John August

Directors

Advice to a First-Time Director

Episode - 176

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Directors, Film Industry, How-To, News, Scriptnotes, Transcribed

John and Craig offer advice to a director taking the plunge, with guidance on both getting the work done and getting the performances you want. From there, we segue into a discussion of the Perfect Director, the next installment of our Perfect series.

We also pay a visit to the Logic Police, whose notes are often frustrating but sometimes correct.

But we couldn’t not talk about the messed-up situation with The Interview and North Korea. It’s a terrible precedent, but the mistake is putting the blame on any one studio. Without coordinated group action, it’s only going to get worse.

Links:

You can download the episode here: AAC | mp3.

UPDATE 12-29-14: The transcript of this episode can be found here.

Left or Right

Directors, Story and Plot

This link has been sitting in my queue for months, but it’s still worth sharing. Tony Zhou looks at how character choice is framed as [going left or right](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X05TDsoSg2Y).

You see this technique in movies going back to the dawn of cinema, but no recent movie has used it as fully as Snowpiercer, in which the entire film moves on a linear track.

On the page, you’ll rarely call out “right” or “left.” But that sense of forcing characters to choose between two visual possibilities is a fundamental and frequently-useful paradigm.

Austin Forever

Directors, Film Industry, QandA, Scriptnotes, Story and Plot, Television, Transcribed, Words on the page

John and guest host Susannah Grant sit down with Richard Kelly, Cary Fukunaga, Peter Gould, Dan Sterling and Mike Birbiglia to discuss the role of a writer/director, the wonder of television, and the purpose of table reads.

Then it’s questions from the audience: How do you know you’ve found your third act? How does one become confident? Does impostor syndrome ever go away?

This episode was recorded live at St. David’s Episcopal Church as a certified blasphemy-free part of the 2014 Austin Film Festival.

Links:

* The [Austin Film Festival](http://www.austinfilmfestival.com/)
* Susannah Grant [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0335666/), and Scriptnotes episodes [144](http://johnaugust.com/2014/the-summer-superhero-spectacular) and [145](http://johnaugust.com/2014/qa-from-the-superhero-spectacular)
* John’s picture of [St. David’s Episcopal Church](https://twitter.com/johnaugust/status/526058899796148224)
* Help is on the way at [writeremergency.com](http://www.writeremergency.com/)
* Richard Kelly [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0446819/), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/JRichardKelly), and Scriptnotes [118](http://johnaugust.com/2013/time-travel-with-richard-kelly), [123](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-holiday-spectacular) and [124](http://johnaugust.com/2013/qa-from-the-holiday-spectacular)
* Cary Fukunaga [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1560977/)
* Peter Gould [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0332467/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/petergould)
* Dan Sterling [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1003839/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/dansterl)
* Mike Birbiglia’s [site](http://birbigs.com/), and [on IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1898126/), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/birbigs) and Scriptnotes episode [121](http://johnaugust.com/2013/my-girlfriends-boyfriends-screenwriter)
* Charlie Kaufman’s [BAFTA speech](http://guru.bafta.org/charlie-kaufman-screenwriters-lecture), and Scriptnotes episode [18](http://johnaugust.com/2012/zen-and-the-angst-of-kaufman)
* [Birdman](http://www.foxsearchlight.com/birdman/) is in theaters now
* [Serial](http://serialpodcast.org/) is a new podcast from the creators of This American Life
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Scriptnotes listener Peter Rinaldi ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))

You can download the episode here: [AAC](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/scriptnotes_ep_168.m4a) | [mp3](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/scriptnotes_ep_168.mp3).

**UPDATE 11-4-14:** The transcript of this episode can be found [here](http://johnaugust.com/2014/scriptnotes-ep-168-austin-forever-transcript).

Storyboarding your film using Fountain

Apps, Directors, Fountain

Charles Forman, who has already made some really [interesting](http://playground.setpixel.com/scriptvisualizer/) [tools](http://playground.setpixel.com/wordcloud/) for visualizing Fountain screenplays, is back with [Storyboard Fountain](http://storyboardfountain.com):

> Storyboard Fountain works with a Fountain screenplay file. Open it, and the entire script is displayed on the left of the file. Action, dialogue, and parenthetical lines are shown as elements, so you can create boards for every filmable line in the movie. In fact, you can have as many boards as you want per line, or even choose not to have a board, if it’s not necessary.

> As you draw, each drawing tool you use is saved on its own layer. The images are saved in a folder next to your Fountain file on your hard drive. The reference to each board is saved in location in the Fountain file itself. As a result, you can use the Fountain editor of your choice to edit your script while maintaining the integrity of the location of the storyboards.

Developers Charles Forman and Chris Smoak have released an open-sourced alpha version for the Mac.

Do most screenwriters need this kind of tool? No.

But screenplays aren’t just for writers. They’re platforms upon which to build a movie, a process that involves many different artists and professions. For some films, storyboarding is key part of the process, so anything that can help couple the words to the images is a win.

I love to see developers using Fountain to build applications like these. It’s an exciting time.