April 9, 2026 • 49 mins
Guy Goldstein discusses how his background as both a programmer and screenwriter led to the creation of WriterDuet, one of the most innovative screenwriting tools available today. Recognizing that screenwriting is often a collaborative process, he built software that allows writers to work together in real time rather than sending drafts back and forth.
The result is a platform designed to streamline the creative workflow while eliminating many of the technical frustrations writers face. The conversation explores how programming principles mirror storytelling structure, why better tools can improve a writer’s process, and how collaboration is shaping the future of screenwriting. Guy also shares insights into WriterDuet’s evolving features and how technology can empower writers without replacing the creative heart of storytelling.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/bulletproof-screenwriting-podcast--2881148/support.
The result is a platform designed to streamline the creative workflow while eliminating many of the technical frustrations writers face. The conversation explores how programming principles mirror storytelling structure, why better tools can improve a writer’s process, and how collaboration is shaping the future of screenwriting. Guy also shares insights into WriterDuet’s evolving features and how technology can empower writers without replacing the creative heart of storytelling.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/bulletproof-screenwriting-podcast--2881148/support.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number four sixty six.
Your dream doesn't have an expiration date, Take a deep
breath and try again.
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Kat You Whitten broadcasting from a dark, windowless.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on
that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you
the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how
to make your screenplay bulletproof.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast.
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I am your humble host Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 5 (00:46):
Now.
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Today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof Script Coverage.
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(01:34):
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
Speaker 4 (01:39):
My next guest is a very busy guy who graciously
came down to talk to me because I know he's
got ten million things going on, and one of the
things that we're going to talk about is writer Duet,
which is his program. My next guest is a screenwriter
and again a software developer with guests Guy Goldstein. So
(02:00):
it's my pleasure, Guy, and I you know, I I've
actually used Writer's Duet. I actually use it right now
as my primary screenwriting software. I've pretty much gotten rid
of everything else, and I'm just you know, now, I'm
full fledging into right right right here too wet. Sorry,
I almost I almost misspoke there, but I'm full fledged
into writer Duet, and honestly, it is the the best
(02:23):
screenwrinning software ever used. Uh, And honestly, it's it's actually
the one thing. The guy that actually held me back
from actually trying it and going, I admit this was
the cloud, the idea of the cloud. I I'm one
of those guys because I actually I know you're an
IT guy too, and I work in it as a
day job, and I'm one of those guys that likes
to have stuff on like a flash drive, you know.
(02:46):
And what happens is, whenever I hear stuff like the cloud,
I'm always like, well, what if I'm at a coffee
shop and I can't get my script? You know what
I mean. Oh and so, but like when I started
using your you know, the whole program, I sort of
real like, oh wait, there's an actual there's an actual
like software that could download and that actually solves the problem.
Speaker 5 (03:04):
Yeah, And that's really important to me because obviously, when
you want to write, it doesn't matter where you are.
You have the idea and you need to get it out.
So offline mode was a really important feature, and having
desk up application, it seamlessly works online and offline, so
if you write without an Internet connection, you don't have
to worry about it. As soon as you connect again
to the Internet, you're going to automatically get that all
your changes, they are going to go up to the cloud.
(03:24):
If you have a collaborator, or if you just wrote
on a different computer or a different mobile device or whatever,
all your change will automatically sink as soon as they
reconnect to the Internet.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
And that's what really sold me on on the program.
And so guy, just so to get started, I want
to ask you know what brought you to create Writer dat.
Speaker 5 (03:43):
Well, originally the backstories. I was a programmer for many
years at an actor since I was about five years old.
I've been sort of improv and writing for many years.
And the first product I made for writers was actually
not Writer do It. It was a spreading called reap Through,
and let's just say it's largely a failure, but it
was a cool idea and still is. We actually have
(04:04):
as a plug in its cydebrit or do it right now.
What it allows you to do is have voice actors
or fullcast of computer voices perform your script online. So
instead of struggling to get twenty actors in a room
to a read through, which I had done a number
of times for my own writing. I allowed you just
to have computer voices if you're just listening to yourself
in your car, just to like hear the script instead
of seeing a paper for one hundred times, and then
(04:25):
have actual actors performance, see if you know it connects
the way you expected to or hoping it would, or
sometimes get better than you thought it would. And then
that was the original reason I got into software for writers,
literally because I wanted that product. I was using the
computer voices when I would drive. I used to live
in Santa Barbara. I would drive to LA just like
a half two hours away, as I could listen to
(04:46):
my script, make all my noise on a voice recorder.
When I got home, I would apply all those notes
and then with the full cast when I got to
like really hear actors. And so it was all about myself.
Everything's about me, almost theme in my life. So writer
really came from. Admittedly it wasn't the store I always
wish it were, which is at a co writer. It's
(05:08):
not true. I did not have a co writer. No
one would put up with me that long. But I
was really interested in screenering software. I'd use Celtics when
I started that I started using file draft, and as
someone who is making software for a living, there were
things that I didn't like about either one. But the
number one thing that was so obviously missing was the
(05:28):
real time collaboration, and that was the entire impetus for this.
It was just knowing that if you did have a
co writer, and so many people do, especially in the
professional ranks. You'll notice I'm not saying exact numbers, I
don't remember it, but a very high percentage of feature
films in Hollywood have co writers. And when you're in TV,
virtually every writer's room, this is a number of writers
(05:48):
damn necessary write all the scripts together, but they brainstorm,
they collaborate on the outlines and on the structure, and
then when they're doing the punch up rounds, you often
have everyone throwing out jokes or having ideas and the
script collaboratively. So really, isn't that was the big missing hole.
That's where I started with. And then once we had
the collaboration, a lot of people were switching to writer
(06:09):
who are using it as an ANON on top of
a final draft of Celtics, which we are fully capatible with,
where you could import their scripts and export them as well,
but we didn't have all the features that you needed
to make your only writing solution. So that was the
sort of iterative process of getting like feedback from real
writers who wanted it to be there on the right sources.
It was so much more convenient. But either had features
(06:30):
that were in Final Draft and they liked and that
was fine, that made those or no one was doing
but they just seemed like really good ideas, like the
infinite revision history. So that doesn't, you know, come from
anything other than a writer. So to say, hey, it
wouldn't be cool if I could see all my past
versions of lines, and I realized we could do that
super easily, or I could go back in time to
a previous version of the script, and so I took
(06:50):
notes like that, ideas like that, We're like, yeah, yeah,
we can do that. And so you could probably count
ninety percent of the features in writer Do. It came
from just launching your products super early, getting all that
feedback from real writers, and implementing all their ideas as
efficiently as so good.
Speaker 4 (07:08):
You know, I've actually used Celtics, I used Final Draft.
Do you remember Sophocles? Have you ever tried that software?
Speaker 5 (07:14):
So the funny thing I had not try because I
don't think I can find it. I don't know if
it's possible to find right now. But I actually maybe
I'm pretty correct on that one. But I had a
number of people say, oh, I remember this Turtle calesoftably
then apparently had a pretty good cult following. Field really
liked it. So I don't know the backstory exactly. I
think there was the one guy kind of like me
at the time now where my company is staying a
little bigger, but one guy who had made that, probably
(07:36):
a similar person who was liked software for himself and
for other writers.
Speaker 4 (07:41):
Yeah, exactly. And what happened was he he just basically
sold the company to I think Final Draft, and they
basically really about the company above the company, and then
just shuttered it. And basically, I actually when he I
think when he sold it, he actually uploaded the code
or something right to site or something like that, and
somebody or just basically I think he just didn't make
a big stink out of somebody uploaded a pirated copy
(08:03):
now because he doesn't own it anymore and they're closing
it down anyway. So I remember a friend of mine
got gave it to me on a on again. Here
we go, give a flash drives. You have to do
it in a flash drive, and he goes, here, just
use this, and I use that for years, and then
I found and then I used like I kind of
like weaned in the Celtics and then final drafts and
then uh, I did like I've tried like fade in
(08:24):
and and and also uh what is that scrivener? And
now I know I'm into what they diet.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's a lot of people.
And it's funny because we always as writers should not
be worried about the software we're using, like it's actually stupid,
just obsess over it when the words on the script
come out the same either way, Like that's a truth.
I am a first new meek software and still believes
you should not obsess over it. But I believe you
should use the best tools for what you're doing every day,
(08:52):
hopefully or a large percent of your days. And I
feel like people organically just try different things because they
just can curious what's out there, and in the end,
it doesn't really make a difference to your writing, to
the results of your writing, but it makes a difference
to your process, Like it makes it easier to put
words on paper and if we do anything, for example,
(09:13):
if you're collaborating, you don't have to wait for an
email from your co writer, or if you're going you
want to see, man, this really funny line and Rider
it has a feature where you can actually search back
in time and find any version of your script with
a line that maybe was removed or whatever at some point,
and you're like, d you know, I just can't remember
what draft that's in. I want to look at our
backups with write or find it. Little features like that
are the things that I think people not sho obsess over,
(09:35):
but should look for because it's going to actually make
their writing life better. So I kint of t side
to where I'm like, yes, you should not have religious
wars over what software you use. Whatever makes you happy
is cool, but you should find something that actually makes
your writing more effective.
Speaker 4 (09:51):
Yeah, I concur because I know you know, you and
I both work in it.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
And really that kind of gives us a different sort
of view of software and using it. But you know, again,
it should be all about the writing. I agree one
hundred and ten percent. And I think that that's what
sort of stops a lot of people because they sort
of they want to obsess. I mean, for instance, guy,
I had a friend of mine who actually used Microsoft
Word to write a screenplay, and I actually said, are
(10:28):
you just a glutton for pashment? Like I said, how
would you even format that? And he actually had a method,
and the method was he would know no indentse for
for exposition, slash action, two indents for I think it
was characters. No, I'm sorry, it was like three indents
for like dialogue and four indents for I mean, my god,
(10:49):
I was like, how could you possibly do this without
like just like throwing your laptop out the window. But
you know, and that's why I like the screenwrinning software
that we've seen now, because again with red Duett, you
could actually you know, you don't have to worry about
for many it correctly, you know what I mean, All
that is done for you.
Speaker 5 (11:06):
Yeah, And that's like the goal of any I mean
software in general, in my opinion is whatever you're trying
to do, you should not realize you're even using software,
is my goal, Like it just happens, like you just
start hitting keys and the right thing just happens as
much as possible, Like no one goes to a software
not Noah, but very few people go thinking, man, do
I want to spend two days learning this? Like you
(11:27):
just want to start using and start writing. And so
I think, with what we do and what we try
to accomplish, it is making it as seamless as possible
for a person who's never even written a screenplay before.
Like one of the early decisions we made, one of
the first ones was almost I think everyone slash almost
everyone in the other products have a dropdown menu where
you select character or dialogue or whatever, and of course
(11:48):
you have tab a, enter, etc. Shortcuts, But the dropdown menu,
first of all, it's a community to click twice doesn't
really tell you any information about what a slug line
is or a character why you'd use one. So one
of the first decisions you made is happening is big
buttons for each one on the top of the script,
and if you mouse over them, it actually explains here's
(12:10):
when you would use this and here's what it is.
And it doesn't get in your way. It's not like
we're wasting space because the buttons, you know, line up
really nicely and it doesn't kill you. But little things
like that, just trying to make it so way a
new writer can jump in or an old writer can
you know, more effectively figure out what they're trying to accomplish.
