Welcome to the ScreenScript Page
Welcome to the ScreenScript Page
I wrote my first screenplay using Microsoft Word and it was extremely painful. I spent more time formatting text than I spent writing. This had to change! When I wrote my second screenplay I decided to switch to Latex (http://www.latex-project.org/). Latex is a type-setting program that allows you to write and not worry about the formatting. After you are done writing, the file is compiled and it produces a publication quality document based on a template file. Latex is great for many reasons, but here are two very good ones: it is free and it produces documents that look better than anything MS Word produces. I am not sure why, but Microsoft has never been able to produce publication quality fonts. If you don't believe me, then print out these two examples of the same page and compare them:
"So what is the catch?" As far as I know, there is no "easy" way to get Latex running in a Microsoft Windows Operating System (OS). It is generally included with any packaged Linux OS though. Why is this such a big deal? Because, it is now possible to buy a state-of-the-art computer for under $150 from Fry's electronics. It has no monitor, and it is running Linux, not Windows, but, still, $150 for a computer....amazing! For the financially poor and suffering screenwriter this is wonderful news, except...what exactly is Linux OS?
In a nutshell, Linux is a free operating system. You can learn more about it at http://www.linux.org or by simply doing a web search. What is important is that Linux systems have actually gotten to the point where the Graphical User Interface (GUI) is on par with Windows and is extremely user friendly. The other important thing is that it has Microsoft nervous...a free operating system with software that similar or better than ours? There are different companies that package the Linux OS. I use Mandrake, but there is Red Hat, Debian and Slackware. What I have done is downloaded Linux Mandrake and installed it on a second drive in my computer. Windows doesn't even know that Linux is on the other drive and, since Linux comes with its own boot manager, it is easy to switch between the two operating systems.
Unfortunately, the one thing that Linux does not have is some of the mainstream but specialized software, like Final Draft or Movie Magic. But we don't care about that, because we have Latex. For everyone familiar with Microsoft Word or other What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get type of software (which rarely actually produces what you see) Latex will surprise you. As you write, you include commands which, after you compile the text file, will result in formatting which is defined by a class file. It is the class file which takes a bit of time to write and it is why this web site is here.
A really powerful aspect of Latex is that IT DOESN”T MATTER what you write your text file with (Notepad, Word, Wordperfect, Emacs..) it is just a text file. I frequently used my MS Windows laptop on trips to do some writing on the plane and then I would transfer the file to my Linux computer via a floppy disk. Remember floppies? Another great thing about using Latex is that the document size is kilobytes, not megabytes!
If you are familiar with Linux and Latex, then using ScreenScript should be very straightforward and easy for you. Actually, you will probably make improvements to the calss file and tell me about it. If you are familiar with Linux, but not Latex, it should still not be very difficult for you to use ScreenScript, just follow the directions in the ScreenScript HowTo and download the ScreenScript Class File. For those of you who are new to Linux and Latex, well....don't start this project if you have a deadline! It is a great operating system and type setting program, but you will probably have to do quite a bit of research to get it up and running.
There is very little that I can share with anyone about actually writing a screenplay. I write them because I enjoy writing. I am fairly successful in my other endevours, so I do not need the income (won't turn it down though!) Luckily, there is Terry Rossio & Ted Elliott's page Wordplay to help you write. If you haven't read everything on their site, then you are missing a great resource. Get busy.
Finally, the credits. ScreenScript actually started as
a small class file that was written by T.J. Porter in 2001 and released
under the terms of the GPL
copyright as film.cls.
I added a great deal of formatting and extra commands to make it ScreenScript,
but you can certainly look at the original. Another is screenplay.cls which
was written by Tom Merrall, April 2002. I didn't discover screenplay.cls
until I had written screenscript.cls, but had I then I would have tried
to use it. It seems much more complete.
Good Luck Writing!
JD