Write It! Tips
Read these 7 Write It! Tips tips to make your life smarter, better, faster and wiser. Each tip is approved by our Editors and created by expert writers so great we call them Gurus. LifeTips is the place to go when you need to know about Screen Writing tips and hundreds of other topics.
Writer's Block?
Question writer's block's existence. Perhaps, it does not exist at all. Motivate yourself daily to write (and you may have to “trick” yourself sometimes). The next time you reach a lull, ram the nose of “writer's block” and write something, anything. Make your blockage a myth!
Direction?
“FADE OUT” ends many a spec script, but not all. The reason may be that “FADE OUT” is a transition, and a film's transitions are up to its director. When you finish a screenplay, tell your friends you “reached ‘FADE OUT'”, but feel free to end a screenplay with--well--“END”.
Catch the Reader's Attention
From the first description line of your screenplay, you want the reader to be moved to read the next line, and the next. Strive to catch the reader's attention with imagery from word one. (Give this a shot on your first draft, and pay close attention to it as you edit.)
If You Love It
The key to finishing a screenplay may be found in one's passion for the work's subject. Most writers cannot finish a story embarked upon solely for its marketability. Write the story in your heart and you will most likely reach FADE OUT.
An Expression
“Typing FADE IN” or to have “typed FADE IN” is an expression sometimes used to indicate a writer has written the first few letters of a nascent screenplay. Many screenplays do not begin with the words “FADE IN”, as that is actually direction (which aspiring screenwriters should eschew). But when you tell your friends you have begun a first draft, be proud and say, “I typed FADE IN, today!”
Creativity from the Start
On your first draft, be creative, write! Include everything that pops into your head. Do not worry over every line--that's editing! The first draft is about writing. Later, you can (and should) refine the words and take out elements that might hurt your chances for a sale.
Ten Vital Pages
How do people in the movie industry sort through all the thousands of scripts that enter their lives each year? They judge a whole by some of its parts. One part by which many a Hollywood player judges a whole screenplay is the first ten pages. Your work's first ten pages must grip the reader. Don't waste pages, or even lines. Avoid superfluous writing. That goes for your whole script, but especially your first ten pages.
Don't worry too much over your first ten pages on the first draft. Be sure to tighten them though, during rewrite.
| Guru Spotlight |
| Tammi Reynolds |
