r/scriptwriting

Hello new to scriptwriting and im just unsure about what to put in a script- and on professional format. Do i need to worry about it being professional for my first time? Do i add where the camera is and how it moves? How do i write scene changes? How do i compute how long my film will be by the length of my script? Is a script basically a book? Do i have to be able to write really good to make a script? Im not bad but by no means am i a John Steinback. What are all those letters on scripts like INT and ENT? Am i just overthinking this? What is a good free preferably online site i can write scripts. Thanks for any advice.

so for the past couple weeks i’ve been writing this screenplay, but for the past few days ive been really interested in this new idea i’ve come up. that is more unique, exciting and works better. it follows a better, more clear 3 act structure. i have the full outline of the movie. but i don’t t want to abandon this current project, as i have a tendency to do and then once i get onto this next project do the same for that one once i get a new idea. what’s the best thing to do in this kind of scenario?

This is an UNFINISHED project and I am aware there are probably many grammatical errors and the format is probably very messed up and hard to read this is one of my first projects

It is inspired by Tyler The Creators "I THINK" and is sort of a music video rather than film

DON’T BE SO EAGER.

INT. HOUSE – DINING ROOM – DAY (BLACK & WHITE)

The song I Think by Tyler The Creator plays, and it as you hear the fuzziness in the song, you can see a man sitting at a little dining table, three chairs around the table in total, he is sitting in one, the other two are empty, he is looking slightly down at the table, and his hand is on the table, tapping not to the beat, not to the song, just tapping, its an unsettling sight, there is a couch in the back that's torn up, the place is kind of a mess, but its a home.

INT. COLORFUL WORLD – DAY

Then the piano and Tyler starts singing, and it cuts to a wonderfully colorful world, maybe too colorful, all we see is a view of a mans eyes, although blocked by sunglasses, we can see lots of people and flashes in the sunglasses, he takes them off, then the camera begins to back off, he begins to smile with gold in his teeth, and he is waving to the paparazzi, and then gets in his limo and drives to him home that is similar to the other, but much more colorful and touched up, and he gets near the dining table and grabs the chair and picks it up and slams the chair onto the ground, breaking some of its legs off, he then sits in the other chair.

INTERCUT – BLACK & WHITE / COLORFUL

Then we cut back and forth from the black and white world to the color ful one, first we see the B&W (Black and white) get up from his chair and walk of camera, and it flashes back and forth between as he does this, eventually they are both in their bathrooms washing up, when they look in the mirror, and the B&W sees himself and more color then he has ever seen before, and the colorful one sees a world of peace and a version of himself where he does not have to deal with being famous.

INT. BOTH WORLDS – CONTINUOUS

And when the song says “while curiosity killed the feline gone”, they touch hands and then interlock, the CF (Colorful)  shows him around his house, and the B&W shows him around his, they both realize that each other's homes is exactly what they long, so they switch places, B&W living his life to the fullest, not being lonely anymore, let alone famous, everyone loves him.

INT. BLACK & WHITE WORLD – DAY

And CF goes to the B&W world, and its everything he wanted, he was finally left alone, but he then realizes by doing this he is losing everything he worked for, so he goes back to his world while B&W is living CF’S LIFE to the fullest, CF is searching the house and finds him in the dining room, and they begin to wrestle, and after tumbling over each other for a bit, B&W full on grips on to CF’s face, and the color begins shifting to him, and he is absorbing it, CF is losing his color by the bit, and eventually all of it is gone, then there's a still shot where B&W (now CF) gets up and his head pops into frame and he flashes a gold smile and fixes his tie, after a hard fight, B&W who is the new CF then takes him back to the B&W World and places him at that lonely dining room table he once sat at.

Looking for something that saves to iCloud and lets me easily pick up where I left off on either device.

Using (Beat) on my Mac. Probably going with (Beat) for iPad, unless there’s a better option.

It’s one thing.

Your script needs to have its own world. With its own characters, and its own way of talking.

If you don’t know what that world is yet, you’re not ready to write yet.

Your script cannot be trying to tap into an already existing films world.

I bought Final Draft 13 to write scripts on. The problem is I feel overwhelmed by my own lack of experience with scripts. I'm going to Illinois State University in a few months to study film and get some experience and confidence to be a professional screenwriter. Should I wait 'til then to use Final Draft? I bought it outright, I didn't pay for a monthly subscription, so should I just let it sit for a while until I know what I'm doing?

Title: Something to say

Pages: 5

Genre: Comedy / Animation

LOGLINE:

A dog lover’s quiet night at home takes a bizarre turn after he wakes to an unexpected confrontation.

I usually go for horror, thriller, and action, but I’m trying out comedy for the first time to broaden my horizons.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1blhQVK2jcMr7nnP6fDQX4z6RM8bO-IvJ/view?usp=sharing

I hope you enjoy.

And of course, thank you for reading.

I really need some advice as of where to start my career for script writing. I’ve been doing it for a long time but never done anything professionally. Just need some very good advice that can make me prosper in my career

How do you write complex environments you’re not personally familiar with? Let’s say you want to write war — and you can’t even accurately gauge how well or poorly you understand it — but you still want it to feel like more than a cliché. How do you work with that lack of awareness?
(Yes, I’ve read O’Briens How to tell a true war story. What’s your personal techniques?)

—
Edit:

Thanks to all repliers so far — research is obviously essential. But at what point does research become a crutch, or worse, a false confidence? You can read every oral history ever published and still not know what you don’t know. How do you find the sweet spot between enough research and the humility to acknowledge the gap that will always remain?

Some writers have made the gap itself part of the work — O’Brien explicitly foregrounds his own unreliability as narrator. Terrence Malick in The Thin Red Line sidesteps authenticity claims entirely by going interior and philosophical. Apocalypse Now doesn’t pretend to understand Vietnam — it stages the incomprehension itself.

Do you lean into the character’s limited perception as a storytelling device? Do you find a proxy experience that approximates the emotional truth without claiming authenticity you don’t have? Looking for specific writing techniques rather than research strategies.

I tried to write feature films with at least 10 to 15 characters, which is the amount of people I have I can act in my films, but my problem is that I can never get the script longer than 45 pages or so. What are some solutions without adding more characters or things that would go over budget?