Last year was a big year for us. We gave birth to two micro-short films, completed the 48 Hour Film Competition, and received some festival recognition. I admit that I became a bit burned out from editing, audio, and the endless film festival submission process; so, I took a breather and just focused on writing. Skip forward to 2019 and I now have cabin fever...it’s time to start shooting….something….ANYTHING! But, what to shoot? I don’t have a completed script, it’s below zero outside and I am out of vacation days. Plus, my compadre is busy with life stuff. What to do?
The great stories have already been written, so steal’em. I admit that’s a bit of a clickbait warm-up, but bear with me. Last year, Don suggested that we adapt or modernize stories from the Bible. This made sense to me. The Bible has well-known personas with comprehensive story arcs. The same could be said about mythology, ancient poetry and the list goes on. Thus, I opened Google Docs and an online Bible resource - Control+C, Control+V. This was my first mistake.
Whoa! Don’t you know the Bible is copyrighted? What?!!! Some translations most notably the King James, have copyrights and international restrictions (specifically, the English version). Others have a limited publication use based on a number of verses given it's not commercially sold. Fortunately, there are people in the world (World English Bible, American Standard Version) who believe the Bible should be free and I thank them for their efforts.
I was salivating. The story cost me nothing; yet, it’s only a copy-pasta mess in a text document. Formatting resulted in some questions, but there’s a bunch of great YouTube resources to assist you with script formatting. Here are a few other websites that I used as a reference:
http://www.scriptologist.com/Magazine/Formatting/Formatted/formatted.html
https://www.writersstore.com/how-to-write-a-screenplay-a-guide-to-scriptwriting/
Remember, a somewhat professional-looking script will reassure your actors that this is a professional production. I also recommend checking out Grammarly, which has a Chrome plug-in. As for our short, you can find a copy of the script on its FilmFreeway project page.
In our next post, we will discuss production design and turning the written page into visual eye candy.