Writing for Visual Media

This book looks at the fundamental problems a writer faces as a beginner learning to create content for media that is to be seen rather than read. It takes you from basic concepts to a first level of practice through explicit methods that train you to consistently identify a communications problem, think it through, and find a resolution before beginning to write.

Through successive exercises, Writing for Visual Media helps you acquire the basic skills and confidence you need to write effective films, corporate and training videos, documentaries, ads, PSAs, TV series, and other types of visual narrative. A new chapter looks at adaptation as a specific script writing problem. Writing for Visual Media also lays a foundation for understanding interactive media and writing for non-linear content with new chapters that cover writing for the web, interactive corporate communication, instructional media, and video games.

This book will make you aware of current electronic writing tools and scriptwriting software through a companion DVD, which offers links to demos and enriches the content of the printed book with video, audio, and sample scripts. Scripts are linked to video clips that are the produced result of the words on a script page. The DVD demonstrates the visual language of scriptwriting (shots, basic camera movement, transitions, etc.) discussed in the book by means of an interactive, illustrated glossary (video and stills) of terms and concepts.

Currently an associate professor in Sam Houston State University's Mass Communications program, Anthony Friedmann has an M.A. from Harvard University and a B.A. and Ph.D. in English from Columbia University and was trained as a filmmaker at the London School of Film Technique. After twenty-one years of writing, producing, and directing film, multi-image, and video, he taught video production, interactive multimedia, and scriptwriting at various colleges. He continues to write scripts for corporate clients and also to develop independent projects. His work ranges from feature film to corporate video for English, American and French clients. Bartleby, which he wrote and directed, won Special Jury Prize at the San Sebastian Film Festival in 1971. He is a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, the Writers' Guild of Great Britain, and the Broadcast Education Association.
Currently an associate professor in Sam Houston State University's Mass Communications program, Anthony Friedmann has an M.A. from Harvard University and a B.A. and Ph.D. in English from Columbia University and was trained as a filmmaker at the London School of Film Technique. After twenty-one years of writing, producing, and directing film, multi-image, and video, he taught video production, interactive multimedia, and scriptwriting at various colleges. He continues to write scripts for corporate clients and also to develop independent projects. His work ranges from feature film to corporate video for English, American and French clients. Bartleby, which he wrote and directed, won Special Jury Prize at the San Sebastian Film Festival in 1971. He is a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, the Writers' Guild of Great Britain, and the Broadcast Education Association.