It's a big part of it, just to make it
easy so you're not spending time worrying about the software.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
Yeah, and that's where you're basically like, Okay, look see
the interface, and you're like, look, let's just get down
to writing now, and we can sort of, you know,
unconsciously do this, you know, because that way you're just
sort of flowing into the story. And that's something too.
I want to ask you guys, when you're coding and
you're you know, obviously you're you're you're a programmer. Did
did you find that when you're coding and you're you're
(12:54):
building something like writer or duet, is it similar to
how you write a screenplay at the same time, So
basically when you because I know you've written screenplays as well,
so when you're sort of writing screenplays and then also
you're coding, do you notice if there's any sort of
parallel to the.
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Two, I need a huge amount. I don't know if
this is true universally, but I see a lot of engineers, programmers,
people are pretty technical who are interested in screenwriting, maybe
more so than they'd be interested in other creative writing things,
because there's a lot of technical stuff that goes into
a screenplay, and not just technical in sense of production,
like technical in the sense of story structure that doesn't
have to be there, but tends to exist. And so
(13:34):
as someone who with code, you know you have a
very very big vision that has to be broken apart
to tractable pieces, and each those tractoral pieces has to
accomplish its role. And then you say, well, how effective
they can do that? Well can you make bet in
this thing? And that's how I look at the scripts,
like what is my big vision? What am I trying
to accomplish? Okay, well, I'm trying to tell a story
about something important to me, whatever that is. How do
(13:57):
I want to reflect that? And then you kind of
break it into well one of the individual components. How
do the components lead up to it? Like what's our scenes?
And how does each scene contribute to the act or
whatever the sequence? How does it affect other characters who
are engaged in the story and each storyline Like if
you're a technical like each scene could be considered a function, right,
(14:19):
and each storyline is there. These characters are variable that
kind of goes through different functions. I don't know, it
is not analogous exactly, but I do take that same
idea of really high level structure for a final accomplished
broke into really small pieces and one I think it's
made me like an effective programmer and the less effective
writer is. I like seeing little tiny things like I like, wy,
(14:43):
I'll just gonna make this one simple thing. I'll make
this on that connects here. I like the connections between
two things. So even when I'm coding, I have this like, oh, man,
if I make this feature, that means we can do
this other thing over here, and I get really excited
and like what if we did this? And it's the
same with a screenplay where wholl if this character picks
up a knife in this scene that's foreshadow to this
other moment where they're going to pick up a gun,
You're like out of whatever it is. And those connections
(15:05):
are I think what makes uh. Sometimes even they don't
guess they get noticed by the casual viewer of a
movie or a person looking at the product. Well, that's
what makes really things exciting when they connect perfectly, everything
lines up the way you would have realized that you're
doing just one little part of that.
Speaker 4 (15:22):
Yeah, you know, I've actually looked at it into coding,
and you know when i've i've i know, a little
bit of HTML and stuff like that, but just very
a little bit. And when I started getting into it,
I kind of noticed there would be a parallel. The
reason being, you know, it's you have to actually you know,
there's breaks in the line, there's all sorts of stuff.
And again, I'm nowhere near as good as you in programming,
(15:44):
but I kind of I could see some kind of parallel.
And then when I saw writer's duet, I water a duet.
I'm sorry, and you know, it's kind of just wanted
to make sure I asked that parallel question because I
imagine there will be at some point, because I mean,
you're obviously, you know, you're writing code, you're taking away
you know, you're you're almost like creating a scratch pad,
you're you know what I mean, and then you're trying
(16:05):
to sort of you know, even when you go into
stuff like GitHub. You know, a friend of mine who
works for Apples was telling me, Hey, go in to GitHub.
You'll see sample code. You could actually see how guys
did all this stuff, and you could actually take it
and try to make your own stuff with it. Still,
you know, it's still interesting stuff like that, And you
know that's why again I want to have it on
the show, because I think it's pretty interesting to talk about.
Speaker 5 (16:24):
Yeah, the inspiration of most code is in some ways
other coud. Right, You have an idea, you see something
in one product and you think, wow, that'd be really
cool if I apply like I hear even and it's funny.
But I spend all my time in a programming text editor,
and there are features I've implemented or we've implemented Ian
Wright or do At that either came from a text
editor's playing with that I thought was cool or personally.
(16:46):
I'll give you an example. I constantly have like something
I'm editing in code, and then I have to jump
somewhere else to see how it works. I can remember
how they connect or whatever, and there's a feature week
doesn't it Either it doesn't exist, or I just keep
stupid to find it in my text editor that I
want to implementing in Writer Duet for writers because I
needed it so much, which was a pin drop, which
is literally you drop a can in a location. He
(17:08):
coul drop as many as you want, and then that
can read somewhere else and jump back to the previous
location without what I actually do my text edge, I
hit a key and I delete it so I can
press undo and jump back there. But it's pay in
the neck. So with fins, it's literally a feature that
I just wanted myself for coding to make it easy
to find. You know, maybe I have three or four
locations that are all really related, so I dropped pins
and you just wanted them to jump through them so
(17:29):
I don't have to constantly find where I was.
Speaker 4 (17:33):
So what were one of the what was one of
the toughest things to implement in the writer Duet from
from from you know, having it out there and from
screenwriters obviously asking you asking questions, uh, you know, maybe
asking for certain features. So what was there any that
come to mind which were the toughest to implement.
Speaker 5 (17:51):
Yeah, one that we did relatively recently, and I can't
say it wasn't worth it, but oh my god, what
a freaking disaster. The time was. We spent three months
on what I think is actually not the most important
thing we've done, which is really cool. It's hard to
say it was worth three months, but you can in writer,
(18:11):
do you. We had have parallel columns, and we already
had done dual dialogue where you could have multiple characters
talking at once. We hadn't done this fully expressive multili
column layout where you get page breaks in the middle.
They got parallel pages didn't really matter, and so you
can write parallel scenes for virtual reality you could have
different directions where you literally had two scenes going on
at once, so if your camera's looking one way, your
(18:33):
characters looking one way see one thing different another. And
it's also good for documentaries, where you do it's called
the audio visual layout, where you're at the audio on
one side and the visual on the other, and that
way for like voiceovers and things like that. You can
mind it up correctly because this, you know, single, you know,
non parallel. You'd have to write while video is going
(18:54):
on and voiceover whatever it is. So the parallel stuff
was actually super complicated. It was one of those things
that in my head was like, ah man, it's gonna
take like a month, and I thought that was bad,
and it was. It was brutal. But yeah, there have
been a few things. I think the things that we've
actually done that have been maybe the most successful and
(19:16):
impactful haven't been that hard. Actually, they've been things that
made sense and you can kind of think about how
they'd fit. And it was as a programmer, and the
same thing for a screenwriter, I think is you have
to find things that fit into the vision pretty well.
Where if you're trying to accomplish something and I'm not
(19:36):
I'm guilty of the opposite of this, or the bad
version where you get distracted and you think, oh man,
this would be so cool if we had this one
little thing, or we could do this feature and and
maybe it doesn't serve the product or the screenplay even
though it's a cool idea and you have to kill
your darlings. You have to not necessarily delete features, although
sometimes you do, but you have to make decisions that
(19:57):
serve the bigger vision.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (20:09):
Instead of necessarily being the coolest thing you could do
that moment or the best idea, because in the end,
you could do anything in your screenplay. You could make
the absolute every detail exactly the way you wanted it,
every joke, every whatever. But how how many years are
you going to spend on that screenplay? Will you ever
release it to anybody? Will you ever actually make it?
If that's your goal, which hopefully is for a lot
(20:31):
of people, so I think you have to kind of,
you know, say this, won't try to accomplish this is
how I'm going to get there. These are the things
that fit with that vision. And mostly that doesn't turn
out to be too hard because it all kind of
works together to make what you want, so that there
be ten different things that don't wish it.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
And you know, as we talk also about all the
features and stuff like that, I know, you know, writer
or do what Three point oh is actually launching tomorrow,
which is June the first, but when this comes out
will be a few days after. But June the first
three point oh is comeing out, so you know, I
know that a ton of new features coming out for it.
The biggest one is the mobile app, which I am huge, huge,
(21:08):
huge about uh And I know a lot of people
go how can you write the screenplay on a phone?
And I say, well when when? When most phones now
on the size of iPads. You know, it's kind of easy.
Speaker 5 (21:18):
Right, Yeah, it's actually really interesting. It's just to clarify,
we're coming out, you know, let's call it the public beta.
We've been in private beta. We're kind of letting people
join in tomorrow and thereafter. Well we'll see how long
that phase goes. Before we got to roll out every
single person. But I'll to answer your question, like about
what it is to mobile, I don't think it's a
ideal writing platform for many people, although I should take
(21:41):
it back because mobile doesn't mean just phones, it means iPads,
it means android tablets, et cetera. So having a mobile
on your on your iPad actually works pretty well. A
lot of pill we're talking they were easing to do
it on their iPad. We're just making a better experience
as an app. But for me personally, I don't think
I would write an entire stream play, but I think
(22:01):
we've maybe talking about earlier or whatever. But when you
have inspiration, you want to put it down somewhere, and
if you can just have your screenwrine program with you
no matter where you are, and always dying to have ideas,
making notes, reading scripts on your phone in just an
easier way. That's I think the ideal use case. If
you want to sit down there and write to our
page script in twenty page script or whatever on your phone,
(22:22):
God bless, but I wouldn't do that. Probably.
Speaker 4 (22:26):
Yeah. I find it's good though, if you ever have
to actually just like if you're writing on your laptop,
for instance, and you have to go out somewhere and
you know you're in line somewhere and you're like, oh
crap that idea, you know, and you can actually just
pop open your screenplay maybe write a line or two.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
The reason I like that better than doing opening something
like let's say, ever note is because again, everything's in
one place now, yeah, and I don't have I'm.
Speaker 5 (22:49):
Sorry, Isaia. Yeah, everything' SYNCD up in real time, so
you don't have to worry about did you transport that
scene in? Did you need some work or whatever?
Speaker 4 (22:55):
Yeah, because then when I get home, I have to
you know, open up every note, make sure I find that,
put it back in there, and now go okay, now
we're back to where we were with That's why I
like the idea of everything in once one place. That way,
I'm not constantly bouncing around to different apps and stuff
like that. So, and I know you were talking about
it's going into public beta, So can you talk about
(23:15):
like some of the other features that are going to
be either seen, invited du at three.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Yeah, I know. So there are a bunch, but at
the high level, like the big things. One of the
coolest ones I think is that we'venplentted what we're calling
drafts or branch drafts. Uh. And so the branches allow
you to first of all, you can already export an
old version of right to do it anytime you go
back to like three days ago at four fifteen pm.
You can just find any version ever. But with branches,
(23:40):
you can go back in time and you can actually
keep writing from that in the same script. So without
like necessarily opening a whole new document having two versions
of your script, you have two branches within your script.
And so what this lets you do is first of all,
easily jump to any point just see what it looks like,
but also have two ideas and you can say, hey,
(24:01):
well you know what I went out to straining for
the last week. It didn't necessarily work there I wanted to.
