| A | B |
|---|
| Concept | A brief outline of the basic elements involved in your story; explains basic premise, setup, inciding incident, and what the majority of the story will be about, including resolution. |
| Screenplay | A screeplay unfolds scene by scene as it would to the audience on screen. It includes details about the characters, actions, locations, and tone of your film written in a specialized dramatic script format. |
| Script Development | This is a phase of development when you're working to write out the story scene by scene in a specialized dramatic format. |
| Treatment | A treatment is written in prose description of the plot, written in present tense, explaining how a film will unfold to an audience scene by scene. |
| Shooting Script | This is the version of a screeplay that you take into production and your creative team uses to bring the film to life. |
| Scene Heading | This is the first line for every scene explaining the location and day/time. |
| Action | This is written throughout every scene explaining in present tense what is happening in a scene in real time. For example, "Alex walks across the table, picking up a basket of bread." |
| Dialog | This is what each character says throughout a scene, back and forth. |
| Character | This is the person talking in a scene; written in ALL CAPS before the actual dialog is spoken. |
| Sound | These are included to mark any audio that is heard in a scene and is positioned off to the right side and labeled. |
| (O.S.) | This is included next to a character's name in a screenplay and marks that something is said by a character off screen. |
| (V.O.) | This is included next to a character's name in a screenplay and marks that something is said by a character as a voiceover. |
| Voiceover | This is a marking in a screenplay that indicates that a character is not speaking from the current time or place. |
| Parenthetical | When a character delivers a line of dialog there is an opportunity for the screenwriter to indicate tone or motivation for the character. This is done in a specific format. |
| Show, Don't Tell | This is the process of demonstrating for viewers what the message is rather than explaining it to them. |
