touchscreen. The app has actually been in development at Final Draft for over two years, but they didn't want to release it until they got it right. The company actually even brought in a specialized team of iOS developers to port their proprietary Final Draft system to the iPad. What does version 1.0 of Final Draft Writer do? It lets you create scripts from scratch, right on your iPad, for starters. The app offers built-in templates for screenplays, stageplays, one hour TV dramas, and sitcoms. Beyond simply creating screenplays, the app also offers several pro features found in the desktop version, including SmartType technology that remembers your Character Names, Scene Headings, etc; Character Highlighting that allows you to call out specific character dialogue in the script; the ability to show Active or Collated Revisions with colored pages; the ability to quickly switch from one revision to the next; a host of reports including Cast, Scene, and Location reports; a specialized Final Draft keyboard header that easily lets you navigate or add script elements; and much more. Sharing features include AirPrint printing, Dropbox integration, and importing scripts through iTunes or email. Final Draft Writer isn't going to replace Final Draft for OS X, just like no word processor for iOS will ever replace desktop word processors for professional writers that deal with manuscripts that are hundreds of pages long. But what Final Draft Writer does do is give screenwriters the ability to work on their scripts any time and any where that they are away from their computers. For writers, it's a welcome addition to iOS's growing list of powerful word processors. Final Draft Writer is available in the App Store starting today. Best of all, it's available for a introductory price of US$29.99 until September 30th, when it will go back up to $49.99. %Gallery-163575%
Bloodrayne screenwriter explains the perils of working with Uwe Boll
"Scripts are late. Writers are two years late. I was two weeks late," Bloodrayne film screenwriter Guinevere Turner passionately explains in an interview pulled from "Tales From the Script," a documentary showcasing stories from across the world of screenwriting. "Uwe Boll calls me [on the phone], 'This is fucking disgusting! You lied to me! Where is my script?!'," she continues, demonstrating how she held the phone away from her head as he yelled. Unsurprisingly, Turner wasn't a fan of being yelled at, and instructed her manager to make sure she never heard from Boll again. When she turned in the script, however, Turner still expected to work with Boll on future drafts. That wasn't to be, as she recalls that Boll accepted the very first "nasty, little scrappy draft"and went right into production (though she notes that only about 20 percent of what she wrote made it into the film's final cut). When Bloodrayne finally debuted at Los Angeles' famous "Mann's Chinese Theater," Turner says she was the only one in the room of production staff "laughing out loud." Adding insult to injury, Turner closes the interview by saying, "It's like a 25 million dollar movie, and it blows! I mean, it's like the worst movie ever made." But then, maybe she hasn't seen Far Cry?
Daily Mac App: Final Draft
Final Draft 8, the industry-standard scriptwriting software, has finally come to the Mac App Store. Even for those of you who have never written a movie script, you've seen the fruits of labor of the app used by those writers. Before Christian Bale utters a menacing threat to a criminal in a Batman movie or Ashton Kutcher cracks a joke on Two and a Half Men, their words were written on Final Draft. AMong its features, Final Draft 8 includes Scene View, which allows writers to drag and drop scenes in the order they want them to appear in the script, split-screen writing so you can be at two places in your script at once and Format Assistant, which checks to make sure your layout and more applies to industry-standard rules. Now while I love Final Draft, it's important to note that the version released on the Mac App Store is the same one that's been available for a while now. There are no big new features that should warrant owners of the current version to switch. However, if you are thinking of buying Final Draft 8, do it through the Mac App Store and not through the website. Until Final Draft 8 became available on the Mac App Store, the software had one of the most burdensome registration processes ever. Instead of relying on a serial number for registration, users had to enter challenge and authorization codes online or over the phone, and if you lost one of those codes (as I have in the past) it was easier to buy a new copy of the software than trying to get the people at Final Draft to reactivate your copy. Users who buy Final Draft through the Mac App Store never have to worry about this again. While I do recommend that anyone who writes scripts for a living use Final Draft, that's not to say the software is without its drawbacks. First off, the UI is beginning to show its age. Also, there is cheaper software, such as Scrivener, that gives Final Draft a serious run for its money. But the main problem I have with Final Draft is they are usually slow to adopt new technology. This is no more apparent than using the software in OS X 10.7 Lion. As it stands now, Final Draft doesn't take advantage of Lion's new features such as Versions, iCloud document syncing, full-screen support and Auto Save. It also doesn't take advantage of Lion's Dictionary panel or scroll bars. The people at Final Draft told me that full-screen support and Auto Save are coming in a future version of the software, but Versions and iCloud document syncing will not be. The reason for this is that Final Draft is developing their own proprietary solution called Final Draft Connect, which will act as an online project-management solution. This makes sense because Final Draft isn't just a Mac app. Its got a massive Windows userbase as well. However, it would be nice if Final Draft would also implement Versions and iCloud document syncing in addition to its proprietary solution. Final Draft 8 is available on the Mac App Store for US$199.99. That's 20% off its normal $249.99 price. The sale runs until the end of October. %Gallery-135614%
Final Draft coming for iPhone and iPad in Spring 2011
Popular screenwriting tool Final Draft is finally making its way to the iPhone and iPad. The company confirmed last year that it was working on a companion iPad and iPhone application, and that app is now close to being finished. While the company has not announced an exact date for launch, a recent email sent to subscribers points to a Spring 2011 debut for its iPad and presumably iPhone version. According to Final Draft's Facebook page, the iOS app will be compatible with version 8 FDX files and will support two-way transfer so that you can easily move your script from your iOS to your desktop and back. While traveling, the tool will let you edit script files and add notes using your iOS device. It will be perfect for those on-the-go moments of inspiration. Budding screenwriters should head over to Final Draft's website and sign up for its iPad alerts so that you can be the first to snag this version when it debuts. [Via Will Robertson]
Montage 1.0 released
Today marks the release of the final version of Montage, which we wrote about when it was but a mere beta. Montage is a professional quality screen writing program which includes a number of things you won't find in traditional text editors. Amongst these features are smart views, Final Draft importing, included industry contacts that you can spam 'contact' with your script, and a full screen mode.A 30 day demo is available and if you like it be prepared to shell out $139.95 for the full version.
DV Guru reviews Montage - Mac screenwriting software
Our pal Ajit Anhony at our sister blog DV Guru has reviewed Montage, a new screenwriting app from Mariner Software, makers of the popular MacJournal. Overall Ajit is satisfied with Montage and sees a bright future for this app in a (finally) growing industry of Final Draft competitors. However, Ajit can't help but compare Montage to his personal favorite, Celtx, especially since Celtx's price of $0 and innovative feature set make it hard to beat.Check out Ajit's review for in-depth details on what this new screenwriting app can offer.
