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describing photographs

L

lalyil

Hi guys,

I'm describing a room now and in the room there are shelves with framed pictures. If, for exmaple I want one picture to be a family portrait from the 1920's and another to be a wedding picture from the 60's and more, etc..

How would you describe it? And what confused me more is do I write all the descriptions in the same 'paragraph' or seperate them
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A screenplay should not have description past what you just put down. Everything else would be the decision of the art designer, not the screenwriter. Screenplays should not feature overly descriptive passages or settings; screenplays are more meant for cut and dry description of dialogue and action. If your screenplay DOES have flowery prose describing all sorts of things... might you consider writing a short story? If you are making the screenplay for yourself, then by all means, do whatever you want (although it would seem curious why you are asking the official way to describe something). However, any professional reading this will simply not care how flowery you describe something. That prose isn't making it on screen, the art director will be deciding what makes it on screen.
 
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Sure, then you mention the specific thing that is important to the story.

Example:


INT. WALKER'S BEDROOM - DAY

Cindy slowly walks into the room, and notices a set of depression era portraits of the Walker family. Upon closer inspection, Mr. Walker is carrying the shriveled head of Cindy's mother.





Or whatever your story is. Point is, keep it simple, concise, and do not write about anything that doesn't push the story along. Does the reader really need to know each specific decade in which the picture originated from? The specifics will not translate to the big screen, a viewer will only see the photograph he is shown. You could say something like, "the photographs span the decades from a 1920's portrait to a modern photo."
 
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Ok thanks, I've only mentioned the important bits..

BUT, I'm now stuck with something else. The script I'm writing IS in a way, historical. It ventures through different decades and it's important to actually note which decade each scene is taken from.
How is that mentioned in the actual script? Do I write it in the scene heading? The description? Or do I not mention it at all and hope that by the fact the main character's age changes it'll be obvious?


And to make things clearer.. The script is about a man with Alzheimer, from his point of view. Mixture of memories, reality and imagination (mostly based on my grandmother's life). It goes from the 20's til modern times. The years are mainly important because the Holocaust is mentioned and other historical events, but it's all built like a puzzle.
 
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Depends on the POV (point of view) you're writing it from... But normally, yes, you'll mention the date in the slugline of the master scene heading. That way we see the passage of time.

Or you could use a SUPER: (super imposition) and then tell us how many years have passed but that could get monotonous after awhile.

Or you could use INSERT - YEAR (type the year in place of the word). These too can be monotonous.

I've also see what's called past life recall... You set up your master scene, intro the character, and then:

PAST LIFE RECALL -- then type your description of the character remember his past life...

Or you could use flashbacks and flash forwards (also called flash ahead)... LOL.

All the above except placing the new year in the slugline would get pretty annoying after being used a couple/few times.

filmy
 
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Yeah lol don't wanna tire the reader. Just wasn't sure it was "legal" (lol) to write the year in the heading, but I think it's really important here as I don't want to confuse the readers.


Thank you :)
 
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