"Discussions" - Day One + Writing Tips

Today we decided to start posting something that could be more interesting to you than our productions. Of course, as usual you can read about making "Discussions" but from now on you can also find here some tips on making your own film. In every post we will update you on producing "Discussions", plans for new projects and mainly help you making short films. Today we talk about first day of shooting and give you some hopefully helpful tips on writing your own screenplay!

Dmitar Velimir left the cast at the day of shooting his scene and we are sorry he wasn't able to shoot that day, but we agreed it was for the best. First day of shooting was easy for one reason: although we didn't separate units we did separate scenes on 1st degree and 2nd degree, and first scene we shot was 2nd degree scene. In our made-up film dictionary 2nd degree scene is an equivalent with 2nd unit. We filmed only video and no sound. Branko Praštalo appeared as "boy going to school". Scene is approximately 40 seconds long and is monotone. We wanted first few scenes to describe the way we look at life in this case. As we already said, the film is about life and death, love and hatred, religion and philosophy. On picture from shooting you can see our DP Darko Sladojević with vlog runner Višnja Reljanović, executive producer and script supervisor Dragana Rokić, actor Branko Praštalo and assistant director and VTR Logger Dejan Šurlan on location.
Now we are about to tell you some more interesting things on how to make a short film. Today we discuss writing a script! On both of our projects we were well aware of the fact that we are making a non to micro low budget film and it affected our writing. You should also know, if you are making independent short film, what can you use and on what you have to spend money. Try to save money on everything that won't affect quality too much. On "The Strange Mind" first thing was to think of main theme for story. After having that it was easy to add ideas to it. You should know that we like to get weird with our stories and it helps us to get creative with the story. It helped us to read some real scripts to get the basic idea of scripting.
It can get really fun in writing room. You don't have to rent a room, use one of yours! It's helpful having calm environment, helps you concentrate on your story. If you're lucky like we were some of writers will be funny and make great atmosphere for working.
Once you set the main idea try to make a storyline. Make few fixed points (beginning, twist and end). It can get very difficult if you don't know where you are going with your story. First thing we decided for "The Strange Mind" was that our main character won't survive, then we added DID and other characters. Also, sometimes it is interesting to go straight forward with writing. For example, Vince Gilligan (the creator of "Breaking Bad") was able to make one of the greatest dramas on TV because he had no idea where he was going with a season. Writers would make a problem and only after think of possible solutions. On the other hand it's easier to find solution and then make a problem. We recommend our way for beginners.
There are several questions you should have in mind. We suggest you answer them before writing the script itself.

• Whose story are you telling?
• What does your character want?
• What's stopping him getting it?
• What's at stake?

While modelling your character it can get really helpful to answer these questions we found on this site. To make a character profile think about these questions:

• Who is your character secretly attracted to?
• What's a topic of conversation that your character's particularly touchy or overly sensitive about?
• Who is your character's role model?
• What's something your character tries not to reveal about himself or herself?
• What's something your character spent too much money on?
• Who is someone your character pretends to like but dislikes?
• Think of something bad that happened to your character in the past that your character's excessively afraid will happen again!
• Where does your character hide private things, and what is it that he or she hides there?
• What's an unrealistic daydream your character has?
• What's positive quality that your character is unaware that he or she has?

You don't have to show all these in your story, you should know the answers for the story. Just answering these questions will help making the plot. We don't recommend making plot around one or more of these questions. Of course, you could make a film just from these but it wouldn't be a very good one. By knowing your character you will easily create a story around your character.
Decide what genre it is! That is the first thing to do. Later in process give your film a tagline, it helps you define the direction you take and overall picture of your film. For "Discussions" we took a line from "Steppenwolf": "For Madmen Only".
It is also a good idea to find inspiration in quotes from your favorite novels. It's very important not to use quotes in your script except if your character quotes someone on purpose.
Try not to use cliche phrases in dialogs.
Great source of inspiration can be music or pictures!

We hope we helped you with some tips. If you have any questions feel free to leave a comment or contact us by e-mail or on facebook. We wish you all the best in writing your scripts. It is our goal to spread creativity all around the world!

"Discussions" open this fall.
For Madmen Only!