How to format a screenplay

Hi everyone. In the previous posts we learned you how to come up with a story and how to create effective scenes. Now you got your story and all your scenes it’s time to make the blueprint of your movie: a script.

Screenplays aren’t easy to be read and aren’t easy to be written. They have a special screenplay format to bring structure to your scenes, which we will learn today.

First you have an action. Actions are things your characters do and they are, naturally written in the script.
E.g. Jack walks down the street. He looks to a child that’s running past him. He enters the shop on his right.
Remember, screenplays are visual!

When your character moves from a certain space to another, Scene Headings must be written.
E.g.

INT. PET SHOP – DAY
Jack looks at puppies in the shop.

The INT. naturally means INTERIOR, meaning your inside a room or building. EXT. therefore means EXTERIOR, when your shots are outside. DAY of course resembles daytime and NIGHT… well night-time.
Remember, Scene Headings are always capitalized!

Characters who have dialogue in a script are always capitalized. Characters or persona’s that do not have any lines of dialogue, are just left uncapitalised.

SANDER sits down and eats a banana. Suddenly he sees MICHIEL.

MICHIEL
Hi! How are you doing?

SANDER
Just eating a banana.

Sometimes dialogues are also described under the name of the character, on how the line of dialogue should be said (emotions).

SANDER
(sad)
My banana is finished…

Here’s an example of a short scene in the screenplay format.

An example of a scene from a formatted screenplay

There are many great scriptwriting programs out there, but they come for mostly $200 dollars each!
We found the cheap solution: the awesome scriptwriting program CeltX with screenplay, project breakdown, schedules, catalogs and much much more is available for FREE at www.celtx.com

See you tomorrow for more filmmaking tips and tricks!

Michiel

Avoiding clichés

Hi and welcome to our new filmmaking posts with tips and tricks to make your new masterpiece.

Do you want your audience to jump up when something unexpected occurs? Do you want to keep them intrigued until the end and then send them home completely satisfied? Well, then first remove ALL clichés from your script.

A cliché is an overused action made by one of the characters, idea or shot that has lost all novelty and force. These can be very predictable and can really bring the mood of your audience down. A few examples of terrible movie clichés are action or horror movies where a damsel in distress runs up to the seventh floor of a building to get trapped instead of running out of the front door, two people meeting in a single’s bar or the cliché romantic kiss in most Hollywood films.

Here are some tips to avoid these hells:

• When writing your script, always think, “how can I introduce this character/make this happen in a way never before done on film”
• For example, you try to introduce your boy and girl in a love story, and you have them meet. Lots of clichés hidden here. Write numerous scenes down, that make you laugh or even cry. Then select one of those meetings, obviously the best.
• And my ultimate tip: watch films and find out how they are structured. This does NOT mean you copy scenes, but learn how annoying those clichés (that you had in mind!) actually are when watching a film.

That’s it for today and join us tomorrow when I’ll tell you how to format a screenplay, one of the most important tips for your $10 masterpiece.

Michiel

Finding a topic

There are millions of screenplays out there, waiting to be read and discovered. In those millions of intensive works 95% is junk. Only 5% can make a difference and can actually be a good script. However, don’t rely on this when writing your first or one of your first screenplays. To write a screenplay and make a good film you’ve got to have a damn good story.

Finding a story isn’t always easy. I should say it’s the hardest part of filmmaking, along with finding a title for your film. There are stories all around us. When you watch the news, several stories are told. When your girlfriend tells you about her incredible headaches (don’t ask) and says she suffers badly from it and nearly collapses on the floor, that’s also a story. These stories, however, suck. As a filmmaker it’s your job, duty I may call it, to deliver something new, fresh, creative and original content to your audience.
But how to find inspiration?

For my films I usually brainstorm, selfish as I am, asking myself what I would like to see in a film. In that way I’m not really making films for an audience, but for the teenager Michiel. Watching films can be a good idea to get some inspiration, but do not make exact replicas of scenes and storylines. They lack originality and are easily recognizable when you take over the story of a golden compass or a dead man’s chest. Finding inspiration can be a tricky task, but I manage to find a good topic going through this list:

• Think about what you want to do. What is it that you want to do? An action film? A drama? A romantic comedy? Or even a western? First decide what genre your film is going to be, because you need it for the following steps.
• Let’s say, for example, you want to make an action film. Great. But what do you want in that action film? What makes your body tingle and sends shivers down your spine? Write it all down on a piece of paper. When you’ve got some examples of what you want to bring to the screen, you can build quite an original story around it, but avoid clichés. (More about that soon)
• Now you’ve got your action scenes it’s time to put a story around it and design your characters. There’s no trick. Just think about your scenes and put characters in those settings.
• Finally, to create an atmosphere and develop scenes, you take the best thing the world has offered since the creation of the woman…music. Making a drama or a romantic comedy? Try listening to Mozart to find inspiration for scenes of pure drama and romanticism. Action geek? Listen to film soundtracks like The Dark Knight, Casino Royale, Gladiator… Western? Listen to some old western soundtracks or even some old pop songs to create mood and style.

Music is the best way to get inspiration, for me that is.
Now your basic story is complete, it’s time to write it out and later make a screenplay out of it.

Next post is on how to write a screenplay in the right format and the right way.

See you,

Michiel

The Three Stages of Filmmaking

In this post, I’ll talk about the three stages of filmmaking: Pre-production, Production and Post-Production. These 3 stages will give you the steps to make a film.

• Pre-production, as the name suggests, is the period in which you prepare the shoot. You search for actors, crew members, you outline the script, you schedule your scenes, make storyboards, find locations and so on. Pre-production is EVERYTHING. A good planning makes a good shoot.

1. Always, under any circumstances, write and bring a script to your shoots. A script or screenplay is a written plan of the film in your imagination. It includes dialogues as well as the scenes, what the actors do, the special effects, the music and so on.
2. Storyboards are a great way to visualize your shots and put some structure in your film. A storyboard is a series of illustrations or images displayed in sequence to give others an idea of how the scenes will look.
3. A shot list is very handy to keep track of shots so that you don’t forget any. When I just started out, I didn’t make shot lists. Because of that, I had to return to a certain location several times, because I forgot shots, and lost a lot of time.

• Production just means that you shoot your film along with the cast and crew.

• Post-production to me is the most fun part. To others it can be rather difficult and not exciting at all. It basically consists of editing your film, composing music, adding visual effects and then release and promote your masterpiece.

Keep following this blog, and enter the magical world of filmmaking, with stories about my own experiences and some great tutorials and tips.

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See you soon,

Michiel

Next blog: writing a script

An introduction to filmmaking

So, you want to be a filmmaker? That’s no problem. Take a camera or your cell phone, shoot some stuff and there you have it.

The problem is I don’t know anyone getting many views or popularity by shooting some random stuff on their cellphone. Only if you film a cow that gets abducted by a flying saucer, you’re in for success. Strangely enough that rarely happens.

Filmmaking, to me, is all about messages. Feelings. Emotions. My ultimate goal as a filmmaker is to give the audience a message and to give the story a meaning, so that they can learn something from my experience. When someone comes to me and says “wow, your film really made me cry”, “your film made me laugh” or “it made me think”, than that film, to me, has done its job. I have done my job. Making people feel an emotion through my films is my ambition, but that’s often more difficult than you would think. Filmmaking is one of the best jobs in the world, but altogether it’s also the most challenging and ultimately the most rewarding.

When you make a film, a whole bunch of people are involved:

In charge there is a director, which will be probably you, directing his crew members. He is in charge of anything that happens when making a film and carries thereby the greatest responsibility.
Second and in my opinion the second most important man is the screenwriter, who writes the script. He writes the script and the story, which means everything all the crew members do will do justice (or not) to the screenwriter and his creative mind.

A director of photography, or cinematographer, composites every shot and is basically in charge of the camera. The director can give an idea of what he wants it to look like, and decide if it looks right or not, but it’s the cinematographers task of experimenting with camera and shots. The production designer designs the overall look of the film, while the gaffer is in charge of the lighting. Also, if you are on a big budget production, you can hire a composer to score your film. If you can’t afford this, there’s always the internet to go to for some free music (more about that in following posts!). There’s the sound designer, in charge of, well yeah, the sound.

But that’s not all. Some big productions also have location managers, storyboard artists (if you can afford them!), casting director and a lot of people behind the scenes.

In the following post, we are going to explain to you the three stages of filmmaking and what to watch out for.

See you soon,

Michiel

Eastern Lights Blogs!

Hi!

Eastern Lights is going to blog.
On this blog you can find information about us, what we do, who we are and what we have done.

So, in the future you can expect a daily blog. But for now, we are working on it 24/7.

Michiel Vaernewijck