I'm going to write some other stuff and then maybe
you wind up merging it together. You can have merged
branches if you need to, or you can have a
different version that you share your scripts already, say which
one do you like better, without having these two manual
documents that you have to deal with. You know these branches,
and what we're doing this is that's a the current
(24:22):
rendition in WD three, but the system is going to
actually allow you to do much more in this. So
we're going to allow you to do a for example,
what we're calling ghosts about where you can, for example,
you have a co writer and you have an idea
that isn't necessarily ready for your co writer to see,
but you don't want to be writing another script because
you want to see what they're doing. All their stuff
is let's go say it ready for live, but your
(24:44):
stuff is more private at the time, So you can
go into ghost mook where you're getting all their updates
but they're not seeing what you're doing in this branch,
and then you can toggle back to the main branch
and right from there and they see it. And then
you can taggle back to your ghost branch. And this
is actually a very common Like I said before, we
actually ideas from the world of technology and programming. So
this is basically how GitHub common repository for programmers works,
(25:08):
where you can have multiple versions of your code. And
I'm working at a branch that is potentially buggy right now,
but I'm going to make sure it works by the
time i merge it with the main branch, and so
along Peo. That in the screenplay I think is really
interesting even for yourself. So you can have a producer's
draft that you turn in, and then you can kind
of go off and write in a different direction, and
then your producer gives you notes and you're like, shoot
(25:29):
out and FIUs this whole other storyline. Well, I'll fix
their notes now. But you don't have to have now
two different copies of the script that all automatically can
merge anytime you want. So that's probably one of the
bigger things. And you also have new stuff from notifications
inside the website and app itself. We have let's see
some other quot Oh, yeah, we have a tiger. We're
(25:49):
actually watching our own tiger finally, which is a pretty
heavily requested feature, and Tiger is going to do two things.
So if you're familiar with the filegrapt Tiger, it allows
you to tag props, characters, et cetera. So you could
do call sheets and you can set up for scheduling,
et cetera. But what we're doing is that and we're
letting you tag based on plot points. So you have
(26:12):
a story, v story, et cetera. Tag those, and then
you can filter just one set of tegts, so you
can say, hey, just show me the A story and
everything else in your script that does not match that
tag is hidden, and you're just seeing one storyline and
you edit it. It's going into the main document, but
you're seeing one view. And when I said before about
like you have to make sure things fit together in
(26:32):
a vision. Where our vision is for screenwriting is actually
really the branches and the tags. I think those kind
of tie really well together. Where you can have any
number of versions of your scripts. You can go off
in any number of directions, and you can reduce any
single direction to the part you're looking for, the part
that you're interested in. So if you just want to
see one character's dialogue, you can pull up that one
(26:53):
characters just want to see the scenes of characters in
or the lines that have some prop and or whatever.
You can find whatever you're looking for and simplify your
script to just those pieces. You don't have to see
hundred and twenty pages all the time. You can look
at three pages that are just the parts relevant to you.
Speaker 4 (27:11):
And see stuff like that is really really cool. I
also like that ghost mode, yeah, because you know, and
the whole idea of collaboration too. I also like the
idea of even if you don't have a co writer,
if I have to show it to somebody anyway, rather
than email, I can just post it on there, send
them a link and you know what I mean, and
I don't have to worry about here's the script and
(27:33):
you know what I mean. And then you know they're
gonna go, oh, I don't have Adobe Reader or whatever.
Speaker 5 (27:36):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
It's stuff like that. Is is also I've noticed that
over the years, like little things like that, but they
add up. You know, it's not just one little thing, right,
it's ten thousand little things said that add up to
this huge amount of time. So and then again, obviously
when you're using all these different features and then when
you actually really are really really getting into it, I mean,
(27:58):
that's when you know you can actually again were it
just you can subconsciously start doing a lot of this stuff.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Yeah, and then the reader is a good one. In general,
we haven't done exactly the version I want for this,
but we have a read on only mode which allows,
you know, mean to invite you to my script and
you can't edit it, but you can add notes. And
while that's convenient versus the PDP is the notes can
be done in line where they actually are relevant. So
you can go through like like wholl I have no
idea what's going on? Or why did she say this?
(28:24):
Or Wow, this is really flying or whatever you want
to give and so you can put that directing in
the script and then if I have several people reading it,
I can see all the notes in one place. We
have another future version of this plan where we're going
to make it like right now, I think it's not
really meant for if I'm going to send it out
to a thousand people and just like get all their feedbacks.
Not really built for that. It's more meant for a
(28:45):
producer or a few important people to the script. We
want to eventually is that version where it essentially replaces
a PDF where I send out my script to any
number of people. They can all come into the script,
they can all read it. They can't necessarily see each
other who else is there? They can, they can see
each other people, each other's comments. They just make their
own you see the collection of everything. But it's kind
(29:06):
of a cheap way to share your script with getting
a logical s feedback collected into one place. That's that's
the vision on that teacher.
Speaker 4 (29:15):
So so, guy, has there ever been anybody that that
you've that you've heard about who've used writer to what?
Who's just you've heard about who's just been you've been
blown away by like any like uh any like famous
people or anything like that. We'll be like, oh my god,
they're using you know, my program? Who would have thought?
Speaker 5 (29:30):
Right? Yeah, it happens all the time, And it's it's
interesting exactly what you said it because I have no
reason to know. I don't you know, look at who's
using that. Probably mostly sometimes I find out because the
email me or whatever, I'm like that name sounds familiar.
The ticking go like wait a second, uh So we've
had that number of times usually, and I says, not
insulting everybody else. I could tell when they're a professional,
(29:52):
just based on the questions they ask, like what they're
writing to me about. I'm like, okay, you know.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (30:07):
You clearly are doing something real and that look, I'm like,
you're like, sure, Runner. We just found out recently. I
was on a scum in conference at Pittsburgh on a
panel with the creator of Downward Dog, which is a
new ABC show, and just coincidenced that we were happy
to be there. I guess together and I mentioned Provider
do it. It's like, oh yeah, we used write to
(30:27):
do it. And I'm like, oh cool. I you know,
would never have found that out except the output to
be there. And so that's some pretty big show. TV
shows have used us. The next Spider Man movie coming
out for Man Upcoming was written on our actually really
excited about whether premature movies have come out, But the
truth is I don't even know. Like, for all I know,
there are dozens or hundreds of TV shows and movies
(30:50):
that are just using it. Like we found out then
other TV show recently had care of the name even
that we were talking to We were trying to convince
them to use that. We thought, we found out they
were already using them, like okay, what's the shared conversation.
So so it comes off a lot and hopefully there's
a tipping point where we're no longer We're still gonna
be excited that they're using it, but we're not gonna
(31:11):
be surprised. We're gonna be like, yeah, of course you
use it. It's just like final draft really is the
industry standard at this time, Like most TV shows, most
feature films are written not at uh we you know,
we don't think that's gonna be the case at some
point hopefully in the for the near future.
Speaker 4 (31:27):
Yeah, you know, and you're one of a good point too.
You know, the New Spider movie is using read duet.
So you know, one of the old arguments was, well, hey,
you have to use the industry standard, which because reason
is is because everybody can have a different page five
or a different page twenty, and also because this is
what everyone uses to sort of break down the script.
You know, uh, this is what the the the prop
(31:49):
department has to go to the script and find out
what props, you know what I mean, and they have
to break everything down. You have to break a schedule
out of this script. And as you know, as this happens.
So when when someone something like this New Spider Man
movies using where duet, you know, are you ever planning
on actually just sort of making it? Also, I know
this isn't about screenwriting, but making like a sort of
(32:11):
it almost like a feature that would help you with
like you know, making like day out of days and
stuff like that.
Speaker 5 (32:16):
So the easy answer is no, And there's a good
reason for this. Number one is, uh, we don't really
I don't know. I don't use scheduling stuff because I'm
not a good enough writer that I've been produced. But
I don't feel qualified to make that software. Uh so,
And I actually feel like other people have done a
(32:36):
reasonable job. I know some people who are making products
like that now new versions. You actually learned about one
today that i'd heard of before that's doing it apparently
doing a reasonable job on the cloud. So I'm not
convinced that there's a need for us to do that.
And we don't want to create redundant software just because
us doing it. If we can actually make something better
(32:58):
we're going to make it better if we can take
a process that is just really not good. And the
other thing is we think there's so much more, like
I don't know what other people see in the screenwriting world,
where we see so many features that could be added
and so much stuff that we can do in terms
of outlining, terms of struction, and they're not like and
not to be ridiculing other products, but there are some
(33:21):
competitive screen arting products that will come out with things
that I think are just there to have a feature
with a name so you can advertise it. And I
don't think that actually help writers necessarily. Some might, but
I want to create stuff that actually makes creativity more fluid,
more engaging, more collaborative. And that's that's the stuff we're
going to worry about. Like the technical stuff on the
(33:41):
scheduling budgeting side, we just did introduce a tiger so
now you can like tag up your script and V
three where you can then import it into a scheduling
program and go from there. But I don't know. I'm
not saying this is the end, but my opinion is
we're about as late in the production cycle we want
to go. We want to go earlier. We want to
(34:01):
help people in their initial creativity. Like we're just talking
to one of our users at this really cool production
tablets studio in town in Austin where we are, and
he was talking about how he used it to but
he does not use riger actually for this. He uses
other products to write a pitch for his our treatment
for his stuff before it goes to producers. And I
(34:25):
was like, well, that's really interesting, Like that's an interesting
problem of how how do you construct that in a
really efficient way Because he told me, like, you might
spend a week just preparing this sort of pitch material
that isn't necessarily going to be used ever. Again, it's
more just to appeal the idea. Then he's going to
go write the script. Like if we could help you
do the part that is artistically interesting I e. Or
e g. A S. But the character breakdowns, the plot stuff,
(34:49):
the log wins, those are helpful as a creator, But
the stuff that makes it look cool, like visually, that's
just something that anyone created or not could kind of
or not create, writer or not could make. What if
we can help you you formalize some sort of creative
stuff like like the character breakdowns pre writing, so yeah,
(35:11):
I think that's the vision. How do we help more
and then beyond that, honestly, we're going to do stuff
that goes beyond screenwriting. We're just interested in creative writing
and creativity in general, Like how can we help people
have their ideas and express them faster and more efficiently
in a more you know, it's that engaging way. You know.
Speaker 4 (35:28):
One future that I would like to pitch guy is
you know, and this is very and this is just
you know, pie in the sky taking forward. It's worth
is I always would like to see a more involved
scratch pad. And what I mean by that is is
a scratch pad that is almost like it can format,
but it also it meaning it's very flexible is what
(35:51):
it can do. And you know, it's kind of like
future rama. There's a funny quote in Futurama. You know,
there was a talk about, hey, it was great in
Today's Scientist invented magic. But I know it's kind of
I'm kind of what I'm describing is like this all encompassing,
uh but uh, you know, perfect thing. But but I
I just wanted to say more engaging scratch pad. I
(36:11):
remember using scratch pads before and uh, you know, I
I think it was honest to god Sophocles. But uh,
that's just something that that I nothing. I mean like
final drafts and uh and fade in and and uh yeah,
Scrivener and all those they haven't done that anywhere near
as well. And honestly, that's what the idea want to
(36:32):
pitch to you, was just a more involved scratch pad
where basically, you know, you you can sort of let
your ideas flow a little bit better, uh, because sometimes
you know, when you're actually in that script, you know,
some people have a lot of like they don't want
to actually write a scene out. They rather you know
what I mean, because it almost feels permanent in that
if you're doing the script. I know sometimes how you
know how writers sometimes think it's almost like, oh my god,
(36:52):
I can't do the leat button. So uh that that's
just one of the features that I would just like
to see. And uh, you know, honestly, if you if
I don't see a guy, believe me, I understand. But
but but that would be just be cool to see.
