Hello,
I’m the developer of a software program for writers called Scrivener, which is currently only available for Mac OS X (sorry Windows users!*):
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scriptfrenzy.html
After sponsoring NaNoWriMo last year and receiving lots of great feedback, we figured we’d do something for scriptwriters, too, as Scrivener is aimed at writers of any long-form text. So, we’re really excited to be sponsoring Script Frenzy for the first time, and to be able to provide some special offers for participants (who will be eligible for a discount of 20% or, if you make 100 pages, 50%) - more on that below.
What is Scrivener?
In case you haven't heard of Scrivener, Scrivener is designed specifically to help hammer out the first draft of a long text such as a novel, thesis or script, finding its structure along the way. It allows you to keep multiple text documents in the same project, and you can view those text documents separately or combined together (so, for instance, you could write and edit scenes individually or together as one document). You can also look at two documents alongside one another, or import and refer to research such as PDF documents, images, web pages and media files, right next to your writing. To find the structure, there is an outliner and a virtual corkboard, and you can assign a synopsis to each text chunk in the project so that you can get an overview of and rearrange your draft by using the synopses on the corkboard or in the outliner. Here are some screenshots:
You can view some of our introductory and tutorial videos here:
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/videos
I wrote Scrivener because it's the tool I wanted for my own writing, as I was fed up with having multiple chapters written in Word scattered around my hard drive, and trying to sort through all my notes and research, trying to organise and get an overview of everything. It's not the sort of writing software that presumes to tell you how to write (I'm not a fan of that sort of software myself); instead it just provides a number of tools that are hopefully a lot more geared towards organising and hammering out a first draft than a standard word processor or scriptwriting program. I'm not going to claim everybody needs such software or any such nonsense, but if like me you've ever struggled with getting an overview of your writing and keeping all of its disparate threads and ideas together, then I hope you'll give it a whirl, and I'd be delighted if in some small way it helps you attain your 100 pages. (If you like the idea but Scrivener just doesn't suit you, there are lots of alternatives on our links page, by the way.)
I should add that Scrivener isn’t a dedicated scriptwriting program, as it can be used for all sorts of writing, but it has a scriptwriting mode and a number of script templates, and you can set up your own formats easily enough. Scrivener started out as a tool for novels and theses, but during beta testing in 2005 and 2006 a number of scriptwriters told me it was exactly the sort of tool that would help them, too, which is why I added the script mode, and now it is in use by many professional scriptwriters working on scripts for films, TV, stage plays, comics and computer games.
Why Use Scrivener?
Seeing as I’m biased, I asked scriptwriter and novelist Neil Cross if he would mind saying a few words about Scrivener. Neil was lead writer on the seventh series of the hit BBC series Spooks (MI-5 in the US), and has just finished an upcoming BBC series called Luther, which tempted Idris Elba (Stringer Bell from The Wire) back to the UK to take the lead role. Neil is also a bestselling novelist, and he writes all of his first drafts for novels and scripts in Scrivener. This is what he had to say:
"Screenplays are all about structure, but creating a television show is all about chaos.
Creative brains can be messy. It doesn’t matter how diligent your planning might be, things change in the writing — new connections wait to be discovered and assimilated, accelerating stories in new, more exciting directions. There are outlines, step-outlines and treatments to be written and re-written. There are producer’s notes, director’s notes, production notes. A million and one things can change; two million and five things actually do. A television show is alive, and it’s hungry.
I continue to submit my scripts in Final Draft. But all the work that gets done leading up to that submission — all the outlining, the brainstorming, the researching, the writing, the revising, the creation of structure from chaos — that gets done in Scrivener, the best writer’s application in the world.”
You can find a good number of testimonials from established writers (including one from Mike Sussman, a Star Trek writer, and another from comics writer and graphic novelist Antony Johnston), on this page:
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/testimonials.html
Relevant Features
Scrivener comes with templates for screenplays, stage plays (US and UK) and comic scripts, but you can also create your own script formats to meet the requirements of whatever type of script you are writing. You can even import any format from a Final Draft 8 template.
Although there’s currently no page layout view in Scrivener (because Scrivener is about the writing rather than the layout), for this special Script Frenzy trial there is a page counter panel that will enable you to track your progress:
So you can just focus on hammering out your script and hit shift-cmd-T to bring up the page count panel whenever you want. That progress bar starts off red but slowly changes to green the closer you get to your target.
You can also compile straight to PDF format to upload your script for validation. And because Scrivener provides outlining, planning and organisational features and allows you to store and refer to research, you can of course start using it to plan your script and gather your research materials before April begins, so that by April 1st you are raring to type that first “INT” or “EXT”.
