Tag Archives: screenplay

Hello again!

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Hey, I think I remember how to use this thing…

It’s been a few, I know. Years, actually. I thought I’d drop a quick line here to make sure things still work, and give a quick update. It’s been two years since my last post… Wow.

I’ve been busy with work, life, moving to a farm, raising two teenagers(!), and I have barely been reading anything other than the occasional article here and there. As for actually writing anything not work-related, well, forget about it.

But I’ve bee wanting to get back to writing for a while. So my current plan (for 2023) is to do some adapting. I want to learn how to write screenplays, so I thought I’d try my hand at adapting a couple of my novels.

For more info, check out my shiny new Screenplays page, where you can download the openings to a couple screenplays I wrote a while ago.

Later!

Screenplay Achieved!

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Cross another item off my Bucket List. I finished my screenplay this morning!

Unassisted Living Page 1It’s right about the length I planned it to be (113 pages, or a one hour, 53 minute movie, and around 26,000 words). All told, it took me three and a half months to write, but about 60 hours total spread out over those months.

But, more importantly — what’s the screenplay ABOUT?

First off, it’s called UNASSISTED LIVING.

Continue reading Screenplay Achieved! →

My August Challenge: Finish writing a screenplay…!

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Sharp-eyed readers of this blog and website may have noticed some movement in my “2013 Word Count Goal” over there in the right-hand sidebar. Yep, I’m getting some writing done again — new words! It feels GREAT.

My current project is a new one for me. Instead of a novel or story, I’m writing a screenplay.

I think I’ve got the basics of the formatting down (I’ve been reading a lot of screenplays from the IMSDb and raiding the library of veteran screenwriter John August for assistance, as well as reviewing the latest version of Screenplay on my Kindle). Luckily I have some experience with the odd formatting of screenplays from my work on the script for our digital comic a few years.

But screenplays, yeah… They can be a bit weird to draft.

Image by orchid | morgueFile
Image by orchid | morgueFile

I figure I can go back and fix the formatting issues later. Right now I’m just chugging through the story. Getting the dialog down, letting the characters get into trouble, keeping up with the action, and so on. Figuring it out as I go.

And I’ve been having a blast. So much so that I want to keep at it. And that’s why I’m going to push myself.

As a writing challenge, I’m setting a firm deadline of the last day of August to finish this screenplay.

Continue reading My August Challenge: Finish writing a screenplay…! →