Speaker 5 (37:07):
Well, have good news for you, so go right. Yeah.
So actually one of the other features, it's uh to me,
is not a huge one, but maybe it's a lot
of people. Hopefully it will be really more important than
I realize, uh is. So there are two features. What
is existing and that's the one or you will exist
in W three, which is you could actually have multiple scripts,
any number in fact, open in one single document. So
(37:28):
you have your main script editor, and then you have
these little floating windows and you can open you know,
probably there's a practical limitation of how many you want
to have opened, but you have any number, uh sitting
on the side. And they can be like scratch pad documents.
You can put whatever you want in each one of them.
You can have one where you put like character stuff,
where you put scenes that you're not sure about. You
can have one that you use for like just internal notes,
(37:51):
like a personal note section wherever you use them for.
And so you have all those scripts open in this
little like dragable section that you can move around, so
you can to your screen however you want. So that
is coming in version three, and that's fully it's a
screenplay writing. It is the same right to ads, just
a sort of mini version of it, and you can
write you know, your text or notes, or you can
actually write full scenes with character and dialogue, et cetera.
(38:13):
And then the other thing. And this is the one
that is to me like the big three point whatever,
three point five, you know, whatever you want to call.
It's not quite big up for four, let's say, but
is a total revamp of how people do outlining and
scratch pat just like maybe you're more thinking out than
the sort of mini editor one. And what that is
(38:33):
to me And this is like I got into that before.
It's the idea of filtering. So right now you can
construct these tags in cyberrit or you tag this is
a story, you start whatever, and you can filter out
just the content you want. Well, what if you applied
those filters and in a sort of broadway where we say, hey,
these are outline notes or these are scratch pad scenes
(38:54):
or whatever they are, and you could freely write those
right inside your script. But you knew they weren't real.
You knew they were just like virtual. They were tagged
as sort of cigurated and maybe by default you hit those,
or maybe by default you just saw those whatever mode
you were in of looking at your script, and then
the outliner could filter your script say hey, just show
me the outliner notes for ceda next on c B
(39:18):
since and these are all actual real text editors, and
so the idea is you can write whatever you want freely,
and you just use these tags to explain essentially what
they are ty semantic meaning to you, it's your ow thing,
and then you filter in or filter out the pieces
that you do or don't want. So I think that's
exactly what you know. Those two things I think kind
(39:40):
of combined to be what you're really looking for, which
is the freedom to just put ideas down as quickly
as you have them without the feeling of now they're permitted,
and even the opposite another future where we out really
soon is so when you're writing the scripts, you delete something.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
We'll be right back after a word from our response
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (40:06):
And that actually feels really permanent as well. That's not
before I do it get the infery vision history. You
can always go back, youep and say, oh man, there's
a great line with tacos and search for tacos and
you find that line that's that's been deleted, but it
still feels permanent. And so what we're gonna do is
have a feature where like just then you know within
a key strike whatever. The key strike you come up
with is delete and safe to like repository or whatever,
(40:31):
and we'll just have that little document that's you know,
maybe this will maybe not, but just hiding on the
side that's keeping track of all this content that you
were deleting. But then you don't have to worry about
it being gone. You have this other second script being
created as you go with all your just ideas that
we're working. So I think that's what you what you're
leading to. I think is what we're going for as well.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Yeah, because that is what I was going for. Because
when you're writing and you're you're you're doing all this
sort of thing, you're you're writing all these scenes out
and you're writing ideas, and you're doing this, and you're
kind of sometimes you're coming back and forth. You kind
of don't want to put a scene in there that
might not fit later on, because then you're like, later
on you're like, oh, what the hell was this thing?
Speaker 5 (41:12):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (41:13):
And then it's kind of you know, it's stuck in there,
and if you again, it feels permanent. So I think
with a with a more of like a flexible scratch pan,
that's what I was going for, but with see guy,
you read my mind, you know exactly what I was
going to ask for.
Speaker 5 (41:23):
Yeah, I mean this is the short version is there
are two things we've learned. One is being a writer ourselves,
Like we're all that the team is a five full time,
two part time now at plus two dogs so they
get tired of lifting. So we're all like writers and
filmmakers are programming team as all ed your creative alriating
a film. So because of that we understand, like, you know,
(41:46):
not necessarily before you have the idea, but as soon
as you said it, I'm like, I know why you
want that, and I don't just know the technical implementation.
I kind of understand how you use it. I can
think of being, oh, well, what if you do this
other thing? Or I can take suggestions because we're also
super interested in listening to you to users, and because
of that, like not to say, you know, it's not
brially when anyone comes up with it, but we just
(42:07):
sort of wait sometimes when we hear one person suggests
the feature, were like a good idea, and then we
just try to wait, and then you know there's another
other person's just the same thing, Like Okay, that's interesting.
And just because in the beginning I would just do
everything because we had prelimited features. So when I started
four years ago, so I could do it all, it
was just me at the time. So it's pretty easy
to quickly iterate as you bigger. We don't necessarily have
(42:30):
that liberty. We have too many users to listen to
every single feature, but we just sort of track. Hey,
people keep asking for exactly what you're talking about, like
a scratchbad and not want there are better ways to
do that, and we're gonna, you know, probably have hundreds
more features suggested by users over the next six months
or so. And so it's just you know, keep coming.
(42:50):
So you got other ones, you know, anyone you and
everyone listening. We're here to not assay solve the creative process,
because I don't think that means anything, but it's we're
here to help people be created in a way that
that works for that whatever that means.
Speaker 4 (43:05):
And you know, and then that is fantastic. And you know,
because guy, we've been talking for about you know, maybe
forty minutes roughly, you know, is there anything that we
didn't discuss that you may wanted to talk about? Or
anything you want to say to sort of put a
period the end this whole conversation.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
No, I mean, ultimately, I think the thing that I
want people to take away is they should find where tools,
you know, make them more effective at what they're doing.
If you're writing and you're happy with your writing process,
I don't have a problem if you want to use
Celtics or anything else or found Pound Draft. I just
think that if you're not happy with the process, there
(43:38):
are things that annoy you. If you're like, yeah, well
it's fine. But now if it doesn't excite you every
time you open up those any product, maybe that's not
the right one for you. You want something that inspires
you to more create it. And if we don't do that,
then we're not the right ones either. It's just, you know,
we always want to feel to find that that perfect,
perfect tool for their use.
Speaker 4 (43:59):
Yeah, and again, you know, I think writer Duett is
a perfect tool because again, even guys like me who
was afraid of the cloud, because again, if I'm at
somewhere and I can't download that script, but then again
you solved that with the app. And I want to
give a shout out to to Mike Berman who's actually
been on the podcast before. And guy, you know you
and I both know Mike. He runs the screenways who
(44:20):
can actually write Facebook group. He is the one who
actually got me into writer duet and he's he was
the one who said, you know what, they have an
app and it actually solved all those problems.
Speaker 5 (44:29):
I gotta say no shot to Mike Helpe. He's listening
to a Mike And this is to all our users. Actually,
we do no marketing. If you want to like Google
shoot Dark Software. We're finally on the first page now,
but you'll never see an ad. I mean right now
you see an ad for writer do at And we
don't do like Facebook ads. We've tried a few, probably
spent a couple hundred bucks on Facebook ads to see
(44:50):
what happened, and the answer was nothing. We don't market
and the reason is found Draft is really good at marketing,
Like they've done a great job. And if if I
had to, like, if I could be as good as
they are marketing, I would adjust it. So we don't.
We just sort of say hey, we're making what we
think is the best product, and people like Mike uh
(45:10):
just really got attached to it because he was using it.
It helped him in some ways and he could honestly
recommend it and he did, and that group, I don't
know what the percents are, but it's pretty high percent
of writers in that group use writer du app because
Mike introduced it to them and then they really liked it.
And they would then in the next person who're asked, hey,
and how you're having a problem with the screen program
or I'm just curious what's out there, all the other
(45:32):
members would say, oh, yeah, I use it too, and
they would get excited. And you know, it's a compliment
to us, some self compliment, I guess, but it's really
a testament to me how how people in the screening
community are willing to not only give back to us
by getting their future ideas, but help each other by
you know, to me advertising with the best product. And
I you know, I guess, thank you to everyone who
(45:52):
does that. And also please continue since my personal one
because in the end of the day, like writers are
here to help out the writers. That's why you need
this podcast. I'm guessing it's not for all the money
to pay you to do it. You just here like
to help with creative community and that's what we're here
for as well.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
Yeah, honestly, guy, the whole story behind this podcast is,
you know, I do a lot of creative work. I
got stifled and right around twenty fourteen, I decided to
start this podcast for a lot of reasons. And I'm
sure all the listeners who've actually listened since episode one,
which there actually are people as shocked as I am,
they've actually they're probably saying, no, don't tell this whole
(46:32):
story again, So I'll spare everybody from telling it again.
But that was the idea though. The short of it
is it just to do something creative and something fun.
And each week That's why I say this is like
a film school, an audio film school, because each week
I'm bringing in a different person who has an entirely
different background. Screenwriters, producers, directors, actors, marketing people. I mean,
(46:54):
you name, and I've had them on the show. I mean, hell,
I've had Casie Ovis on here, who was the executive
producer Dallas Buyers. You know, I mean, it's just like,
I mean, he said, yes, why, I have no idea,
But I was like, okay, I've had Mark Banstock, who's
a producer for M I Shamalan stuff. I mean, it's
just been you know, I mean, and then I've just
been blown away by all the talented people like yourself
(47:15):
guy who've had on this podcast. And it is a
small world too, because you both know Mike Bierman, so
it's it. It's just such a small world and it's
just getting smaller.
Speaker 5 (47:23):
Yeah, writers like writers are so isolated sometimes just that
we don't know this from writing. You kind of get
in that mode and you're lonely. Don't stay in there.
That's my biggest recommendation. They kind of find communities, find
a Facebook group, plus we actually write as one. There's
a really good Creddit community for screenwriters where it's even
(47:45):
if you never contribute, I think just I go there
obsessively admittedly, and even sometimes I like, see you writer,
do you have questions on there? And I just kind
of wait and sometimes see if anyone else is going
to answer this before I do. I just really enjoy
that can unities that have been formed around such an
isolated activity as writing, and people who are willing to
get back and contribute, so hopefully everyone gets to participant
(48:08):
in as Yeah, and that is a.
Speaker 4 (48:10):
Very good Facebook page too, and it's it's not very
very common to actually get a really awesome Facebook page
where everyone's actually helping each other out. Usually, as you know,
guys social media, if you have like a Facebook page,
it usually ends up in like some kind of flame
war where it's like people fighting over absolutely nothing. And
(48:31):
you know, because I mean, I've seen that tons of times,
you know what I mean, And that's why I've kind
of stayed away from a lot of those groups. But
that one group is amazing. The Scare has we've been
actually right, and I like that in the show notes
as well. But guy, it's been excellent having you on.
And where we will find you out online.
Speaker 5 (48:46):
You can find us on Twitter at writer Duets I
think Facebook slash writer duet or whatever the URLs for
a group. Yeah, you'll see me around. I'm pretty I'm
pretty out there, so if you catch me in the
Reddit forum or the scare actually ray, you'll find me
pretty fast. So don't shower saying hi anyone out there.
