Here’s a tip I developed over the years to quickly turn an outline into a script and save a lot of wasted time and stress.
After I’ve written an outline, and am ready to start the script, I cut and paste the outline directly into my screenwriting software formatted as action. Then I reformat it all into script format, including slug lines, character names, and dialogue.
Let me show you an example from one of the episodes I wrote for Nickelodeon India’s Little Krishna series, “The Mystery of the Vanishing Sheep”. I’m just going to turn one scene of the outline into script form so you can see how I do it.
Here is the scene from the outline:
EXT. GOVARDHANA HILL – DAY
Krishna & Madhu return to tell the others what they did, and share their treats, only to discover Bal, Sridham, Subala, and just two other boys dressed as sheep. “Where have all our other friends gone?” asks Krishna. Sridham accuses Subala of stealing all his “sheep”. But again, Subala protests his innocence. Then Radha, Lalita and Vishaka lead Chandrika and Prabhavathi to Krishna. But before they can punish Krishna, Chandrika looks around and notices that her son is not there. Prabhavathi doesn’t see her boy either. “Where are they?” asks Prabhavathi. “And who’s that boy over there?” wonders Chandrika, referring to Vyomasura (in disguise) as he sneaks toward the two remaining sheep-boys. Krishna sees through the boy’s disguise, and when he does, Vyomasura sees Krishna in his warrior form. When Krishna confronts the boy, Vyomasura resumes his towering demon form, and reveals he has kidnapped the other boys and will kill them all…as soon as he’s killed Krishna! Hearing that the demon has their sons, Chandrika and Prabhavathi collapse in grief. Krishna battles the demon and, despite his smaller size, wrestles Vyomasura to the ground, causing Govardhana hill to shake so much that his brother, Balaram, has to press his foot down on the earth to stabilise it, leaving a deep footprint. Finally, Krishna throws the demon down with such force that he dies instantly from the impact. Then Chandrika and Prabhavathi plead with Krishna to find their sons. So Krishna leads them away.
That’s a pretty dense scene, so when you look at just that paragraph and think about turning it into script, it seems like it’s going to take quite a bit of work. But watch how simple it is. Here is the very same paragraph reformatted with virtually no editing:
(you can find the exact layout of how scripts should be formatted here)
EXT. GOVARDHANA HILL – DAY Krishna & Madhu return to tell the others what they did, and share their treats, only to discover Bal, Sridham, Subala and just two other boys dressed as sheep.
Krishna
"Where have all our other friends gone?" asks Krishna.Sridham
accuses Subala of stealing all his "sheep".Subala
But again, Subala protests his innocence.
Then Radha, Lalita and Vishaka lead Chandrika and Prabhavathi to Krishna. But before they can punish Krishna, Chandrika looks around and notices that her son is not there. PRABHAVATHI doesn't see her boy either.
Prabhavathi
"Where are they?" asks Prabhavathi.Chandrika
"And who's that boy over there?" wonders Chandrika, referring to
VYOMASURA (in disguise) as he sneaks toward to the two remaining sheep-boys. KRISHNA sees through the boy's disguise, and when he does, VYOMASURA sees Krishna in his warrior form. When
Krishna
confronts the boy,
Vyomasura resumes his towering demon form, and
Vyomasura
reveals he has kidnapped the other boys and will kill them all...as soon as he's killed Krishna!
Hearing that the demon has their sons, Chandrika and Prabhavathi collapse in grief. KRISHNA battles the demon and, despite his smaller size, wrestles Vyomasura to the ground, causing GOVARDHANA HILL to shake so much that his brother BALARAM has to press his foot down on the earth to stabilise it, leaving A DEEP FOOTPRINT. Finally, KRISHNA throws the demon down with such force that he dies instantly from the impact. Then
CHANDRIKA AND PRABHAVATHI
plead with Krishna to find their sons. So Krishna leads them away.
As you can see, I just turned a third-of-a-page, single-spaced paragraph into one-and-a-half pages of rough draft script. Extrapolate this and a four page outline turns into 18 pages of script. That’s nearly three-quarters of a half-hour script! It’s a rough draft and needs a good deal of cleanup, editing, and dialogue punch-up, but it sure beats the heck out of facing blank pages.
©Jeffrey Scott, All Rights Reserved
Jeffrey Scott has written over 700 animated and live-action TV and film scripts for Sony, Warner Bros., Disney, Marvel, Universal, Paramount, Columbia, Big Animation, Hanna-Barbera and others. His writing has been honored with three Emmys and the Humanitas Prize. He is author of the acclaimed book, How to Write for Animation. To work with Jeffrey visit his website at www.JeffreyScott.tv.
Read other articles from this series:
#1 The difference between live-action and animation writing
#3 It all begins with a premise
#4 The secret to developing your story
