Screenwriting : Formatting Quick Scenes by Christa Springs

Within, next, nearby, simultaneously, immediately following. Dialogue, Action, Dialogue, Action within the least amount of scene headings possible. Give an elaborate description of the area with the least amount of sentences you can under the first scene heading. Break the action with dialogue even if it is a grunt, sigh, wince or whisper then take the action to the next place using location description unless a new scene heading is absolutely necessary for instance instead of inside plaza the location is outside the plaza or plaza perimeter or if it is from a new character perspective. I think the only time you have to really use multiple scene headings in a row is perhaps when character perspectives are constantly changing or the general location drastically changes. Not a pro and not experienced much with action features but that is how I would try and do it initially and then see how it turned out. Think in the aspect of flow and not just location details too. Why does the scene flow to that location within the location. I'll be brave and post my opinion first and let everybody pick my methodology apart. LOL!

i was gonna say the same, but assumed maybe he's shooting his own film. I hope.

Alle and Cherie: Yes, I shoot my own stuff. Or at least I would. I don't live around people who are as interested in film as me so I write everything as if I were doing it myself. Example: ----------- An eye envelops the screen. A man's jaw hangs open. An OLDER MAN is leaning perilously out of a second story window of a cottage like house, with a forgotten washcloth in his hand. He stares wide eyed at something beyond our sight. A pitcher of tea CRASHES to the ground, sending shards of glass in every direction. Looking up, we see its owner, a petrified BARISTA, backing away. A WOMAN standing in the open doorway of her cottage house backs away from the light and into darkness, a look of dread being the last expression on her face. A dog barks. ---------- Do I need scene heading for each of these?

If it's a different place then it's a different scene, which means you put a new scene heading up.

I'm not 100% sure, but i think the enveloping eye can be inserted into the scene without a scene heading. But you do need to make a note of it, but i'm not sure what you use.

My advice is to favour what works on the page over what may seem technically correct. Some sequences become a really hard read if you slug out every switch. Plus it all really hinges on what you are trying to achieve. For example, action sequences such as car chases or shootouts can switch focus rapidly. You're talking a moment here and a moment there to paint the scene emotionally and you may not want to break that up to much or make it feel too mechanical. I found reading the screenplays for films with similar scenes really helped.

Ok I am doing a Series of Shots, but my scene takes place in a town square, or a plaza. The problem with that is that there is action going inside buildings, or outside storefronts (such as an outdoor cafe eating area), all of which are still located in the Plaza. So if I just say ... EXT. TOWN PLAZA - DAY Do I need a different scene heading anytime action takes place that is inside the plaza, but in a different location in the plaza? Picture a strip mall with a fountain in the middle. You could say EXT. STRIP MALL but when anything took place inside an actual building, or alley, or the window of a building, would you make a new heading? Like... EXT. TOWN PLAZA - DAY A girl drops her bags and runs. EXT. PLAZA ALLEY Jane peers out into the street. EXT. PLAZA HOUSE A man leans from his window to catch a glimpse. -------- OR SERIES OF SHOTS A girl drops her bags and runs. Jane peers out into the street. A man leans from his window to catch a glimpse.

@Allie I am doing a narrated intro in which a series of actions take place.

Ok...Thank you. I'm going to try that and then post something on here so people can see if i did it right. Do you mind if add you Dan?

I'm not a jargon type of person so while I may know what it is I haven't seen or paid much attention to the term sub heading. So scene heading is EXT. HOUSE - NIGHT What's the sub heading?