Speaker 4 (49:06):
Die Goldstein, I just want to say thank you so
much for.
Speaker 5 (49:08):
Coming on you, thank you for having me. This is
a really blast.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
a great job on this episode. If you want to
get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
head over to the show notes at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.
Forward slash for sixty six. Thank you so much for
listening to guys. As always, keep on writing no matter what.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at bulletproof
Screenwriting dot tv.
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifahpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number four sixty six.
Your dream doesn't have an expiration date, Take a deep
breath and try again.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Kat You Whitten broadcasting from a dark, windowless.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on
that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you
the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how
to make your screenplay bulletproof.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast.
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I am your humble host Alex Ferrari.
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Now.
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Today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof Script Coverage.
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(01:34):
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
Speaker 4 (01:39):
My next guest is a very busy guy who graciously
came down to talk to me because I know he's
got ten million things going on, and one of the
things that we're going to talk about is writer Duet,
which is his program. My next guest is a screenwriter
and again a software developer with guests Guy Goldstein. So
(02:00):
it's my pleasure, Guy, and I you know, I I've
actually used Writer's Duet. I actually use it right now
as my primary screenwriting software. I've pretty much gotten rid
of everything else, and I'm just you know, now, I'm
full fledging into right right right here too wet. Sorry,
I almost I almost misspoke there, but I'm full fledged
into writer Duet, and honestly, it is the the best
(02:23):
screenwrinning software ever used. Uh, And honestly, it's it's actually
the one thing. The guy that actually held me back
from actually trying it and going, I admit this was
the cloud, the idea of the cloud. I I'm one
of those guys because I actually I know you're an
IT guy too, and I work in it as a
day job, and I'm one of those guys that likes
to have stuff on like a flash drive, you know.
(02:46):
And what happens is, whenever I hear stuff like the cloud,
I'm always like, well, what if I'm at a coffee
shop and I can't get my script? You know what
I mean. Oh and so, but like when I started
using your you know, the whole program, I sort of
real like, oh wait, there's an actual there's an actual
like software that could download and that actually solves the problem.
Speaker 5 (03:04):
Yeah, And that's really important to me because obviously, when
you want to write, it doesn't matter where you are.
You have the idea and you need to get it out.
So offline mode was a really important feature, and having
desk up application, it seamlessly works online and offline, so
if you write without an Internet connection, you don't have
to worry about it. As soon as you connect again
to the Internet, you're going to automatically get that all
your changes, they are going to go up to the cloud.
(03:24):
If you have a collaborator, or if you just wrote
on a different computer or a different mobile device or whatever,
all your change will automatically sink as soon as they
reconnect to the Internet.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
And that's what really sold me on on the program.
And so guy, just so to get started, I want
to ask you know what brought you to create Writer dat.
Speaker 5 (03:43):
Well, originally the backstories. I was a programmer for many
years at an actor since I was about five years old.
I've been sort of improv and writing for many years.
And the first product I made for writers was actually
not Writer do It. It was a spreading called reap Through,
and let's just say it's largely a failure, but it
was a cool idea and still is. We actually have
(04:04):
as a plug in its cydebrit or do it right now.
What it allows you to do is have voice actors
or fullcast of computer voices perform your script online. So
instead of struggling to get twenty actors in a room
to a read through, which I had done a number
of times for my own writing. I allowed you just
to have computer voices if you're just listening to yourself
in your car, just to like hear the script instead
of seeing a paper for one hundred times, and then
(04:25):
have actual actors performance, see if you know it connects
the way you expected to or hoping it would, or
sometimes get better than you thought it would. And then
that was the original reason I got into software for writers,
literally because I wanted that product. I was using the
computer voices when I would drive. I used to live
in Santa Barbara. I would drive to LA just like
a half two hours away, as I could listen to
(04:46):
my script, make all my noise on a voice recorder.
When I got home, I would apply all those notes
and then with the full cast when I got to
like really hear actors. And so it was all about myself.
Everything's about me, almost theme in my life. So writer
really came from. Admittedly it wasn't the store I always
wish it were, which is at a co writer. It's
(05:08):
not true. I did not have a co writer. No
one would put up with me that long. But I
was really interested in screenering software. I'd use Celtics when
I started that I started using file draft, and as
someone who is making software for a living, there were
things that I didn't like about either one. But the
number one thing that was so obviously missing was the
(05:28):
real time collaboration, and that was the entire impetus for this.
It was just knowing that if you did have a
co writer, and so many people do, especially in the
professional ranks. You'll notice I'm not saying exact numbers, I
don't remember it, but a very high percentage of feature
films in Hollywood have co writers. And when you're in TV,
virtually every writer's room, this is a number of writers
(05:48):
damn necessary write all the scripts together, but they brainstorm,
they collaborate on the outlines and on the structure, and
then when they're doing the punch up rounds, you often
have everyone throwing out jokes or having ideas and the
script collaboratively. So really, isn't that was the big missing hole.
That's where I started with. And then once we had
the collaboration, a lot of people were switching to writer
(06:09):
who are using it as an ANON on top of
a final draft of Celtics, which we are fully capatible with,
where you could import their scripts and export them as well,
but we didn't have all the features that you needed
to make your only writing solution. So that was the
sort of iterative process of getting like feedback from real
writers who wanted it to be there on the right sources.
It was so much more convenient. But either had features
(06:30):
that were in Final Draft and they liked and that
was fine, that made those or no one was doing
but they just seemed like really good ideas, like the
infinite revision history. So that doesn't, you know, come from
anything other than a writer. So to say, hey, it
wouldn't be cool if I could see all my past
versions of lines, and I realized we could do that
super easily, or I could go back in time to
a previous version of the script, and so I took
(06:50):
notes like that, ideas like that, We're like, yeah, yeah,
we can do that. And so you could probably count
ninety percent of the features in writer Do. It came
from just launching your products super early, getting all that
feedback from real writers, and implementing all their ideas as
efficiently as so good.
Speaker 4 (07:08):
You know, I've actually used Celtics, I used Final Draft.
Do you remember Sophocles? Have you ever tried that software?
Speaker 5 (07:14):
So the funny thing I had not try because I
don't think I can find it. I don't know if
it's possible to find right now. But I actually maybe
I'm pretty correct on that one. But I had a
number of people say, oh, I remember this Turtle calesoftably
then apparently had a pretty good cult following. Field really
liked it. So I don't know the backstory exactly. I
think there was the one guy kind of like me
at the time now where my company is staying a
little bigger, but one guy who had made that, probably
(07:36):
a similar person who was liked software for himself and
for other writers.
Speaker 4 (07:41):
Yeah, exactly. And what happened was he he just basically
sold the company to I think Final Draft, and they
basically really about the company above the company, and then
just shuttered it. And basically, I actually when he I
think when he sold it, he actually uploaded the code
or something right to site or something like that, and
somebody or just basically I think he just didn't make
a big stink out of somebody uploaded a pirated copy
(08:03):
now because he doesn't own it anymore and they're closing
it down anyway. So I remember a friend of mine
got gave it to me on a on again. Here
we go, give a flash drives. You have to do
it in a flash drive, and he goes, here, just
use this, and I use that for years, and then
I found and then I used like I kind of
like weaned in the Celtics and then final drafts and
then uh, I did like I've tried like fade in
(08:24):
and and and also uh what is that scrivener? And
now I know I'm into what they diet.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's a lot of people.
And it's funny because we always as writers should not
be worried about the software we're using, like it's actually stupid,
just obsess over it when the words on the script
come out the same either way, Like that's a truth.
I am a first new meek software and still believes
you should not obsess over it. But I believe you
should use the best tools for what you're doing every day,
(08:52):
hopefully or a large percent of your days. And I
feel like people organically just try different things because they
just can curious what's out there, and in the end,
it doesn't really make a difference to your writing, to
the results of your writing, but it makes a difference
to your process, Like it makes it easier to put
words on paper and if we do anything, for example,
(09:13):
if you're collaborating, you don't have to wait for an
email from your co writer, or if you're going you
want to see, man, this really funny line and Rider
it has a feature where you can actually search back
in time and find any version of your script with
a line that maybe was removed or whatever at some point,
and you're like, d you know, I just can't remember
what draft that's in. I want to look at our
backups with write or find it. Little features like that
are the things that I think people not sho obsess over,
(09:35):
but should look for because it's going to actually make
their writing life better. So I kint of t side
to where I'm like, yes, you should not have religious
wars over what software you use. Whatever makes you happy
is cool, but you should find something that actually makes
your writing more effective.
Speaker 4 (09:51):
Yeah, I concur because I know you know, you and
I both work in it.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
And really that kind of gives us a different sort
of view of software and using it. But you know, again,
it should be all about the writing. I agree one
hundred and ten percent. And I think that that's what
sort of stops a lot of people because they sort
of they want to obsess. I mean, for instance, guy,
I had a friend of mine who actually used Microsoft
Word to write a screenplay, and I actually said, are
(10:28):
you just a glutton for pashment? Like I said, how
would you even format that? And he actually had a method,
and the method was he would know no indentse for
for exposition, slash action, two indents for I think it
was characters. No, I'm sorry, it was like three indents
for like dialogue and four indents for I mean, my god,
(10:49):
I was like, how could you possibly do this without
like just like throwing your laptop out the window. But
you know, and that's why I like the screenwrinning software
that we've seen now, because again with red Duett, you
could actually you know, you don't have to worry about
for many it correctly, you know what I mean, All
that is done for you.
Speaker 5 (11:06):
Yeah, And that's like the goal of any I mean
software in general, in my opinion is whatever you're trying
to do, you should not realize you're even using software,
is my goal, Like it just happens, like you just
start hitting keys and the right thing just happens as
much as possible, Like no one goes to a software
not Noah, but very few people go thinking, man, do
I want to spend two days learning this? Like you
(11:27):
just want to start using and start writing. And so
I think, with what we do and what we try
to accomplish, it is making it as seamless as possible
for a person who's never even written a screenplay before.
Like one of the early decisions we made, one of
the first ones was almost I think everyone slash almost
everyone in the other products have a dropdown menu where
you select character or dialogue or whatever, and of course
(11:48):
you have tab a, enter, etc. Shortcuts, But the dropdown menu,
first of all, it's a community to click twice doesn't
really tell you any information about what a slug line
is or a character why you'd use one. So one
of the first decisions you made is happening is big
buttons for each one on the top of the script,
and if you mouse over them, it actually explains here's
(12:10):
when you would use this and here's what it is.
And it doesn't get in your way. It's not like
we're wasting space because the buttons, you know, line up
really nicely and it doesn't kill you. But little things
like that, just trying to make it so way a
new writer can jump in or an old writer can
you know, more effectively figure out what they're trying to accomplish.
It's a big part of it, just to make it
easy so you're not spending time worrying about the software.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
Yeah, and that's where you're basically like, Okay, look see
the interface, and you're like, look, let's just get down
to writing now, and we can sort of, you know,
unconsciously do this, you know, because that way you're just
sort of flowing into the story. And that's something too.
I want to ask you guys, when you're coding and
you're you know, obviously you're you're you're a programmer. Did
did you find that when you're coding and you're you're
(12:54):
building something like writer or duet, is it similar to
how you write a screenplay at the same time, So
basically when you because I know you've written screenplays as well,
so when you're sort of writing screenplays and then also
you're coding, do you notice if there's any sort of
parallel to the.
