Ten Days and Counting

Well, here it is. The final countdown. I have about ten days before I have to be finished with the rough draft of my pilot. Ten. One zero.

I am screwed.

I mean, it'll happen but no one is going to like me for the next weekish. I am going to be unpleasant, stressed distracted, and (hopefully) completely in the world of my characters. This does not bode well for paying bills on time, homework, calling family to chat, and video games? HA! I've already forgotten that Skyrim and Sims 3 exist.

Currently, I have a teaser I'm not pleased with and an outline for the rest of it. By Sunday, I want to be half done. ~30 pages by Sunday. Yeah, I can do that (with the help of Ms. Amanda Palmer, The Dresden Dolls, and The Maccabeats).

Of course, I'm feeling upbeat and motivated to do this now (while I'm at work waiting for the toddler to wake up) but when I get home it's going to be "but I'm tired, I could play Skyrim..." le sigh.

Expect tons of updates if I get stuck, or don't expect to hear from me until February when my writing schedule slows to allow for filming.

Oh yeah! The Amulet!

It's coming along great. I have our WGA Registration number and we har started to cast :) We're almost there on our Kickstarter (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1214577909/the-amulet) $1435! Woo!

Soon, we'll be fully funded and it will be amazing! We shoot in February and until then it's all about prep and planning (which means I'm pretty uninvolved right now).

I'll keep you updated though!

Kickstarter! Complete Script! $17k!

Wow, this past month has been a whirlwind. I completed The Amulet script (barring minor changes that will happen after we have actors), we raised 85% of our budget, and we've launched our kickstarter campaign for the last $3000.

Seriously, this is exciting! We've raised $17,000! We just need that last little bit for film and processing (or car rentals and expendables, or food, or however you want to slice the budget).

We're almost there! Can you help us out?

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1214577909/the-amulet

Websites, Facebook, Concept Art, and Projects on the Horizon

Hey everyone! Thanks for reading the blog, I hope you continue to do so. The Amulet, a short film directed by Andrew Dean and written by Alexandra Napolitano, can now be found at The Amulet Film as well as on Facebook at The Amulet stop on by and give us a Like!

I submitted the fifth draft to the director (and my directed study group) last night and I'm pretty sure I've got it. Just the polish, a table reading or two, and my part is (mostly) done!

Next on the agenda is working on the pilot based off of The Amulet. I'm so excited to move forward within this world and to be able to create something really cool.

Synopsis and logline of The Amulet will be posted as soon as I can get the approval of the director to submit the script to the WGA for registration.

Oh! We also posted the concept art over on Facebook! You can check it out here.

The Amulet!

The short that I've been blogging about has been officially titled! Woo! We're calling it The Amulet. The website will be up soon,  we're still tweaking the set up and finagling content and whatever else the template allows. For now, you can follow the film at @theamuletfilm, the writer (me!) at @aknapoli and the director at @_andrewdean all on Twitter.

I saw some more concept sketches today for possible posters and promotional material and it looks amazing. I can't wait to show everyone. This weekend I should be able to post a quick little synopsis of the short and if you keep your eye on the twitter, there might be a sneak peek into things as production gets closer.

Is it February yet?

Concept Art!

Just dropping in quickly to say that we got some concept art today! It's looking amazing. As soon as the art is finished, I'll post a couple of images so everyone can see it. I'm super excited to see how everything turns out.

Off to work on draft #4!

Writing is hard, yo

Quite a few people I've talked to over the past couple of weeks have exclaimed how if I make it into the industry I'm going to have the best job. They ramble about how I'll get to stay home, wearing pajamas and writing all day.

These people, they don't know what they're talking about :)

First off, writing is HARD. It's difficult to make everything sound genuine. It's complicated to give your characters a voice and an outlook on life and have them stick to it when it would be so much easier for your story if they were just a little more easy going/confrontational/purple.

Beyond that, though it's rather difficult for me to get into the right frame of mind to write. I'll spend two hours looking over my notes, rereading my script versions, and trying to figure out where and with what to begin. Then, finally, it'll hit me and BAM I've written six or seven pages in an hour... and they're good.

I've been trying to write a little every day, to get into the frame of mind that writing is just something I do - like checking my email. But even so, I still have to be in the right place to write well. I can produce endless pages of crap (which nothing ever comes of) if I really wanted to, but I'd rather use my time wisely and try to wait for the lightning to strike as it were.

Deadlines help. If I know I have to get something done, my brain just kind of shuts up and allows me to work. Sadly, artificial deadlines don't produce the same sort of urgency - which is really too bad.

I got notes on the third version of the short I've been working on yesterday, I think I'll end up writing the fourth draft this Wednesday or Thursday (depending on how depressing Tuesday is).

I've also got my first day of class for The Writer's Room tonight. Yay? I'm looking forward to it, but I'm hesitant to say whether or not I'll enjoy it. Then again, I'd better because this is what I've been hoping will be my career for the next forever. It's an undergrad class taken as a directed study, so hopefully it won't be filled with Freshman.

