How to Script.

Heh. I don't know. I really don't. I could maybe tell you how to script a comic, considering I did that once, and I didn't finish the project... (Though with the advent of the Multiple Earths again in DC, suddenly my idea becomes more and more viable, in some ways. In others, the deaths of a few DC characters have changed certain things...)

I've been writing since... The third or fourth grade. Probably before that, because there's a copy of something my Mom transcripted that I made up about two dinosaurs going on a road trip together. It's accompanied by a drawing, in crayon, of the dinosaurs, their car, and their top hats.

But the fourth grade is the closest I can come to dating this momentous event. Being the kid who got the notes home about reading books under the desk in math class, and missing the bus a few times because I went to the school library *really quick* after class let out meant that there was a time where I was pretty sure I'd read all the fiction in my elementary's library. And my teacher assigned what was probably a Christopher Pike novel.

It was bad.

I think most of his books are bad, and I think I've only read one of his "Fear Street" novels. Tripe, I guess.

This book was so bad, I put it down, and with all the gravitas a elementary school child can muster I said, "Even I can write something better than that."

It was total hubris that put me on this path. ^_^ You have to love that.

One of the first things I wrote was this almost exact copy of a fantasy book I loved called "The Dragon's Egg". The next thing I wrote was some garbage about my best friend being a werewolf.

But in the fourth grade, there was a writing contest, and I know I entered that. I didn't win. Meh.

So, years, and years later, with a huge Rubbermaid crate in the garage of handwritten fiction later, here I am writing a script. Which wasn't originally what I planned on doing this June, but sometimes things happen.

I was sure me and this script thing weren't going to jive. The comic one hadn't panned out, and I remember being confounded by it. And when I was chatting with Erin, who runs all the MLs for NaNoWriMo, I sort of accidentally agreed to ML (and write a script) for Script Frenzy.

Cheerfully press ganged I set about learning how to write a script. It looks very complicated. It's probably that complicated. I don't know. I'm kind of ignoring half the rules. They have an "Intro to Screenwriting" explanation on the Script Frenzy site but when it gets to all this "INT. SARAH'S BEDROOM - DAY" that's about where I get the confounded feeling. Why not just write "Interior"? And all this tabbing? What?

What I really wanted to say in this post, somewhere, is that I'm really happy and thankful to all the people that are commenting on my post, and telling me how it is, and what it needs to do. In script writing I have no idea how much I'm allowed to describe things, or what camera angles are, or where I'm supposed to put things.

This loops back to what I was saying earlier about writing in the fourth grade. Because, you see, I didn't stop there. I just kept writing. I wrote a novel between the fifth and sixth grades. It's badly awesome, hand written, all one paragraph, and the characters all have preposterous rock star names like "Wind" or "Tornado" or "Lighting". I spell "vampire" five different ways on the FIRST page. It's about... 450+ pages.

I wrote another novel in High School at some point, and this one tops out around four hundred or five hundred hand written pages. It was so good that my friends all passed it around, in this huge three ring binder. Imagine getting High Schoolers to willingly read- I mean, for some that's not so hard, but others, it's like herding cats. Most of High School I wrote fanfic, sparsely populated with original work. Randy tells me that we learned how to plot novels in High School English class, but I don't remember that. Or if I do, that might have been the first time we actually used all the writing terminologies that confuse me to this day.

And, then, I got out of High School and went to college, and wrote more fanfic.

And then, there was NaNoWriMo. I wrote my first Novel for that in 2004. I even bought the writing book Chris Baty wrote.

And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is the first writing book I ever read. The first "How to" of any kind, on the craft.

Pretty much, it was the last too, because other than that book I find writing guides really confusing. What is this "story arc" that they speak of, what are all these "acts"? I have no idea. I mean, I get it, that these things exist and you can diagram a novel into sections and pieces, and label them all like a map of how to get there. But I never think like that.

This happens, so that happens, and then the characters go here.

Except with names and places thrown in. That makes sense to me, and it follows whatever a story is supposed to follow. It's like calling the thigh bone a femur (except I know what that is, so the metaphor doesn't work quite right).

I guess this is what happens when you read enough; you know how the tale works, without any need for the mechanics therein.

[22:19] Randy: its the diffrnce between a wizard and a sorcerer
[22:19] Bento: one learns, one figures it out?
[22:19] Randy: something like that
[22:20] Randy: sorcerers have natural magical abilty they just tap into
[22:20] Randy: wizards must study for years for the simplest spells
[22:22] Bento: i'm gonna quote you in my blog
[22:23] Randy: yay! i feel special!

What I wanted to make a point of, is that all my fiction writing has been me, by myself, figuring it out. I read a lot, so that's really been my only teacher of how to do things, and I think for the longest time that I didn't know there were writing guides. I just picked up a pencil one day, and said, "I'm going to write a story." and all it had to do was be better than the book I'd read. And then I kept going, until now. Which is thirteen years, and only three years ago did I pick up a writing manual. What people read of mine, is all homemade, and self crafted. I put those words in order, not just in the literal sense of pen on paper or keyboard onto screen, but in the sense that I invented this by myself. (well, I suppose that's goofy to say I invented writing, but I mean that I invented my own writing) I didn't know other writers personally, in real life, until I was well into High School and we never talked shop. The first time I actually talked shop with other writers was, *surprise* Work Dinner. Which is why half the time I sit around with this happy face and glazed eyes, just insanely pleased to hear Cliff and Charles talk about writing something, or how they came up with it, or an idea.

I hope I'm not coming off like a pretentious ass, who thinks they can write anything without looking at books about it, or asking for help. I don't want to sound like that. I want help. Because I have no idea what I'm doing with script format. ^_^

But I am very flattered that everyone took the time to read it, and tell me what they think. And I'm glad they sound like they're really talking. ^_^ I'm pretty sure that's the goal. I'm gonna go poke at the script with Cliff's words in mind, and see what difference it makes. I might post a revision...