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Two, I need a huge amount. I don't know if
this is true universally, but I see a lot of engineers, programmers,
people are pretty technical who are interested in screenwriting, maybe
more so than they'd be interested in other creative writing things,
because there's a lot of technical stuff that goes into
a screenplay, and not just technical in sense of production,
like technical in the sense of story structure that doesn't
have to be there, but tends to exist. And so
(13:34):
as someone who with code, you know you have a
very very big vision that has to be broken apart
to tractable pieces, and each those tractoral pieces has to
accomplish its role. And then you say, well, how effective
they can do that? Well can you make bet in
this thing? And that's how I look at the scripts,
like what is my big vision? What am I trying
to accomplish? Okay, well, I'm trying to tell a story
about something important to me, whatever that is. How do
(13:57):
I want to reflect that? And then you kind of
break it into well one of the individual components. How
do the components lead up to it? Like what's our scenes?
And how does each scene contribute to the act or
whatever the sequence? How does it affect other characters who
are engaged in the story and each storyline Like if
you're a technical like each scene could be considered a function, right,
(14:19):
and each storyline is there. These characters are variable that
kind of goes through different functions. I don't know, it
is not analogous exactly, but I do take that same
idea of really high level structure for a final accomplished
broke into really small pieces and one I think it's
made me like an effective programmer and the less effective
writer is. I like seeing little tiny things like I like, wy,
(14:43):
I'll just gonna make this one simple thing. I'll make
this on that connects here. I like the connections between
two things. So even when I'm coding, I have this like, oh, man,
if I make this feature, that means we can do
this other thing over here, and I get really excited
and like what if we did this? And it's the
same with a screenplay where wholl if this character picks
up a knife in this scene that's foreshadow to this
other moment where they're going to pick up a gun,
You're like out of whatever it is. And those connections
(15:05):
are I think what makes uh. Sometimes even they don't
guess they get noticed by the casual viewer of a
movie or a person looking at the product. Well, that's
what makes really things exciting when they connect perfectly, everything
lines up the way you would have realized that you're
doing just one little part of that.
Speaker 4 (15:22):
Yeah, you know, I've actually looked at it into coding,
and you know when i've i've i know, a little
bit of HTML and stuff like that, but just very
a little bit. And when I started getting into it,
I kind of noticed there would be a parallel. The
reason being, you know, it's you have to actually you know,
there's breaks in the line, there's all sorts of stuff.
And again, I'm nowhere near as good as you in programming,
(15:44):
but I kind of I could see some kind of parallel.
And then when I saw writer's duet, I water a duet.
I'm sorry, and you know, it's kind of just wanted
to make sure I asked that parallel question because I
imagine there will be at some point, because I mean,
you're obviously, you know, you're writing code, you're taking away
you know, you're you're almost like creating a scratch pad,
you're you know what I mean, and then you're trying
(16:05):
to sort of you know, even when you go into
stuff like GitHub. You know, a friend of mine who
works for Apples was telling me, Hey, go in to GitHub.
You'll see sample code. You could actually see how guys
did all this stuff, and you could actually take it
and try to make your own stuff with it. Still,
you know, it's still interesting stuff like that, And you
know that's why again I want to have it on
the show, because I think it's pretty interesting to talk about.
Speaker 5 (16:24):
Yeah, the inspiration of most code is in some ways
other coud. Right, You have an idea, you see something
in one product and you think, wow, that'd be really
cool if I apply like I hear even and it's funny.
But I spend all my time in a programming text editor,
and there are features I've implemented or we've implemented Ian
Wright or do At that either came from a text
editor's playing with that I thought was cool or personally.
(16:46):
I'll give you an example. I constantly have like something
I'm editing in code, and then I have to jump
somewhere else to see how it works. I can remember
how they connect or whatever, and there's a feature week
doesn't it Either it doesn't exist, or I just keep
stupid to find it in my text editor that I
want to implementing in Writer Duet for writers because I
needed it so much, which was a pin drop, which
is literally you drop a can in a location. He
(17:08):
coul drop as many as you want, and then that
can read somewhere else and jump back to the previous
location without what I actually do my text edge, I
hit a key and I delete it so I can
press undo and jump back there. But it's pay in
the neck. So with fins, it's literally a feature that
I just wanted myself for coding to make it easy
to find. You know, maybe I have three or four
locations that are all really related, so I dropped pins
and you just wanted them to jump through them so
(17:29):
I don't have to constantly find where I was.
Speaker 4 (17:33):
So what were one of the what was one of
the toughest things to implement in the writer Duet from
from from you know, having it out there and from
screenwriters obviously asking you asking questions, uh, you know, maybe
asking for certain features. So what was there any that
come to mind which were the toughest to implement.
Speaker 5 (17:51):
Yeah, one that we did relatively recently, and I can't
say it wasn't worth it, but oh my god, what
a freaking disaster. The time was. We spent three months
on what I think is actually not the most important
thing we've done, which is really cool. It's hard to
say it was worth three months, but you can in writer,
(18:11):
do you. We had have parallel columns, and we already
had done dual dialogue where you could have multiple characters
talking at once. We hadn't done this fully expressive multili
column layout where you get page breaks in the middle.
They got parallel pages didn't really matter, and so you
can write parallel scenes for virtual reality you could have
different directions where you literally had two scenes going on
at once, so if your camera's looking one way, your
(18:33):
characters looking one way see one thing different another. And
it's also good for documentaries, where you do it's called
the audio visual layout, where you're at the audio on
one side and the visual on the other, and that
way for like voiceovers and things like that. You can
mind it up correctly because this, you know, single, you know,
non parallel. You'd have to write while video is going
(18:54):
on and voiceover whatever it is. So the parallel stuff
was actually super complicated. It was one of those things
that in my head was like, ah man, it's gonna
take like a month, and I thought that was bad,
and it was. It was brutal. But yeah, there have
been a few things. I think the things that we've
actually done that have been maybe the most successful and
(19:16):
impactful haven't been that hard. Actually, they've been things that
made sense and you can kind of think about how
they'd fit. And it was as a programmer, and the
same thing for a screenwriter, I think is you have
to find things that fit into the vision pretty well.
Where if you're trying to accomplish something and I'm not
(19:36):
I'm guilty of the opposite of this, or the bad
version where you get distracted and you think, oh man,
this would be so cool if we had this one
little thing, or we could do this feature and and
maybe it doesn't serve the product or the screenplay even
though it's a cool idea and you have to kill
your darlings. You have to not necessarily delete features, although
sometimes you do, but you have to make decisions that
(19:57):
serve the bigger vision.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (20:09):
Instead of necessarily being the coolest thing you could do
that moment or the best idea, because in the end,
you could do anything in your screenplay. You could make
the absolute every detail exactly the way you wanted it,
every joke, every whatever. But how how many years are
you going to spend on that screenplay? Will you ever
release it to anybody? Will you ever actually make it?
If that's your goal, which hopefully is for a lot
(20:31):
of people, so I think you have to kind of,
you know, say this, won't try to accomplish this is
how I'm going to get there. These are the things
that fit with that vision. And mostly that doesn't turn
out to be too hard because it all kind of
works together to make what you want, so that there
be ten different things that don't wish it.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
And you know, as we talk also about all the
features and stuff like that, I know, you know, writer
or do what Three point oh is actually launching tomorrow,
which is June the first, but when this comes out
will be a few days after. But June the first
three point oh is comeing out, so you know, I
know that a ton of new features coming out for it.
The biggest one is the mobile app, which I am huge, huge,
(21:08):
huge about uh And I know a lot of people
go how can you write the screenplay on a phone?
And I say, well when when? When most phones now
on the size of iPads. You know, it's kind of easy.
Speaker 5 (21:18):
Right, Yeah, it's actually really interesting. It's just to clarify,
we're coming out, you know, let's call it the public beta.
We've been in private beta. We're kind of letting people
join in tomorrow and thereafter. Well we'll see how long
that phase goes. Before we got to roll out every
single person. But I'll to answer your question, like about
what it is to mobile, I don't think it's a
ideal writing platform for many people, although I should take
(21:41):
it back because mobile doesn't mean just phones, it means iPads,
it means android tablets, et cetera. So having a mobile
on your on your iPad actually works pretty well. A
lot of pill we're talking they were easing to do
it on their iPad. We're just making a better experience
as an app. But for me personally, I don't think
I would write an entire stream play, but I think
(22:01):
we've maybe talking about earlier or whatever. But when you
have inspiration, you want to put it down somewhere, and
if you can just have your screenwrine program with you
no matter where you are, and always dying to have ideas,
making notes, reading scripts on your phone in just an
easier way. That's I think the ideal use case. If
you want to sit down there and write to our
page script in twenty page script or whatever on your phone,
(22:22):
God bless, but I wouldn't do that. Probably.
Speaker 4 (22:26):
Yeah. I find it's good though, if you ever have
to actually just like if you're writing on your laptop,
for instance, and you have to go out somewhere and
you know you're in line somewhere and you're like, oh
crap that idea, you know, and you can actually just
pop open your screenplay maybe write a line or two.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
The reason I like that better than doing opening something
like let's say, ever note is because again, everything's in
one place now, yeah, and I don't have I'm.
Speaker 5 (22:49):
Sorry, Isaia. Yeah, everything' SYNCD up in real time, so
you don't have to worry about did you transport that
scene in? Did you need some work or whatever?
Speaker 4 (22:55):
Yeah, because then when I get home, I have to
you know, open up every note, make sure I find that,
put it back in there, and now go okay, now
we're back to where we were with That's why I
like the idea of everything in once one place. That way,
I'm not constantly bouncing around to different apps and stuff
like that. So, and I know you were talking about
it's going into public beta, So can you talk about
(23:15):
like some of the other features that are going to
be either seen, invited du at three.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Yeah, I know. So there are a bunch, but at
the high level, like the big things. One of the
coolest ones I think is that we'venplentted what we're calling
drafts or branch drafts. Uh. And so the branches allow
you to first of all, you can already export an
old version of right to do it anytime you go
back to like three days ago at four fifteen pm.
You can just find any version ever. But with branches,
(23:40):
you can go back in time and you can actually
keep writing from that in the same script. So without
like necessarily opening a whole new document having two versions
of your script, you have two branches within your script.
And so what this lets you do is first of all,
easily jump to any point just see what it looks like,
but also have two ideas and you can say, hey,
(24:01):
well you know what I went out to straining for
the last week. It didn't necessarily work there I wanted to.
