Friday 21 August 2009

'EXILE' - part 1

A while ago, I talked about doing a series of posts detailing my writing methods through a feature script. Alas I got sidetracked (which is not uncommon for me). However, with the idea I'm working on at the moment, it's impossible for me to get sidetracked, because it's for uni.

So here I am, talking through how I go about writing a feature script. A year ago I came up with the basic idea and wrote a (very rushed and consequently poor) script. Now I've taken that idea and expanded.

I've just finished writing the synopsis for 'EXILE'. It's essentially a rough, prose version of the story, with no dialogue and very little detail. It comes to a hefty 12 pages (7500 words) which is very long for me. But it should make the scriptwriting considerably easier.

Now I'll make revisions to the story, theme and characters (I expect to remove a few) and try and work out how long (screen time) that'll be. The plan is to take the synopsis and work it into a very rough scene breakdown. Obviously, from there I'll know how many scenes I have and roughly how long each one will take on screen. If it's too much or too little, I'll get to work expanding the story.

All this might take some time because I want to get opinions before rushing on with things. Primarily I'll be getting the advice from my tutor Linda-Lee. After all, she'll be the one helping most and marking the damn thing!

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