Writing the Short

Documentary Script

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Dylan Pank - I have these
recommendations:
• nail your narrative down as much as possible
– Don't make the mistake of being clear and linear and
boring, or being experimental and pretentious.
– Use your time to explore something in detail; rather
than skim over something big of which you'll barely
scratch the surface.
• Make sure your showing something new or
unusual.
– Every year at least one group of students want to
make a film about a student who is also a DJ, as if
Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
that was something new and revolutionary that had
 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Pre-Interview!
– If you're doing interviews, then pre-
interview first, make notes and prepare
questions.
• Decide whether you want your questions to be
heard in the soundtrack or not.
• Write a script, even if you don't know all the
subjects answers yet, imagine what they might
be, research with pre-interviews would help you
here.
– The script should contain visual as well as verbal
Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
information
 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Transcripts and Paper Edits
– once you've done your interviews, do a transcript
and then a paper edit.
• Don’t waste your time (let alone your editor’s!) while you
wallow in all that footage as you search for a story.
• You can always improve on the paper edit, but it gives
you the equivalent of a script to work on when you go
into the edit room.
• It seems like a drag (the transcript and paper edit) but it
will save you loads of time. You can always improve
upon the paper edit, but it gives you a map to work with.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Some Tips from the
Experts
• And finally, the above is, as the man
said "more what you'd call "guidelines"
than actual rules."

• ...Except the bit about paper edits.

• That's a rule.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Richard Alvarez
– I like to write out the script, including what I
expect the interviewees to say. Then, when
I am conducting the interviews, I ask
questions that will result in the sorts of
answers I am looking for.
– Is this 'objective'? It is as objective as your
advocacy is. You still have to be flexible
enough to follow the answers wherever
they might lead.
Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
 Some Tips from the
Experts
• The term "DOCUMENTARY" is a
generic label for anything that's not
'narrative'.
– Within that label are investigative reports,
issue docs, advocacy docs, expose's,
biographies, etc. etc. Each of these
subsets has a specific point of view going
in.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Michael Plunkett
– A beginning, a middle and an end is a
noble starting point and it should be no
different for any film regardless of size.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Barry Hampe
– From the very start of the scripting process, your
research, planning, organization, and writing must
be pointed toward answering the question, What
will the audience see?
• As writer of the script, you have to show to the client, the
director, the camera operator, and the video editor—and
through them the audience for the video—the images
that make up the story you want to tell.
• You do this with a well-visualized, coherent script which
clearly communicates your intentions to the people who
will read it.
Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
 Some Tips from the
Experts
• The more specifically you can describe your
script in terms of concrete images, the better
your chance of communicating through video.
– Similarly, the more abstract or interpretive your
idea is, the more important it becomes to build up
evidence for the idea through concrete images.
• To be recorded on video, an image has to be
solid, tangible.
– Images are described with concrete nouns and
action verbs.
– A concrete image can be understood in a single
shot. Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
 Some Tips from the
Experts
• Field research is so important to a
scriptwriter.
– You can't describe what you haven't seen.
• And you can't use as visual evidence what you
don't even know exists.
– As a scriptwriter, you not only have to think
in pictures, you have to learn to see like a
camera.
• When you are out scouting a scene, a setting,
or a location, you have to learn to see what is
actually there.
• Otherwise
Old Dominion University Film Studies Program
your brain may instruct your eye to
 The Documentary Script
Format
• The following slide is an example of the
typical format used for documentary
scripts.
• It’s as easy as using the tables menu in
MSWord.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 The Three Column
Format
Time Video Audio

Black Screen. Fade In:

0:00:00 Fade in Title Credits. Background music – Title Music.
Title Credit: BERT WALL AND THE Rousing but a bit mystical.
GHOST STORIES OF THE DEVIL’S
BACKBONE

0:00:20 Camera Wide on an open 2-lane A rushing sound should accompany

Texas Highway as the headlights each image as it appears and floats
of a car pierce through the fog towards the car windshield then fly
and mist. off left and right.
Images of Spirits, an Indian on
horseback, a Woman sitting by a A background sound of the tires of a
fire in a rocking chair, a road car on the tarmac of a Texas
sign that reads: “Purgatory Highway.
Road”, a white stag deer, a
white owl flies by, another road
sign that reads “Texas Highway
32”, and a lone Indian with a
flat brimmed hat and an eagle
feather appear in the distance.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program

 Final Thoughts

• Field Research Before You

Write.
• Write Before You Shoot.
• Paper Edit Before You Edit.

Old Dominion University Film Studies Program