John August

Apps

Bronson Watermarker 1.6 gets customized

Apps, Bronson

The new version of Bronson Watermarker — in the [Mac App Store today](http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker/id481867513?mt=12) — adds our single most-requested feature: customization of the font, size and transparency of watermarks.

It’s one little button, but it lets you spend a dangerous amout of time tweaking and futzing with your watermark.

That potential time-suck is why we made it easy to ignore. You don’t *have* to choose fonts and colors and opacity. In fact, you probably shouldn’t. After all, the default styles are good enough for [Ron Howard’s Arrested Development script](https://twitter.com/RealRonHoward/status/228261666234707969/photo/1).

[bronson icon](http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker/id481867513?mt=12)

But if you need to customize the watermark — perhaps on a dark photo — now you can.

Bronson 1.6 also includes Mountain Lion support, Retina graphics and the ability to drag in images directly from iPhoto.

All this, plus a refreshed icon that looks great on your dock.

Bronson Watermarker is a [steal at $9.99](http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker/id481867513?mt=12) in the Mac App Store.

Writing screenplays with Scrivener and iA Writer

Apps, First Person, Fountain, Highland, Screenwriting Software

A reader named Gerry wrote in to share his screenwriting workflow, which uses [Fountain](http://fountain.io) as a bridge between Scrivener, iA Writer, Dropbox and Highland.

—

first person[iA Writer](http://www.iawriter.com/) is my favorite application to write in because of its minimalist UI and Focus Mode. I just wish it had features similar to [Scrivener’s](http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php) Binder and Compile. I love the flexibility of having one scene or one sequence per document and organizing them within Scrivener’s Binder — as was [described so well](http://prolost.com/blog/2010/6/17/the-state-of-screenwriting-software.html) by Stu Maschwitz on Prolost.

Fortunately, Fountain lets me leverage both iA Writer and Scrivener.

I write scenes in iA Writer using Fountain syntax, saving them as plain text files in a [Dropbox](http://dropbox.com) folder. I can then work with them using iA Writer on a Mac, iPad, or iPhone, which is handy.

iA Writer is perfect for scenes, while Scrivener is great for the bigger script.

Because Fountain files are plain text, Scrivener is happy to handle them. I use Scrivener’s “Sync > with External Folder…” command to build a binder for the script, which maintains a link to those original files.

scrivener screenshot

(I prefer working with a minimized Scrivener UI. I “borrowed” icons from the Storyist application to customize Scrivener’s Binder.)

Meanwhile, iA Writer still sees the individual files. If I edit them, those changes appear within Scrivener after the next “Sync > with External Folder…”

iawriter screenshot

Using Scrivener’s “Compile…” command, I can then export a group of Scene and Sequence documents as a single plain text Fountain file.

With [Highland](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/highland), I can then convert that Fountain file to PDF or Final Draft.

—

Gerry’s workflow is more complicated than many screenwriters would prefer, but I like that he’s using the tools he wants for each part of the process. Rather than being boxed in by one monolithic app, he’s taking the best of various apps.

With Fountain, we’ve worked hard to keep the format as agnostic as possible. Scrivener and iA Writer didn’t have to add support for Fountain, because they’ve always had it.

Some upcoming apps will do more with the format — using its built-in notes and sectioning, for example — but even the most basic text editors can do 90% of what you’d want.

For now, Highland helps complete the loop by letting you convert to and from Fountain easily. The free public beta is still going, so if you’re curious, by all means [try it out](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/highland).

Falling in love with plain text

Highland, Screenwriting Software, Tools

Stu Maschwitz explains how blogging led him to get over his need for as-you-type formatting and [embrace plain text](http://prolost.com/blog/2012/7/16/gradually-falling-in-love-with-plain-text.html):

> I’d often find myself battling that little WYSIWYG text window. I’d press Return after some quoted text and it would create another quoted paragraph. I’d press the “quote” button to un-quote the current paragraph, and an extra line would be inserted. I’d try to delete it and now there was no separation between the paragraphs. I’d press “Publish” and the extra line would be back.

> I’d eventually go into the post HTML and try to remove the offending line break, crossing my fingers that I wasn’t destroying something else in the process. After all this, I’d be afraid to touch the WYSIWYG editor again. A typo or broken link would have to be pretty important for me to risk touching this house of HTML cards I’d created.