Alright, it's time to prep for class. Next time I update I will have a fourth draft and a TITLE. Wooo!

Draft #3 be damned!

This afternoon I just completed draft #3 of the short that I've been working on. It's occurred to me that since this is the only short that's being produced, it's pretty much also the only one that I'm going to get constant feedback on between drafts.

I am going to be working on another short for someone, but from what I gather, he doesn't seem to be the type who wants constant control over the script because he's not planning on shooting it immediately. He's just hoping to be able to make it some day.

Other than that though, everything will be entirely up to me. Sure, I can have other people look over it and tell me what they think, but in the end the final editing choices will be solely my decision. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I like having someone else to work with and bounce ideas off of when they're invested in how it turns out too. I think it will be much more difficult to write without solid deadlines (other than the end of the year one) as well. I guess I'll have to learn how to make my own and stick to them... or I'll just learn how to write really fast when I realize that things aren't up to snuff and I only have one month left. We'll just have to see.

I did another draft of the pilot I've been working on too. Well, a mini-draft. I took the criticism and comments given to me by a reader and applied most of it. I still have some things that the reader mentioned to cover. Some of it is dialogue based, which I will work on last and some of it is stuff that I don't agree with yet, but probably will by the end of it all. I just have to see where the characters are going and how to take them there.

One more thing that I've been working on (though not in a written down sort of way, just in a tossed around in my head way) is an outline for my second pilot. It's the only other large project I have (two pilots, three shorts) so I want to get it started. And since it's closely tied into the short I'm working on, I'm not sure how they will connect.

I'm debating between having the pilot be a longer version of the short or having the short be the intro to the world and then having the pilot be the second, but larger story in the series. I'm not sure which would better serve an audience.

All in all, things have been busy and school, officially, starts tomorrow. I've got Mastering Dialogue (yay!) and a group directed study for screenwriting (the only class where I'll actually get to work on my thesis projects). On Monday nights (not tonight) I'll have a class too (The Writer's Room), but today is Labor Day, so that class will start next week.

Moving onto draft 2

Today I'm starting draft 2 of short #1 (when they have appropriate titles, you will know :). I'm a little nervous because we're making big changes to the feel and structure of the story and this is going to feel more like a first draft. Either way, the changes that the director and I talked about look awesome and now it's all about implementing them. Woo!

After I finish this draft, I'm going to begin working on draft #2 of Pilot #2 - which is very exciting. Pilot #2 is my baby. I've been working on it for a year already and I finally got a draft where I wanted it to be. It originally began as a feature length film and kind of evolved from there. I took a class called the Feature Film Outline and I had been told by my advisor that it wouldn't be an issue to write a television pilot outline - I would just have to talk to my instructor. 

So, first day of class instructor gives me the okay to do what I want. Second day of class, he tells me that I can't do it because it's not a feature film outline. Sigh. After that I decided that I could develop the story and just reshape it however I want, but he was insistent the entire semester that I follow his rules and do what he says... without ever really critiquing my work or giving me any helpful development ideas. Very frustrating. But throughout that whole ordeal, I wound up with a decent outline that would take me through to a pretty tight pilot episode. So much has changed from the working title (now a different one) to the formulation of the characters and how they relate to each other. What the show is really about also changed, it went from being a pioneering story to one about family. Either way, I'm exceedingly pleased. 

Alright, it's time to actually get to work on the second draft. Zero down, twelve pages to go!

The Beginning of the End

The work for short #1 has really started over the past week. It's been pretty grueling working out the story and how I want it to flow. First drafts, for me, are all about getting the right feel for the story onto the page as well as producing a clear and concise storyline that I can build upon.

Right now, I'm on page seven out of twelve and I'm relatively happy with this draft so far. Sure, it needs dialogue work and some tweaking on character voices and b-plot elements, but it's coming together well. I plan on sprinting for the next hour - hopefully I can finish the twelve pages and then start tweaking before I pass the first draft onto my director.  I'm really excited to see where this story will go and how it will change - especially as it relates to Pilot #1.

Pilot #1 and Short #1 are directly related. The short is a condensed version of the pilot meant to give a producer/network an idea of how the show has been conceived. The idea is to pitch the short script, pilot script, and short film as a package in order to gather interest from as many places as possible.

Once we get closer to a final draft, I might have a special giveaway for a blog reader who donates to our Kickstarter fund (link to come when Kickstarter has been launched).

As for Pilot #2, I have a first draft done and a ton of editing, tweaking, and rewriting to do. I received some very nice notes from a reader and I can't wait until I can get back to work on it. I'm taking a much needed break between drafts, however, because I want to be able to look at my work with fresh eyes. If I focus on one project for too long, I can get a little shortsighted. Plus, this time before the semester begins is the only time that I'll be able to actually have a break, so I'm really pumped to take advantage of that.

Thanks for reading! More updates to come!

Well, today I officially start work on my thesis as I have passed my midpoint review! This means the beginning of this blog. Over the next nine months I will write three shorts and two television pilots while blogging and tweeting about them.

Stay tuned!