Screenplay writing Process:

As writers are full of ideas, there's always a surplus and when it comes to
narrowing down on one idea, most find it extremely difficult.

The three most important factors to consider before you start writing the
story. The process begins with asking these questions.

1. Does your idea promise something new?

2. Does it have the potential to develop into something concrete?
3. Does it stay with you over a period of time?

We, as viewers, always root for novelty in films. So, even as

screenwriters, one needs to look for newer elements in the story. Also,
not all the ideas you hit upon have the potential to turn into a full length
feature script. Each story comes with its own form and the job of a writer
is to recognise the form the story demands. An idea might be excellent for
a short film, but might not work out well at all if stretched into a feature
film. As a writer, one needs to gauge that.

Also, if you've thought of an idea a few years back, probably an innocent

wonderment from school years, and it still hasn't deserted you and you
find yourself going back to it - that might just be it. Something that can
occupy your mind for such a long time, shows potential and also your
involvement in it.

So, once you have found the right idea and want to develop it into a
screenplay, how do you go about it?

A Working Premise

Once you begin thinking about your idea, the first step is to narrow it
down to a premise. The working premise does two things:

Firstly, it defines who your main character or protagonist is.

And it brings to the board, a central situation.

In other words, when you figure out the working premise, you know who
your protagonist is and what kind of struggle he's going to go through.
"Any film is an interplay between the character and the situation. With
conflict, you start to discover the human characteristics. If your character
desires something and he gets it easily, it's not an interesting story you'd
root for. The energy comes from the struggle."

A working premise, which is often used while pitching the idea to the
producers in the initial stages. Which is also called a Logline. But apart
from being a marketing tool, this one-sentence summary
of the story functions as a helpful guide to focus on the most important
aspects while writing. In other words, it helps you stay on track.

The Plot

The next stage is to develop the plot (we often hear the two words, plot
and story being used interchangeably). The plot gives you the idea of
events that occur in your story and how it's going to progress. The plot
ought to be roughly a page long, where the character becomes a bit more
refined and defined.

While thinking of the plot, there also needs to be a consideration of the

structure. Each story follows it's own structure and form, it cannot be
predefined. Yes, there's the popular that has developed through the ages,
evolving out of Greek dramas and is widely employed in storytelling
today. The three act structure has three parts, the setup, the confrontation
and the resolution. Not limited to the stage, it can be spotted in films,
novels, comic books as well as short stories among other art forms. But it
is important to not limit yourself by these structures. These structures are
there to help you, not limit you. Find your own structure.

Characterization

"You need to know the plot of your film before you start researching the
character. What you need while writing your film isn't the biography of
the character, it's the character sketch."

Once you have the plot ready, you can turn to your character and start
finding the nuances and character traits. Now is when you get deeper
into the physiology, sociology and the psychology of your character.

Up until now, at some point in the process, the key characters have
already sprung to life. It’s time to dig into them. Explore more and
explore those areas, which are relevant to your story.

"There are two things that are the most important when it comes to the
characters. Your character needs to be vulnerable. Vulnerability is life,
that's where people empathize with your character."
The 4-pager

Once we know the plot and the characters, we need to take some time to
elaborate and put everything together to bring it into perspective.

We might consider the word 'synopsis' for this one, but we need to keep
in mind that though the 4-pager might be similar to a synopsis, it's not a
synopsis in the sense that it's written before you write your entire script.
It's not a summary in any way, it's a four page account of how your story
is going to take turns to reach the end.

Treatment

Once you have your 4-pager, it's time to start thinking about your story
visually. Ultimately, you're writing cinema, an audio-visual medium. The
stage where your plot transitions from being a story towards becoming a
screenplay. Here, you have all the events that are going to happen in your
story. This is the stage where the visual genesis of the scenes happens.

This document can be compared to a short story, written in the present

tense. It should present the entire story including the ending, using
various key scenes.

Also, treatment is where the structure of your film comes out more
prominently. Treatment is written by breaking down the progression of
the story. Once you have a written draft in front of you, sometimes you
see new ways that the characters connect or the conflicts unfold.
Exploring these creative possibilities, you might land upon something
novel and fresh in your story, which hadn't revealed itself so far.

Since these documents are used for pitching the projects, brevity is
always advised.

Step-Outline

By now, the screenwriter has found his story and has a good mental
sketch of all the scenes. A step-outline is much more developed than the
treatment and is broken up into distinct scenes. Also called as 'beat sheet',
Is like telling the story in detail, describing every scene.

Here you briefly detail every scene and one can often find indications for
dialogue as well as character interactions. It's advisable to number
the scenes, which makes it convenient. You write a paragraph to describe
'the action' taking place in the scene. You basically create a list of these
short paragraphs, one para per scene. At this point, you don't need to
struggle with little details: no dialogue, no mise-en scène details, no
secondary and tertiary characters unrelated to the central action of that
particular scene. All of that comes in the next step, which is the final
stage, the script.

"When you're writing your scenes, you should always remember that
every scene is in the story for a purpose. A scene should either take your
story forward or it should reveal something about the character. If it's not
doing any of the two things, it's redundant, leave it out."

Step-outline especially is of great help during the editing and rewriting

stage of the script, as it has the structure of your story planned, which can
be referred to while rewriting.

The Script

This is the final document that you'll end up working on while rewriting
(with reference to the step-outline).

Script is where you write the dialogues. This is where you fill in all the
blanks that are there- the little details, the color of the curtains (if that's
relevant!), the secondary characters and the subplots. Sometimes, the
screenwriter might also have a hunch of the way the scene needs to be
shot - you might as well find references to angles and camera movements.

"When you write a scene, three things need to be kept in mind.

Firstly, what is the state of the mind of the character as he or she enters
the scene.

And secondly, what are the characters' expectations from this scene.

Then, what is the scene doing to your story.

Once you are clear on these three points, it's much easier to etch out the
scenes."

"Your script acts as the blueprint for your film. Approximately, a feature
film has about 80 to 120 scenes and the write-up goes to about 95 to 110
pages."