I'm going to write some other stuff and then maybe
you wind up merging it together. You can have merged
branches if you need to, or you can have a
different version that you share your scripts already, say which
one do you like better, without having these two manual
documents that you have to deal with. You know these branches,
and what we're doing this is that's a the current
(24:22):
rendition in WD three, but the system is going to
actually allow you to do much more in this. So
we're going to allow you to do a for example,
what we're calling ghosts about where you can, for example,
you have a co writer and you have an idea
that isn't necessarily ready for your co writer to see,
but you don't want to be writing another script because
you want to see what they're doing. All their stuff
is let's go say it ready for live, but your
(24:44):
stuff is more private at the time, So you can
go into ghost mook where you're getting all their updates
but they're not seeing what you're doing in this branch,
and then you can toggle back to the main branch
and right from there and they see it. And then
you can taggle back to your ghost branch. And this
is actually a very common Like I said before, we
actually ideas from the world of technology and programming. So
this is basically how GitHub common repository for programmers works,
(25:08):
where you can have multiple versions of your code. And
I'm working at a branch that is potentially buggy right now,
but I'm going to make sure it works by the
time i merge it with the main branch, and so
along Peo. That in the screenplay I think is really
interesting even for yourself. So you can have a producer's
draft that you turn in, and then you can kind
of go off and write in a different direction, and
then your producer gives you notes and you're like, shoot
(25:29):
out and FIUs this whole other storyline. Well, I'll fix
their notes now. But you don't have to have now
two different copies of the script that all automatically can
merge anytime you want. So that's probably one of the
bigger things. And you also have new stuff from notifications
inside the website and app itself. We have let's see
some other quot Oh, yeah, we have a tiger. We're
(25:49):
actually watching our own tiger finally, which is a pretty
heavily requested feature, and Tiger is going to do two things.
So if you're familiar with the filegrapt Tiger, it allows
you to tag props, characters, et cetera. So you could
do call sheets and you can set up for scheduling,
et cetera. But what we're doing is that and we're
letting you tag based on plot points. So you have
(26:12):
a story, v story, et cetera. Tag those, and then
you can filter just one set of tegts, so you
can say, hey, just show me the A story and
everything else in your script that does not match that
tag is hidden, and you're just seeing one storyline and
you edit it. It's going into the main document, but
you're seeing one view. And when I said before about
like you have to make sure things fit together in
(26:32):
a vision. Where our vision is for screenwriting is actually
really the branches and the tags. I think those kind
of tie really well together. Where you can have any
number of versions of your scripts. You can go off
in any number of directions, and you can reduce any
single direction to the part you're looking for, the part
that you're interested in. So if you just want to
see one character's dialogue, you can pull up that one
(26:53):
characters just want to see the scenes of characters in
or the lines that have some prop and or whatever.
You can find whatever you're looking for and simplify your
script to just those pieces. You don't have to see
hundred and twenty pages all the time. You can look
at three pages that are just the parts relevant to you.
Speaker 4 (27:11):
And see stuff like that is really really cool. I
also like that ghost mode, yeah, because you know, and
the whole idea of collaboration too. I also like the
idea of even if you don't have a co writer,
if I have to show it to somebody anyway, rather
than email, I can just post it on there, send
them a link and you know what I mean, and
I don't have to worry about here's the script and
(27:33):
you know what I mean. And then you know they're
gonna go, oh, I don't have Adobe Reader or whatever.
Speaker 5 (27:36):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
It's stuff like that. Is is also I've noticed that
over the years, like little things like that, but they
add up. You know, it's not just one little thing, right,
it's ten thousand little things said that add up to
this huge amount of time. So and then again, obviously
when you're using all these different features and then when
you actually really are really really getting into it, I mean,
(27:58):
that's when you know you can actually again were it
just you can subconsciously start doing a lot of this stuff.
Speaker 5 (28:03):
Yeah, and then the reader is a good one. In general,
we haven't done exactly the version I want for this,
but we have a read on only mode which allows,
you know, mean to invite you to my script and
you can't edit it, but you can add notes. And
while that's convenient versus the PDP is the notes can
be done in line where they actually are relevant. So
you can go through like like wholl I have no
idea what's going on? Or why did she say this?
(28:24):
Or Wow, this is really flying or whatever you want
to give and so you can put that directing in
the script and then if I have several people reading it,
I can see all the notes in one place. We
have another future version of this plan where we're going
to make it like right now, I think it's not
really meant for if I'm going to send it out
to a thousand people and just like get all their feedbacks.
Not really built for that. It's more meant for a
(28:45):
producer or a few important people to the script. We
want to eventually is that version where it essentially replaces
a PDF where I send out my script to any
number of people. They can all come into the script,
they can all read it. They can't necessarily see each
other who else is there? They can, they can see
each other people, each other's comments. They just make their
own you see the collection of everything. But it's kind
(29:06):
of a cheap way to share your script with getting
a logical s feedback collected into one place. That's that's
the vision on that teacher.
Speaker 4 (29:15):
So so, guy, has there ever been anybody that that
you've that you've heard about who've used writer to what?
Who's just you've heard about who's just been you've been
blown away by like any like uh any like famous
people or anything like that. We'll be like, oh my god,
they're using you know, my program? Who would have thought?
Speaker 5 (29:30):
Right? Yeah, it happens all the time, And it's it's
interesting exactly what you said it because I have no
reason to know. I don't you know, look at who's
using that. Probably mostly sometimes I find out because the
email me or whatever, I'm like that name sounds familiar.
The ticking go like wait a second, uh So we've
had that number of times usually, and I says, not
insulting everybody else. I could tell when they're a professional,
(29:52):
just based on the questions they ask, like what they're
writing to me about. I'm like, okay, you know.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (30:07):
You clearly are doing something real and that look, I'm like,
you're like, sure, Runner. We just found out recently. I
was on a scum in conference at Pittsburgh on a
panel with the creator of Downward Dog, which is a
new ABC show, and just coincidenced that we were happy
to be there. I guess together and I mentioned Provider
do it. It's like, oh yeah, we used write to
(30:27):
do it. And I'm like, oh cool. I you know,
would never have found that out except the output to
be there. And so that's some pretty big show. TV
shows have used us. The next Spider Man movie coming
out for Man Upcoming was written on our actually really
excited about whether premature movies have come out, But the
truth is I don't even know. Like, for all I know,
there are dozens or hundreds of TV shows and movies
(30:50):
that are just using it. Like we found out then
other TV show recently had care of the name even
that we were talking to We were trying to convince
them to use that. We thought, we found out they
were already using them, like okay, what's the shared conversation.
So so it comes off a lot and hopefully there's
a tipping point where we're no longer We're still gonna
be excited that they're using it, but we're not gonna
(31:11):
be surprised. We're gonna be like, yeah, of course you
use it. It's just like final draft really is the
industry standard at this time, Like most TV shows, most
feature films are written not at uh we you know,
we don't think that's gonna be the case at some
point hopefully in the for the near future.
Speaker 4 (31:27):
Yeah, you know, and you're one of a good point too.
You know, the New Spider movie is using read duet.
So you know, one of the old arguments was, well, hey,
you have to use the industry standard, which because reason
is is because everybody can have a different page five
or a different page twenty, and also because this is
what everyone uses to sort of break down the script.
You know, uh, this is what the the the prop
(31:49):
department has to go to the script and find out
what props, you know what I mean, and they have
to break everything down. You have to break a schedule
out of this script. And as you know, as this happens.
So when when someone something like this New Spider Man
movies using where duet, you know, are you ever planning
on actually just sort of making it? Also, I know
this isn't about screenwriting, but making like a sort of
(32:11):
it almost like a feature that would help you with
like you know, making like day out of days and
stuff like that.
Speaker 5 (32:16):
So the easy answer is no, And there's a good
reason for this. Number one is, uh, we don't really
I don't know. I don't use scheduling stuff because I'm
not a good enough writer that I've been produced. But
I don't feel qualified to make that software. Uh so,
And I actually feel like other people have done a
(32:36):
reasonable job. I know some people who are making products
like that now new versions. You actually learned about one
today that i'd heard of before that's doing it apparently
doing a reasonable job on the cloud. So I'm not
convinced that there's a need for us to do that.
And we don't want to create redundant software just because
us doing it. If we can actually make something better
(32:58):
we're going to make it better if we can take
a process that is just really not good. And the
other thing is we think there's so much more, like
I don't know what other people see in the screenwriting world,
where we see so many features that could be added
and so much stuff that we can do in terms
of outlining, terms of struction, and they're not like and
not to be ridiculing other products, but there are some
(33:21):
competitive screen arting products that will come out with things
that I think are just there to have a feature
with a name so you can advertise it. And I
don't think that actually help writers necessarily. Some might, but
I want to create stuff that actually makes creativity more fluid,
more engaging, more collaborative. And that's that's the stuff we're
going to worry about. Like the technical stuff on the
(33:41):
scheduling budgeting side, we just did introduce a tiger so
now you can like tag up your script and V
three where you can then import it into a scheduling
program and go from there. But I don't know. I'm
not saying this is the end, but my opinion is
we're about as late in the production cycle we want
to go. We want to go earlier. We want to
(34:01):
help people in their initial creativity. Like we're just talking
to one of our users at this really cool production
tablets studio in town in Austin where we are, and
he was talking about how he used it to but
he does not use riger actually for this. He uses
other products to write a pitch for his our treatment
for his stuff before it goes to producers. And I
(34:25):
was like, well, that's really interesting, Like that's an interesting
problem of how how do you construct that in a
really efficient way Because he told me, like, you might
spend a week just preparing this sort of pitch material
that isn't necessarily going to be used ever. Again, it's
more just to appeal the idea. Then he's going to
go write the script. Like if we could help you
do the part that is artistically interesting I e. Or
e g. A S. But the character breakdowns, the plot stuff,
(34:49):
the log wins, those are helpful as a creator, But
the stuff that makes it look cool, like visually, that's
just something that anyone created or not could kind of
or not create, writer or not could make. What if
we can help you you formalize some sort of creative
stuff like like the character breakdowns pre writing, so yeah,
(35:11):
I think that's the vision. How do we help more
and then beyond that, honestly, we're going to do stuff
that goes beyond screenwriting. We're just interested in creative writing
and creativity in general, Like how can we help people
have their ideas and express them faster and more efficiently
in a more you know, it's that engaging way. You know.
Speaker 4 (35:28):
One future that I would like to pitch guy is
you know, and this is very and this is just
you know, pie in the sky taking forward. It's worth
is I always would like to see a more involved
scratch pad. And what I mean by that is is
a scratch pad that is almost like it can format,
but it also it meaning it's very flexible is what
(35:51):
it can do. And you know, it's kind of like
future rama. There's a funny quote in Futurama. You know,
there was a talk about, hey, it was great in
Today's Scientist invented magic. But I know it's kind of
I'm kind of what I'm describing is like this all encompassing,
uh but uh, you know, perfect thing. But but I
I just wanted to say more engaging scratch pad. I
(36:11):
remember using scratch pads before and uh, you know, I
I think it was honest to god Sophocles. But uh,
that's just something that that I nothing. I mean like
final drafts and uh and fade in and and uh yeah,
Scrivener and all those they haven't done that anywhere near
as well. And honestly, that's what the idea want to
(36:32):
pitch to you, was just a more involved scratch pad
where basically, you know, you you can sort of let
your ideas flow a little bit better, uh, because sometimes
you know, when you're actually in that script, you know,
some people have a lot of like they don't want
to actually write a scene out. They rather you know
what I mean, because it almost feels permanent in that
if you're doing the script. I know sometimes how you
know how writers sometimes think it's almost like, oh my god,
(36:52):
I can't do the leat button. So uh that that's
just one of the features that I would just like
to see. And uh, you know, honestly, if you if
I don't see a guy, believe me, I understand. But
but but that would be just be cool to see.
Speaker 5 (37:07):
Well, have good news for you, so go right. Yeah.
