Celtx Script Writing Tutorial
Magdalen Tibor
You just felt the lightning bolt of inspiration every aspiring or novice screenwriter has dreamed of, that spark of creative energy that you just know is going to translate into a game-changing short film, television, or feature film idea ripe to earn every award, accolade, streaming deal, and box office bonus on the planet.
Which begs the question . . . now what? How do you take the mountain of ideas piling up in your brain and convert them into, well, an actual story for whatever your visual medium of preference is, be it network TV, web content, feature films, streaming fare, and more?
Screenplay formatting is not arbitrary. Scripts as we read them today a product of decades of development and fine tuning. The objective of screenplay formatting is to ensure that the information that is critical to conceptualizing how the film will be shot is displayed prominently and clearly on the page, as well as making the content of your story easy to parse and isolate for editing.
Script formatting is a huge umbrella topic that addresses a bevy of screenplay mechanics, from typography and font size all the way down to specific screenplay elements, their placement on the page, and their relationships with one another.
Specific, yes. Random, not so much! One of the most critical and probably widely recognized elements of script formatting that makes these documents so distinct is their unique font. Screenplays must use 12-point Courier font at all times! This is a very strict rule that every professional adheres to, because like most principles of script formatting, it serves a unique purpose beyond the cosmetic.
Using a 12-point Courier font creates the closest 1:1 relationship possible between script length and screen time. This industry-wide typography plays a huge rule in maintaining the rule that one page of a traditional screenplay translates to roughly one minute of screen time in the final product.
The keyword there is roughly, because the recurring caveat for just about any screenwriting rule is that it is largely dependent on genre. That said, on average you can rely on a 90-page script translating into a 90-minute feature film.
A large majority of your screenplay elements will stick to the aforementioned margins. Where this deviates is with character names and dialogue, both of which are kept significantly more centered on the page with wide margins on either side, almost as if they were columns.
Character names, which are always capitalized for readability, are positioned exactly 3.7 inches from the left side of your page. Dialogue for that character is entered immediately below, and this block of text starts 2.5 inches from the left side of the page.
Screenplay elements are the building blocks of this effort, the tools in your creative toolbox that allow you to extrapolate all the feelings of your characters and minutia of your story into lights and sounds that readers of your script can appreciate and, more importantly, the audience of your final product can understand and participate in.
Each elements has their own unique formatting system and stylistic etiquette. Outlined below are the five fundamental screenplay elements you must understand, what their storytelling function is, and how to professionally format them within your screenplay, either manually or by using screenwriting software.
If you wish to add more elements to your scene heading, such as shot types or subjects, separate them with a dash. A good rule of thumb is to go from general to specific in terms of these elements, for example:
In later screenplay edits, you can get more comfortable with employing the very few exceptions to these scene heading rules, such as writing INT./EXT. to describe the ongoing action in and around a car, or to us MORNING or DUSK at the end of your heading to be more specific about the time of day.
The meat of your script, action describes everything that is happening within a scene outside of dialog. Action is written in standard paragraphical format, albeit with a few quirks. The most important quirks are the rules surrounding capitalization. There are three things that, as a rule, should always be capitalized in a piece of action: the initial appearance of a character with dialogue, sound effects (and, if present, the objects producing the sound), and camera directions.
As discussed, character names are centered in the middle of your screenplay, 3.7 inches from the left side of the page. Any time a character speaks, you need to name whoever is speaking by writing their name in ALL CAPS, with their dialogue immediately below.
When introducing a character for the first time in an action description, capitalize their NAME and include a very short sentence (or just handful of descriptive words) that detail their age, personality traits, or other unique characteristics that provide your reader a better understanding of who they are.
To simplify formatting and your script breakdown later on, make sure to use the same name for your character throughout your screenplay, even if their name is changed or shortened throughout the course of your story.
When writing dialogue, make an effort not to project your own voice or thoughts on your character. Focus on who they are as individuals and try to understand who they fundamentally are in real life. The closer you get to understanding them, the more organically you can establish their unique, and believable, voice.
While not as fundamentally important as the other four elements, parentheticals are another piece of the creative puzzle that provide a unique layer of texture that the other screenplay elements cannot.
Parenthetical direction is inserted into dialog to describe what a character is doing while they speak, or how they are speaking. They should not include punctuation nor should they be capitalized. Try to keep them short, telegraphically written, and if you are describing multiple actions you should link them together with semicolons. Never end a piece of dialog with a parenthetical. For example:
Now, it is time to get slightly nittier and grittier with more in-depth screenplay elements and how to format them. These elements are not difficult concepts to grasp, but what they may lack in difficulty, they make up for in specificity!
These terms and abbreviations are standard and used for screenplay elements throughout the filmmaking industry. Once you become familiar with them, they will become second nature, and will only help to further texturize your script.
All creative projects and creative people take varying amounts of time to start and complete their work. Scripts are no different. Writing your first script can take more time because you will be learning the ropes, but a few months is an appropriate amount of time to create a really impactful first draft.
It could take you 2 weeks or the better part of a year, it just depends on your story and your style of writing. That being said, it is useful to set a deadline to keep yourself on track and accountable to ensure you do, in fact, finish your project.
It is true that having a thoughtful and polished logline, treatment, and beat sheet can be used like handrails and will go a long way in helping you write your script at a healthy pace. Having those documents to hand should allow you to write on-average 5-7 pages of script in a full 8-hour work day.
huh, I never noticed before that it used the server to generate the pdf, but it does, weird. You could always print to flash paper if you have it, or use another tool to convert the text doc if you are that worried about that portion of your work.
Just so I have this right zhester, you are going to write a tutorial going through the movie-making process using celtx and blender. You might want to check out the wiki part that papasmurf just snuck in ahead of me, darn long-winded posts. That would probably be best I think, that way as both programs evolve it can be updated fairly easily, unless of course you were going to write a book or something and wanted to retain rights or whatever.
Welcome back to lesson 2 of this video series about making comics. This session is probably the one most people are going to skip, because they want to get right on with drawing. But YOU made it, so I tip my hat to you.
Now, having said all that, if you are writing for a MOVIE, then Final Draft Pro has some features you WILL want and which movie makers find useful. One of the things Final Draft can do is organize your scenes for shooting efficiently. Movies are usually NOT shot in the order that things appear on screen. Usually movies are shot by location. So, if there is a house in a story, all the scenes that take place in that house will be shot in that house. This is to minimize cost and shoot things efficiently. Final draft allows you to write a script in chronological order, but then arrange things differently, automatically, based on your needs. For example, if you want to know EXACTLY how many lines a character has in the script (which may be useful in determining PAY for that actor) Final Draft can mine that type of information from your script.
Hello Palle ,
i have been creating stories since i was a little kid and my biggest dream is to become a scriptwriter and director of films. however, it will take a long time till i get to that point in life so i thought about doing a comic book . of course writing a comic book is not that easy but it definitely sounds to me like a great start.
I have watched your video about how to write a script , but u referred to short and basic stories. i am preparing to write three novels , but still i feel like i dont really know the common and the acceptable structure of writing a script. in addition, should i already find a suitable illustrator before the writing is done or should i find one after writing everything?
thank u
i am looking forward to your reply .
Hey Ritika, I suppose most of the tips do apply. But I focus a lot on storytelling in comics, the flow of the narrative. A single illustration relies on other things, although the drawing process is similar.
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