Screenplay: from story to scenes

The Screenplay pane takes a story and turns it into scenes: each with its heading (INT./EXT. PLACE - TIME), the characters in it, a synopsis and the text in script form — action in the present tense, the character's name in capitals, dialogue. It is the tool for asking what a story becomes when it has to be seen rather than read, and for handing a writer for the screen an orderly base. This guide explains where the text comes from, what the conversion does, how scenes are refined and how the result is exported.

Why convert into scenes

A story can work beautifully on the page and not survive staging: too much happens inside the characters' heads, places multiply, dialogue turns into summary. Split into scenes, the text shows what the reader never sees — how many scenes are really needed, how many share the same place and time, where the story is told instead of happening.

It is also an adaptability check: for an editor or an agency it is a quick way to see whether a manuscript has a structure that holds outside the page, without writing a treatment.

The conversion neither invents nor cuts the story: the same events, the same characters, the same order. What changes is the form — from prose to scenes.

How to enter the pane

The screenplay is a project library, like plots, moodboards and blocks: a project can hold several screenplays, each with a name, and you find them again in the project card, where they can be renamed, duplicated and deleted. The entry points are the same as the other tools:

• the Screenplay card in the app home;
• the Tools → Structure → Screenplay menu with a project open;
• the Screenplay action in the project card, which opens the picker with the existing screenplays and the entry to create a new one;
• the direct address #app/screenplay.

Where the text comes from

A screenplay starts from a story, and the story is chosen in two ways:

• Import a file: you upload a document (TXT, MD, RTF, DOC, DOCX, PDF). The text enters the project as a file, so it stays visible in the editor, is analysed like the others and its origin survives a page reload.
• Import from the project: pick a file that is already there, without uploading anything. A list of only the project files opens — here you choose a text, not a project.

The text is not copied into the screenplay: it lives either in the project file or in the scenes already converted. If the source file changes, the conversion you already refined stays as it is.

The conversion

Convert to screenplay starts a job: the model reads the story and returns the scenes. On long texts the conversion works in windows, cut only between one paragraph and the next, and the scenes from each window are joined in the order of the story. Beyond the window ceiling the first part is converted and the pane tells you with a notice: for the rest, start again from a shorter file.

The cost depends on the words, with a minimum per conversion:

Words in the story	Credits
Up to 4,000	8
20.000	40
60.000	120
120.000	240

Converting costs more than splitting into modules because the model rewrites: it turns prose into action and dialogue, it does not cut up the existing text. If the job fails, the credits are refunded.

What a scene is made of

Every scene has four parts, all editable:

• Heading: interior or exterior, place and time of day. The place stays clean — no repeated INT. and no “day” attached to the name of the location: the two pieces of information sit in the right fields and build the heading.
• Characters: who appears in the scene. They let you read the story by presence — who is there, who is missing, who comes back.
• Synopsis: one line on what happens, to skim the outline without reading everything.
• Text: the script itself.

Inside the text, blocks are separated by a blank line. If the first line of a block is all capitals, it is a character name and what follows is their dialogue; a line in brackets is a stage direction; everything else is action. It is the same convention the export uses, so what you read in the pane is what ends up in the file.

Working on scenes

• Add scene creates an empty scene to fill in by hand.
• Move a scene with the up and down arrows: that order is what gets exported.
• Expand all and Collapse all switch from the compact outline — heading and synopsis — to the full read.
• Delete removes the scene from the screenplay without touching the source story.

Once the screenplay has scenes, the starting commands (convert, import, new) disappear: only those acting on the content stay, with export first. To start over, create a new screenplay from the project picker.

The scene text reads like a page, not like an editor inside a box: no frame, full width, the content sets the height and the page is what scrolls — with the two jump commands for top and bottom once the screenplay grows long.

Export to the editor

Export to the editor turns the scenes into a file: you can create a new file (or a new project) or write into an existing file. The text arrives laid out as a screenplay — the name as the title, each scene heading as a subheading, action and dialogue in paragraphs, the character's name highlighted — ready for export to RTF, TXT, MD and HTML, for correction and for print preparation.

From there the screenplay joins the normal editor flow: versions, analysis, findings and reports work on the exported file like on any other text.

Sharing the scenes

From the screenplay bar, Share publishes a read-only copy of the scenes: headings, characters, synopsis and text, laid out as in the pane. Whoever opens the link reads and scrolls, and nothing moves in the published order: no handles, arrows or delete buttons. It is a snapshot, and you withdraw it whenever you want.

Common mistakes

• Expecting an identical copy: the conversion rewrites in script form. Fidelity is about events, characters and order, not about single sentences.
• Uploading the same file again to fix a scene: conversion is a metered job; the scenes you already have are refined by hand, in the pane.
• Re-running the conversion on the whole manuscript when part of it is enough: working on a shorter file keeps the cost low and avoids the long-text notice.
• Using the pane as a correction tool: here the shape of the story changes; typos and grammar are a different operation.
• Forgetting the origin: importing a file turns the text into a project file — that is deliberate, but it means you will also find it in the File tab.

In short

The Screenplay pane takes a story off the page: a file or a project text becomes a list of scenes with heading, characters, synopsis and dialogue, which are reordered and refined like an outline. It helps you see what holds the story when it has to be seen, and to hand a working base to a writer for the screen.

Related guides: blocks editor, the manuscript in modules · narrative analysis: plot, characters and continuity · plot editor and narrative timeline.