I'm not sure if it's exactly the same thing as Dan has suggested, but what I've often seen for switches around a building are mini-slugs. This is where you simply state the room on it's own line, formatted as a slug, but lacking the prefixes and affixes that are implied eg; PLEASE NOTE The forum formatting doesn't always put the line breaks in correctly. INT. HOTEL, BAR - NIGHT The bar bustling, rock music blasting, disco lights dancing. Bobby enters and cuts shyly through the crowd toward the bathroom. BATHROOM Bobby exits a stall and washes his hands. He pauses and stares at his quivering fingers as water trickles over them. BAR Sue leans over the bar, her beaming smile picking her out the heaving wall of eager drinkers. She catches the Bartender's attention and signals for a beer. Here's an extract from Scriptnotes on the topic of moving around a location: http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-ep-108-are-two-screens-better-tha... "People often ask us about if you’re moving around inside a house do you have to do slug lines for each room in the house. No. You don’t. This is an example of a choice, a style for how you move around a house where it just goes living room, bedroom, hallway. If a character is moving through a space, you don’t have to break out each individual space that way. That can be a good choice for showing us a location. Now, here’s the con for describing the inside of the house this way. Let’s say most of the movie takes place inside this house, this is going to become very frustrating if you didn’t actually break this into slug lines. So, here it worked really well because the character was moving through the space and we were just giving little small slug lines for where we are in this. But if you’re going to be spending most of your movie in this house you’re going to need to do real scene headers for the different locations, otherwise it’s going to get confusing. It’s just going to feel like a play, that we’re just in this one space the whole time. And the scene headers will help you structure and let us know really what’s a scene and where scenes begin and where scenes end." Another style I've seen work well is establishing two sub-locations and then starting a sequence that combines the two eg; INT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Bobby throws himself over the counter and fires off rounds out the window, EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Sue ducks, runs to her car for cover and takes aim. INT/EXT. GAS STATION - SHOOTOUT Bobby dives to cover. Sue lets rip. BANG! BANG! BANG!. Glass shatters. Bottles explode. He winces as he reloads. Click click, She's out of ammo. You can also get quite playful with mini-slugs eg; EXT. CITY ALLEYWAY - DAY Sue ducks down the alleyway, her eyes wild. She sprints by trash-bags and leaps discarded boxes. A dead end. She circles round desperate and spots -- A DUMPSTER She drops inside, eases the lid down and sits panting in the darkness. ALLEYWAY Bobby charges down the alleyway, kicking aside boxes and glaring furious. He pauses at the dead end and searches around. DUMPSTER Sue tries to steady her breathing as rats rustle through the trash beneath her. As screenwriters we're constantly walking this fine line between efficiency, readability and accuracy. It's stuff like this that can really bring out our style and creativity. Also always keep in mind that it's your universe, if you can't make it work on the page you can change what happens in the story so it comes across better in your writing. And don't worry too much about it. If your scenes are compelling then the reader should keep reading.

Thanks CJ and Dan. Really helpful especially since I could use these.

What's really helped me is finding a few professional writers or scripts you really admire and keeping those on file. Whenever you're in a situation like this, you can quickly scan through them and see how they handle a similar situation. This doesn't just help you creatively, it helps reassure you that you're not doing anything too weird. There's often more than one way to skin a cat when it comes to screenplay writing, the bulk of scripts out there proving that.

Christa for the most part I like the comments everybody has given you on here. Sometimes it is hard for me to convey in description in regards to methodology what I intend and why I think there should be dialogue breaks. I’ll use the bar/bathroom scene as an example. Int. Bar- Night John Doe walks into Joe Doe’s bar. The bar is half filled with customers. Through the dull drone of conversation and slight haze of smoke John finds and enters the bathroom to take care of necessities. Int. Joe Doe’s Bathroom John takes care of necessities and goes to wash up in front of the mirror…… Personally I don’t like the sub-heading method here. Bathroom? What bathroom? Where? Perhaps I’ll instinctively know but Joe Does Bathroom, oh yeah, o.k., I got it, continue. Another sub-heading bathroom to bar? Duh! I mean like yeah I know that. Unless he were to exit the bathroom to a parallel universe or something, it’s a given. Now here is why I think a dialogue break is in order. It is an opportunity to set tone of what’s to come not only for the reader but in this case audience. Here are a few examples of what I mean. Example 1 John takes care of necessities and goes to wash up in front of the mirror, straightens his collar and smiles winking to himself. John Doe It’s on John exits the bathroom with confidence and goes up to order his favorite drink. Example 2 John takes care of necessities and goes to wash up in front of the mirror looking a bit dismayed really showing his stress lines. He splashes water on his face and looks at his stoic reflection. John Doe A must is a must. John exits the bathroom slowly walking towards his destination and who he came to see. Example 3 John takes care of necessities and goes to wash up in front of the mirror. John is extremely jovial almost laughing at himself. John Doe Tonight is the night John exits the bathroom almost magnetically beaming appearing as if he is to own the room. Now if you put” Tonight is the night” in Example 2 it would have a totally different tone or intonation. I guess my point is dialogue break really helps the intonation, flow and tone of any scene single or multiple area and even multiple shot.