Of course, if you’re writing a screenplay and hoping that it may eventually one day be made into a film, Final Draft is still the industry standard, and we are proud to be in partnership with them:
http://www.finaldraft.com/company/technology-partners.php
This means that you can import from or export to Final Draft 8 using the FDX format, or Final Draft 7 and earlier using the FCF (file converter) format. So you can write and structure your script in Scrivener and easily export it to Final Draft later down the line if you need to. Or, you can just print from Scrivener directly or export it to a word processor such as Word, as Scrivener supports most common file formats.
Special Script Frenzy Scrivener trial version
We want to try to make it as easy as possible to use Scrivener for Script Frenzy 2010 for those who are interested in doing so. For that reason, before mid-March we will be releasing a special Script Frenzy 2010 trial version of Scrivener. Normally, Scrivener's free trial period lasts for 30 non-consecutive days. This means that it doesn't run out until you have used it on thirty different days (so if you used it only twice a week, it would last fifteen weeks, for instance). But of course, you are going to want to try out Scrivener before April starts to see if you will be comfortable writing your 100 pages in it, and after the month ends, if you decide after hammering out your script that Scrivener isn't for you (although obviously I hope you will love it and decide to continue to use it!), you will want to get your work out again after the month has finished. And that's more than thirty days of use.
For these reasons, the special Script Frenzy trial version will run from March through to the 7th May, so that you have March to get used to it and the first week of May to decide if you want to continue using it and buy a licence, or export your work to continue along in your regular word processor or scriptwriting program.
You can download the special Script Frenzy trial version here:
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scriptfrenzy.html
Getting Up and Running
To get up and running, follow these simple instructions:
1) Download the Script Frenzy trial from the above page.
2) Install the trial from the downloaded disk image, making sure that you double-click on the Extras Installer to install the extra templates, which include the one for Script Frenzy and several script formats. If you’ve never installed from a disk image before, we have a short video tutorial on how to install Scrivener on our videos page (http://www.literatureandlatte.com/videos).
3) Once you’ve installed, launch Scrivener. You will be alerted that you are using a trial version, so just choose to continue using the trial.
4) Go to the Help menu and select “Tutorial”. This prompts you to save to disk an interactive tutorial project, which then opens automatically. Going through this project should take you about an hour, after which you will have a really good idea of what Scrivener can do. It’s the fastest and best way to learn how to use Scrivener (although our introductory video covers similar material, this is hands on).
5) Once you feel you’re ready to start your own project, go to File > New Project and select the special Script Frenzy template. There’s a document at the top of the binder (you’ll know what the binder is once you’ve been through the tutorial) that explains how to use the template.
Special offer for all Script Frenzy participants
We also have a great offer open to all Script Frenzy participants this year. Scrivener is normally a mere $39.95 (or $34.99 for students), but we are offering a further 20%-off discount for Scrivener (from the regular $39.95 rate), starting now and ending on the 15th of May. To use it, just go to our product page, click on "Buy Now", select the regular licence and enter “SCRIPTFRENZY” into the "Coupon Code" text field in the top right of the web store.
You might want to hold out until the end of April, though, because all winners of this year's Script Frenzy will be eligible for a 50% discount. Winners will receive a special coupon for this discount on their winner's page on the Script Frenzy site at the end of April, once their page count has been confirmed. That means you can get Scrivener for less than $20 if you make your 100 pages this year - no more than the price of two movie tickets.
Hello Scrivener users
Existing Scrivener users can still download the special Script Frenzy trial if they want to use the special page count progress tracking feature - just replace your regular version of Scrivener with the Script Frenzy trial (it won’t be a trial to registered users). Registered Scrivener users who achieve 100 pages will be able to pass on their 50% coupon to a friend, of course. And if any Scrivener users reading this would care to share how they have used Scrivener for writing scripts in the past, or pass on any tips they have, I'd love to read your comments in replies to this thread.
Anyway, I hope some of you Mac-using Script Frenzy folk decide to give Scrivener a whirl this year if you haven't already tried it - be sure to let me know in the replies to this thread how you get on, and feel free to ask me any questions or field any problems. I'll be monitoring and answering questions on this thread throughout April, along with answering technical support queries in our regular forums:
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum
You can also contact me directly on contact AT literatureandlatte DOT com.
Oh, and be sure to check out our Facebook and Twitter pages, as we post a tip-of-the-day there every day. We’ll be sure to put some more script-related ones up during April:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scrivener/126134826351
http://twitter.com/scrivenerapp
Thanks for reading. Good luck with the writing!
All the best,
Keith
*Note to Windows users: If you like the look of Scrivener and are miffed that you can’t use it, consider signing up for our Windows newsletter, here: http://www.literatureandlatte.com/about.html#windows That way we can notify you of any news about a version of Scrivener for Windows - let’s just say for now that we don’t rule it out. :)
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