So actually one of the other features, it's uh to me,
is not a huge one, but maybe it's a lot
of people. Hopefully it will be really more important than
I realize, uh is. So there are two features. What
is existing and that's the one or you will exist
in W three, which is you could actually have multiple scripts,
any number in fact, open in one single document. So
(37:28):
you have your main script editor, and then you have
these little floating windows and you can open you know,
probably there's a practical limitation of how many you want
to have opened, but you have any number, uh sitting
on the side. And they can be like scratch pad documents.
You can put whatever you want in each one of them.
You can have one where you put like character stuff,
where you put scenes that you're not sure about. You
can have one that you use for like just internal notes,
(37:51):
like a personal note section wherever you use them for.
And so you have all those scripts open in this
little like dragable section that you can move around, so
you can to your screen however you want. So that
is coming in version three, and that's fully it's a
screenplay writing. It is the same right to ads, just
a sort of mini version of it, and you can
write you know, your text or notes, or you can
actually write full scenes with character and dialogue, et cetera.
(38:13):
And then the other thing. And this is the one
that is to me like the big three point whatever,
three point five, you know, whatever you want to call.
It's not quite big up for four, let's say, but
is a total revamp of how people do outlining and
scratch pat just like maybe you're more thinking out than
the sort of mini editor one. And what that is
(38:33):
to me And this is like I got into that before.
It's the idea of filtering. So right now you can
construct these tags in cyberrit or you tag this is
a story, you start whatever, and you can filter out
just the content you want. Well, what if you applied
those filters and in a sort of broadway where we say, hey,
these are outline notes or these are scratch pad scenes
(38:54):
or whatever they are, and you could freely write those
right inside your script. But you knew they weren't real.
You knew they were just like virtual. They were tagged
as sort of cigurated and maybe by default you hit those,
or maybe by default you just saw those whatever mode
you were in of looking at your script, and then
the outliner could filter your script say hey, just show
me the outliner notes for ceda next on c B
(39:18):
since and these are all actual real text editors, and
so the idea is you can write whatever you want freely,
and you just use these tags to explain essentially what
they are ty semantic meaning to you, it's your ow thing,
and then you filter in or filter out the pieces
that you do or don't want. So I think that's
exactly what you know. Those two things I think kind
(39:40):
of combined to be what you're really looking for, which
is the freedom to just put ideas down as quickly
as you have them without the feeling of now they're permitted,
and even the opposite another future where we out really
soon is so when you're writing the scripts, you delete something.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
We'll be right back after a word from our response
and now back to the show.
Speaker 5 (40:06):
And that actually feels really permanent as well. That's not
before I do it get the infery vision history. You
can always go back, youep and say, oh man, there's
a great line with tacos and search for tacos and
you find that line that's that's been deleted, but it
still feels permanent. And so what we're gonna do is
have a feature where like just then you know within
a key strike whatever. The key strike you come up
with is delete and safe to like repository or whatever,
(40:31):
and we'll just have that little document that's you know,
maybe this will maybe not, but just hiding on the
side that's keeping track of all this content that you
were deleting. But then you don't have to worry about
it being gone. You have this other second script being
created as you go with all your just ideas that
we're working. So I think that's what you what you're
leading to. I think is what we're going for as well.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
Yeah, because that is what I was going for. Because
when you're writing and you're you're you're doing all this
sort of thing, you're you're writing all these scenes out
and you're writing ideas, and you're doing this, and you're
kind of sometimes you're coming back and forth. You kind
of don't want to put a scene in there that
might not fit later on, because then you're like, later
on you're like, oh, what the hell was this thing?
Speaker 5 (41:12):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (41:13):
And then it's kind of you know, it's stuck in there,
and if you again, it feels permanent. So I think
with a with a more of like a flexible scratch pan,
that's what I was going for, but with see guy,
you read my mind, you know exactly what I was
going to ask for.
Speaker 5 (41:23):
Yeah, I mean this is the short version is there
are two things we've learned. One is being a writer ourselves,
Like we're all that the team is a five full time,
two part time now at plus two dogs so they
get tired of lifting. So we're all like writers and
filmmakers are programming team as all ed your creative alriating
a film. So because of that we understand, like, you know,
(41:46):
not necessarily before you have the idea, but as soon
as you said it, I'm like, I know why you
want that, and I don't just know the technical implementation.
I kind of understand how you use it. I can
think of being, oh, well, what if you do this
other thing? Or I can take suggestions because we're also
super interested in listening to you to users, and because
of that, like not to say, you know, it's not
brially when anyone comes up with it, but we just
(42:07):
sort of wait sometimes when we hear one person suggests
the feature, were like a good idea, and then we
just try to wait, and then you know there's another
other person's just the same thing, Like Okay, that's interesting.
And just because in the beginning I would just do
everything because we had prelimited features. So when I started
four years ago, so I could do it all, it
was just me at the time. So it's pretty easy
to quickly iterate as you bigger. We don't necessarily have
(42:30):
that liberty. We have too many users to listen to
every single feature, but we just sort of track. Hey,
people keep asking for exactly what you're talking about, like
a scratchbad and not want there are better ways to
do that, and we're gonna, you know, probably have hundreds
more features suggested by users over the next six months
or so. And so it's just you know, keep coming.
(42:50):
So you got other ones, you know, anyone you and
everyone listening. We're here to not assay solve the creative process,
because I don't think that means anything, but it's we're
here to help people be created in a way that
that works for that whatever that means.
Speaker 4 (43:05):
And you know, and then that is fantastic. And you know,
because guy, we've been talking for about you know, maybe
forty minutes roughly, you know, is there anything that we
didn't discuss that you may wanted to talk about? Or
anything you want to say to sort of put a
period the end this whole conversation.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
No, I mean, ultimately, I think the thing that I
want people to take away is they should find where tools,
you know, make them more effective at what they're doing.
If you're writing and you're happy with your writing process,
I don't have a problem if you want to use
Celtics or anything else or found Pound Draft. I just
think that if you're not happy with the process, there
(43:38):
are things that annoy you. If you're like, yeah, well
it's fine. But now if it doesn't excite you every
time you open up those any product, maybe that's not
the right one for you. You want something that inspires
you to more create it. And if we don't do that,
then we're not the right ones either. It's just, you know,
we always want to feel to find that that perfect,
perfect tool for their use.
Speaker 4 (43:59):
Yeah, and again, you know, I think writer Duett is
a perfect tool because again, even guys like me who
was afraid of the cloud, because again, if I'm at
somewhere and I can't download that script, but then again
you solved that with the app. And I want to
give a shout out to to Mike Berman who's actually
been on the podcast before. And guy, you know you
and I both know Mike. He runs the screenways who
(44:20):
can actually write Facebook group. He is the one who
actually got me into writer duet and he's he was
the one who said, you know what, they have an
app and it actually solved all those problems.
Speaker 5 (44:29):
I gotta say no shot to Mike Helpe. He's listening
to a Mike And this is to all our users. Actually,
we do no marketing. If you want to like Google
shoot Dark Software. We're finally on the first page now,
but you'll never see an ad. I mean right now
you see an ad for writer do at And we
don't do like Facebook ads. We've tried a few, probably
spent a couple hundred bucks on Facebook ads to see
(44:50):
what happened, and the answer was nothing. We don't market
and the reason is found Draft is really good at marketing,
Like they've done a great job. And if if I
had to, like, if I could be as good as
they are marketing, I would adjust it. So we don't.
We just sort of say hey, we're making what we
think is the best product, and people like Mike uh
(45:10):
just really got attached to it because he was using it.
It helped him in some ways and he could honestly
recommend it and he did, and that group, I don't
know what the percents are, but it's pretty high percent
of writers in that group use writer du app because
Mike introduced it to them and then they really liked it.
And they would then in the next person who're asked, hey,
and how you're having a problem with the screen program
or I'm just curious what's out there, all the other
(45:32):
members would say, oh, yeah, I use it too, and
they would get excited. And you know, it's a compliment
to us, some self compliment, I guess, but it's really
a testament to me how how people in the screening
community are willing to not only give back to us
by getting their future ideas, but help each other by
you know, to me advertising with the best product. And
I you know, I guess, thank you to everyone who
(45:52):
does that. And also please continue since my personal one
because in the end of the day, like writers are
here to help out the writers. That's why you need
this podcast. I'm guessing it's not for all the money
to pay you to do it. You just here like
to help with creative community and that's what we're here
for as well.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
Yeah, honestly, guy, the whole story behind this podcast is,
you know, I do a lot of creative work. I
got stifled and right around twenty fourteen, I decided to
start this podcast for a lot of reasons. And I'm
sure all the listeners who've actually listened since episode one,
which there actually are people as shocked as I am,
they've actually they're probably saying, no, don't tell this whole
(46:32):
story again, So I'll spare everybody from telling it again.
But that was the idea though. The short of it
is it just to do something creative and something fun.
And each week That's why I say this is like
a film school, an audio film school, because each week
I'm bringing in a different person who has an entirely
different background. Screenwriters, producers, directors, actors, marketing people. I mean,
(46:54):
you name, and I've had them on the show. I mean, hell,
I've had Casie Ovis on here, who was the executive
producer Dallas Buyers. You know, I mean, it's just like,
I mean, he said, yes, why, I have no idea,
But I was like, okay, I've had Mark Banstock, who's
a producer for M I Shamalan stuff. I mean, it's
just been you know, I mean, and then I've just
been blown away by all the talented people like yourself
(47:15):
guy who've had on this podcast. And it is a
small world too, because you both know Mike Bierman, so
it's it. It's just such a small world and it's
just getting smaller.
Speaker 5 (47:23):
Yeah, writers like writers are so isolated sometimes just that
we don't know this from writing. You kind of get
in that mode and you're lonely. Don't stay in there.
That's my biggest recommendation. They kind of find communities, find
a Facebook group, plus we actually write as one. There's
a really good Creddit community for screenwriters where it's even
(47:45):
if you never contribute, I think just I go there
obsessively admittedly, and even sometimes I like, see you writer,
do you have questions on there? And I just kind
of wait and sometimes see if anyone else is going
to answer this before I do. I just really enjoy
that can unities that have been formed around such an
isolated activity as writing, and people who are willing to
get back and contribute, so hopefully everyone gets to participant
(48:08):
in as Yeah, and that is a.
Speaker 4 (48:10):
Very good Facebook page too, and it's it's not very
very common to actually get a really awesome Facebook page
where everyone's actually helping each other out. Usually, as you know,
guys social media, if you have like a Facebook page,
it usually ends up in like some kind of flame
war where it's like people fighting over absolutely nothing. And
(48:31):
you know, because I mean, I've seen that tons of times,
you know what I mean, And that's why I've kind
of stayed away from a lot of those groups. But
that one group is amazing. The Scare has we've been
actually right, and I like that in the show notes
as well. But guy, it's been excellent having you on.
And where we will find you out online.
Speaker 5 (48:46):
You can find us on Twitter at writer Duets I
think Facebook slash writer duet or whatever the URLs for
a group. Yeah, you'll see me around. I'm pretty I'm
pretty out there, so if you catch me in the
Reddit forum or the scare actually ray, you'll find me
pretty fast. So don't shower saying hi anyone out there.
Speaker 4 (49:06):
Die Goldstein, I just want to say thank you so
much for.
Speaker 5 (49:08):
Coming on you, thank you for having me. This is
a really blast.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
a great job on this episode. If you want to
get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
head over to the show notes at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.
Forward slash for sixty six. Thank you so much for
listening to guys. As always, keep on writing no matter what.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at bulletproof
Screenwriting dot tv.
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