Screenwriting : Which do you find harder ... by Kenneth Michael Daniels

For me I feel like it would be doing it justice writing it! I think so long and hard about making it perfect the first time whereas conceptually it is very easy for me to find what I want to tell though both are difficult in its own right

Doing the concept justice writing it is harder for me, Kenneth Michael Daniels. Coming up with the concept and outlining it are easier.

Doing it justice for sure. Often takes me a few drafts and multiple rounds of notes to unlock the perfect combination of style/substance

I kind of write it out and power to the end. After I reread it I’ll see what I can pick out it. Sometimes it works or not.

Great question as I’m just starting my first feature spec. During the outlining phase I started with creating a satisfying ending so I have something to build towards. Not sure if this will be how I do things in future projects but it seemed like a logical idea to keep the story focused.

I try to let the process show me. I don’t hunt the perfect concept. I have some seed to something I find interesting. After some time of thinking and exploring hopefully finding a specific, personal view on the subject I wanna tell. This is the way I wanna tell it. Many screenwriters search for smart concepts and they don’t write scripts till they do. short answer is; let the process of writing find an interesting concept.

I find it harder to come up with the concept. Definitely a “gardener” letting it reveal itself to me.

The biggest challenge for me is to make sure the formatting and action lines are industry correct. This is my first true selling script and if the formatting is wrong it's dead on arrival.

Writing

I don't find either hard. I enjoy writing.

Mike Childress

I get where you are coming from, but disagree. Some of us are terrific technicians without an original idea in our head, while others of us have terrific concepts but can't put a coherent sentence together to save our lives.

Of course most of us fall somewhere on the spectrum between those extremes, but where exactly is quite difficult to discern, even for ourselves. IMHO, ideation is a natural gift which is hard to improve upon, our ideas are about as good as they are apt to ever be (though there are strategies to get nominally better), whereas one can get much better at the craft with even a small amount of study and effort. Put more simply: while repetition is the key to mastery, you can't polish a turd.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

I find coming up with a concept fairly easy. I feel writing the story is more difficult as I frequently second guess myself on how something is worded or if there’s a way it could be better.