I'f you're in tune with the rarely discussed world of writing and its holiday months, you'd be typing a screenplay draft for script frenzy or trying your hand for National Poetry month. Two great things to do on the month of April fools, Marley fest, and 4/20. Whats even more entertaining is not one of these pays you with a prize, but instead some new material and confidence to boost your portfolio of creations. Hell, I'm already spending 70% of my time writing a revenge script while listing to Dave Brubeck repetitively. But this month is pleasure in a basket as many Script frenzy-ers spend their time getting in to multi-personality mode to create characters for their scripts.
Celtx
So for a quick steady view I'm doing a personal opinion view of this month's tool of choice: Celtx, a free script writing utility. 
You are greeted with some options of what to write which in my opinion is perfect for professionals and amateurs alike. I'm going to focus on the film aspect of this software and pros and cons of writing a script with with Celtx.
The Interface. 
The interface is simple enough to use as many of the tools are presented on the screen which makes everything a click away. They put some tabs on the bottom and top to make the focus of the software the word processor instead of a cluster-fuck of various windows. It runs on Windows, Mac and Linux so the big three can just about use it to type a screen play. The software is visually simplistic enough that the learning curve can be broken down by newcomer to the writing world. I give the interface a 9/10. My only complaint is the large icons on the top of the window.
Features
What I love even more about it is its features such as index cards (which gives you the ability to summarize each scene) and its scratch pad (which is a type of mini word processor for notes and ideas). They also have a sticky note tagger for little things that you want to want type for a certain dialog or action that you find necessary. My other favorite is the Master catalog which holds information such as Character Bios, crew, camera settings, ect, it can hold a ton of information. 
The master catalog is a fascinating organization tool that will bind writers to their keyboard for hours just creating little notes on how they see their production. Another great add on is for the visual people, artpacks for those who need to see the scene. 
You can buy additional artpacks from their website or use the drawing tools to make your own. They also offer writer tools for those who need extra organization for their production. Another cool little feature is the ability to adapt the screenplay to a stageplay or story board if you decide that your script is better suited for something else. The PDF feature is pretty nifty but you absolutely must be online to use it for some reason. But online is common so that shouldn't be a problem.
Overview
Celtx seems to be a really good tool for screenwriters and I can't find much to complain about. Its free, has the basics of what every writer needs and is easy as pie to learn to use. There are the corporate tools such as the upcomming software from adobe for writers, but some things are just overkill for screen production. I hate to compare it to others but its often necessary for switchers. In my opinion its stands well next to Movie Magic and Final draft. I've tried the beta version of adobe's software and theirs seems to just be another generic tool to used to sucker writers into dishing out more cash. I enjoy Celtx and am currently using it for a couple of projects to take a break from Final Draft 8. I think for the free software community Celtx is a perfect solution for those in the writing world.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
April Madness!
