Have you read any of these following books?
Publishing a full sized novel is hard work! It requires hours upon hours of planning, writing, editing, and marketing!
But writing a story can also be tons of fun.
In this Unit Project, we will be "publishing" our own short stories for our classmates to read!
- First, you will be spending the first section of your time by planning your story. You will scribble down some rough ideas and start to fill in sketches and notes about the characters, setting, and major themes of your story.
- Next, you will fill out the "Three Act" story plotline to plan out your story. This part is very important so you can avoid writing yourself into a corner!
- Once you have done all your planning, you can write the first rough draft of your story.
Video Transcript
Welcome to week two of 12 Step Screenwriting. I trust everyone spent last week working on their ideas. This week, let's talk three-act structure.
Simple explanation is this: Act one, establish the tone, main characters, the world they live in, and you set up the story. Usually in the first 10 or 15 pages, there's a plot point that introduces change into that status quo. We call it the inciting incident. The rest of the first act is all about building up to the turning point that brings in the main problem of the story. This is the event that motivates everything else.
Another way to look at this is: in act one, chase your character up a tree. In act two, throw rocks at him. The character will try to solve the problem, but things keep getting harder on him. This is what we call raising the stakes. There's a big turning point in the story, usually right in the middle of act two. The fallout from this plot development sets the stage for the climax of act two as well. In most movies, this is called the "all hope is lost" segment.
This brings us to act three: resolution. The character has to confront the problem head-on, and it's do or die. Ideally, everything in the movie builds to this: protagonist versus antagonist, where the hero prevails despite the audience being led to believe that's impossible.
For this week, translate your story idea into a treatment that breaks things down into three acts. Go scene by scene if possible. If you have questions, leave them for me in comments. Don't forget to subscribe, and we'll see you back here next week.
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