Pre-Production: Skill Set Group - Scriptwriting

There are a few skill-set groups throughout the pre-production unit. These groups allow people in my year who are either writing, directing, producing their major projects, etc. to get help with any problems we may have in this particular area. It gives us a chance to get advice from others that may be in a similar situation to you.

For me I chose to attend the skill set groups for scriptwriters and directors, as they were the areas I am involved in, for this project.

I benefitted more from the scriptwriting group as I was struggling more with the scriptwriting side of production. My main struggle was with creating supernatural characters. I originally decided to include a vampire and a witch, within these short three films, however I was worried in what ways I could take a supernatural monster like the vampire and make it original without it being linked or similar to films and TV shows that are already out there.

One of the students in the group, Helen suggested maybe not to do about a vampire, etc. as they’ve been used and adapted a lot already.  It would be hard to adapt a vampire in a way that is not stereotypical/copying what has already been created.

I decided to go with Helen’s advice and use different supernatural creatures in my stories. I wanted to make sure that I chose creatures that were roughly known, but have also not been adapted as much. I realized that it would be a risk to change my idea at this point, however I’ve previously done an adaptation of a vampire for a different project and if I wanted to create original short films, this would be a risk worth taking.

A screenshot from my fiction adaptation unit, where I adapted a poem about a vampires transformation. 

I spoke to Sei-Kai and she was happy to change the ideas. We immediately started brain storming  into different supernatural creatures we could use.

Apart from that, another tip I got from the group was that when it comes to writing the scripts, to actually go to the location (or somewhere similar). This would help with visualization for when we came to shoot the films; especially as I will also be directing these films.