Lesson 1 of 5 · 6 min
Writing scenes
You can write a scene list that produces a video with a beginning and an end.
The most common video brief describes a mood and expects a story back. What produces a usable video is a list of shots, in order, each one describing what is in frame.
Steps
- Decide the one thing the video is for before you write a word.
- Write three to five scenes. Each one gets a subject, a setting and an action.
- Make scene one establish and the last scene resolve.
- Read the list back and check that removing any scene would break it.
What a scene needs
Who or what is in frame, where they are, and what changes during the shot. A scene where nothing changes is a photograph with a runtime.
What to watch for
Scene lists that are all the same length feel mechanical. Real edits breathe: a long establishing shot, two quick ones, then a longer close. You can ask for that.
Avoid writing dialogue into a scene description unless you intend it to be spoken. Descriptions of speech tend to produce mouths moving without meaning.