NEWM-N 460 Advanced Scriptwriting for New Media
3 credits
- Prerequisites: ENG W302 or NEWM N260
- Delivery: On-Campus
- How to compose short scripts through multiple drafts, revising based on peer feedback, self-reflection, and instructor’s written comments.
- How to discuss, analyze, and respond in depth to a variety of media (e.g., short films, film clips, and scripts) to identify filmic elements, strategies, and conventions.
- How to discuss, analyze, and respond in depth to the ways in which various visual and verbal texts achieve, or fail to achieve, their purposes.
- How to analyze scripts for story structure, pacing, character development, and effective dialogue, as well as theme, metaphor, symbols, and other narrative devices commonly used in visual storytelling.
- How to become more critical and careful readers of both their own and others’ scripts in a workshop environment.
- How to collaborate in developing ideas, scripts, and providing constructive peer feedback in a workshop setting.
- How to reflect (orally and textually) on creative choices and decisions to shape a script for a specific audience and purpose.
- How to reflect (orally and textually) on creative choices and decisions to construct meaning out of and provide feedback for others’ scripts.
- How to work with techniques for developing dialogue, character, and plot, putting these techniques into practice by composing at least two short scripts.
- How to research relevant material to write effectively.
- Develop, write, and workshop complete original short scripts suitable for production at the capstone level, either as a film script, game, or other interactive media.
- Evaluate the work of their classmates by offering both written and verbal constructive criticism in a workshop environment.
- Understand that thinking and writing visually is essential to composing short scripts.
- Distinguish between scriptwriting and other forms of written storytelling, with emphasis on how problems of narrative time, interiority, backstory, and character development are solved in scripts.
- Revise their own work by incorporating both peer and instructor feedback.
- Apply comprehensive and advanced methods for the successful creation and revision of narrative scripts.
- Develop effective strategies of creative invention, drafting, and revision for different film genres and individual composing styles.
- Compose collaborative and individual scripts with creativity and audience awareness.
- Perform research to achieve effective writing.
- Demonstrate a professional attitude toward their writing and the writing of others by focusing on the need for appropriate format and style.
This course provides a deeper examination of scriptwriting for 3D animation, computer games, and film, building on previously introduced theories and practices. It focuses on an in-depth analysis of the techniques and processes of scriptwriting, including genre, theme, development, character, dialogue, story structure, formatting, style, and revision.