For his blog, the solution was [Markdown](http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/). For screenwriting, the solution ultimately became [Fountain](http://fountain.io), our joint spec for writing screenplays in any old text editor.

Tools like Markdown and Fountain don’t replace dedicated apps, which can do sophisticated things that would otherwise be very difficult. But too often we’re trying to do too much too soon.

If you’re fighting to get Final Draft to recognize a parenthetical, you’re no longer writing. You’re formatting. You’re a poet picking fonts. You’re a novelist worrying about hyphenation.

Plain text keeps you from worrying about the wrong things at the wrong time.

Phil Coulson and the failure of IMDb

Less IMDb, Rant

If you click over to my [IMDb profile](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0041864/), you’ll see two new projects: “Phil Coulson: Agent of Shield” and “Coulson’s Day Off.” I’m listed under the writer section, having contributed characters.

Only I didn’t. At all.

I’d never heard of these shorts until I saw them on my profile page. Yes, I worked on the original Iron Man, but I’m not a credited writer and didn’t have any input whatsoever on the character played by Clark Gregg in the franchise.

I’m fairly certain the director simply attached my name — along with Joss Whedon, Fergus & Otsby, Marcum & Holloway — to attract attention to his Marvel fan film. And now that I’m blogging about it, he probably will get some attention.

He’ll also probably get a scary letter from Marvel legal.

Maybe I should feel bad about that — but I really don’t. Fuck him. He’s drafting off my name (and Whedon’s much bigger name) by misrepresenting my involvement in his short film.

If he wanted me to see his movie, he could have sent me a link. Lord knows I’m [accessible](http://twitter.com/johnaugust). I often plug stuff I like. But he didn’t give me that chance. So, as I said, fuck ‘im.

Now, it’s possible that the director himself didn’t link my name to this. ((Click through his other credits and you’ll see the same pattern.)) IMDb credits can be edited by just about anyone, so someone else could have done it.

Which is why I’m saving the bulk of my opprobrium for IMDb.

C’mon, IMDb. Why do you have to suck so much?
—–

My team can make a [browser plug-in](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/less-imdb) that makes your layout less terrible, but we can’t fix your data. That’s on you. You have to do better.

Here’s a simple way you can start: I’m a registered user, so why doesn’t your system kick out an email to confirm a change like this? I know I didn’t work on this. It should never have showed up on the page.

I have a movie coming out, and I’m starting to do publicity. All is takes is one lazy journalist looking at IMDb to assume I’ve been reduced to doing crappy superhero knock-offs.

True, one idiotic fan film isn’t going to hurt my reputation much, but what happens when I’m listed for acting in a porn film, or producing a inflammatory religious documentary? To me, that’s a lot worse than [revealing an actress’s age](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/07/huong-hoang-actress-suing-imdb-amazon_n_1191236.html).

Because there’s no real competition, we’ve come to rely on IMDb. That’s a mistake, but there is not yet a viable replacement. ((On The Talk Show, we speculated that Apple might come out with their own Siri-integrated solution for film credits.))

For now, I could use some reader help — and if you have a few minutes, it’s a useful exercise for seeing how the current IMDb system can be gamed so easily.

1. If you have an IMDb login, head over to [my page](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0041864/) and click the Edit Page button. (Less IMDb has to be turned off to access it.)
2. In the Filmography > Writing Credits section, choose Correct/Delete.
3. Click Continue.
4. On the next screen, choose Delete for the two Phil Coulson credits.
5. Click “Check these updates.”
6. You’ll get an error message asking you to state why these credits should be deleted. I leave this to your creativity.
7. Click “Recheck these updates.”
8. Click “Submit these updates.”

And you’re done! Maybe! There’s nothing to indicate whether a change is really in the works. Some updates show up quickly, but the auto-generated email lists 7-10 days as normal.

Which says a lot about how seriously IMDb is taking its mission.

**Update:**

Eight hours after posting this — and three days after first filing the credit notice — IMDb has excised the two Phil Coulson shorts from my profile. Thanks to everyone who submitted on my behalf.

I suspect some higher-up at IMDb paid attention, because the other writers who had been listed (including Whedon) are also now unlinked. But the same director is still drafting on credits for other filmmakers. IMDb has corrected one mistake, but not their system.