Über editor: D to F

© 2004 Ginny Lowndes

Daily dramatic serial/serial
A serial is a drama that is produced for first run broadcast of five episodes per week usually after 6pm with a core cast of characters usually numbering no more than 12. Serial has a beginning, middle and end to stories. If the serial is shown during daytime hours with open-ended and sometimes improbable stories, it is known as ‘a soap', ‘soapie' or a ‘soap opera'. The structure and story between serial and soap opera is markedly different.

Data-casting/digital television
Data-casting is the delivery of the internet through home television sets, in the digital part of the spectrum. Digital television is a cheap, effective way of delivering internet services.

Deal memo
A deal memo is a legal document signed by all parties that sets out the terms and conditions or specifications agreed upon for writing a script. 

Deferred compensation
Deferred compensation is money to be paid from funds that, for a writer, are generally the net profits. A writer will almost never see such compensation.

Dénouement
A dénouement is the concluding scene in a production where the story elements are finished and, after the climax, the characters' new status is revealed.

Deus ex machina
A deus ex machina is a contrivance or a clumsy plot device that an unskilled writer uses to solve a story problem. It's commonly known as an “oh by the way …” ending. Your loyal viewers will resent you deeply for using this device. See disbelief, suspension of.

Development
Development is the process in which a script is altered, changed, modified, etc., by a series of collaborative meetings between the writer and/or production executive, studio executive, director, editors or other individuals who may be attached to the project.

Development proposal
A development proposal is the written presentation of an idea for a film or television project. It consists of basic story elements and general descriptions of the principal characters and runs to about ten pages.

Dialogue
Dialogue is the speech delivered by one character to another. Dialogue comments on and forwards action. 

Didactic drama/worthy drama/pushing a wheelbarrow or a cause
This type of drama is specifically designed to make an audience directly aware of current political or other issues. It is designed to provoke debate or discussion as in ‘the water cooler effect'. It is usually most effective in a documentary or magazine-style format. See moral entrepreneur and moral panic.

Director
A director is an individual who is the principal creative artist on a movie set.

[ Australian Screen Directors Association [ASDA], from http://www.asdafilm.org.au/] 

Director of photography/cinematographer
Director of photography (DoP) is a cinematographer who is ultimately responsible for the process of recording a scene the way a director has indicated.

[Australian Cinematographers Society, from http://acs.mylithio.com/home]

Director's cut
A director's cut is the preferred edit by a director of a film without studio interference. 

Disbelief, suspension of
Suspension of disbelief occurs when the audience agrees to suspend judgement about the limitations of the medium and improbability of the story in return for being entertained. However the writer must plot the story very carefully so that the trust the audience has placed in them is not broken.

(Coined by S T Coleridge, 1817)

Dissolve
Dissolve is an e diting technique whereby the images of one shot are gradually replaced by the images of another. The instruction, dissolve, is written into a script by the writer.

Distribution royalty
A distribution royalty is a payment based on the distributors' gross revenue.

Distributors' gross revenue
A distributors' gross revenue is the money derived from distribution of a film or television program.

Documentary
A documentary is n on-fiction narrative that uses ‘real people' rather than actors. It is made for cinema release or television. See didactic drama.

Documentary drama
Documentary drama presents historical facts in a non-fictionalised, or only slightly fictionalised, manner.

Documentary outline or proposal
Documentary outline or proposal is a concept document that indicates the intent, style, proposed structure and content that serves as a guide for further development of the project. See hunter-gatherer.

Documentary script
A documentary script provides all the written material necessary for the production. It may have a structural plan that includes interviews, locations, recreations, archival material and other elements together with the intent of the production.

Domestic drama/kitchen sink drama
Domestic drama is a tragic type of drama written for film, television, radio or theatre, which is based on the lives of ordinary people in their suburban homes. Television usually broadcasts it during the daytime.

Draft script
A draft script is a complete draft of any script submitted in a mutually agreed form in a length that has been specified by a producer. A draft script can be a first draft or a fifty-first draft. It should be numbered and tracked in the writer's asset register.

Dramatic action
Dramatic action is that action which brings forth an emotional response in an audience. In order for dramatic action to succeed it must have structural unity.

Dramatic irony
Dramatic irony occurs when the audience knows something the characters in the script don't. (See Macguffin)

Dramaturg/dramaturge/dramaturgy
A dramaturge is an individual who works as a story and script editor in theatre. They are specialists in dramatic construction and dramatic literature. Dramaturges are frequently engaged to choose and analyse scripted material and to assist in choosing and analysing plays, or the development of production concepts. They can research topics pertinent to an historical period or develop a play's production style. Dramaturgs also write program essays to inform the public about the play. Well-known dramaturges include Bertold Bretch (1898-1956); Lessing (1763); Diderot (1758); Kenneth Tynan (1927-1980) and Nick Lathouris, actor/dramaturge, Australia . Dramaturgs are increasingly being hired to work with actors in film and television productions.

Editor
An editor is an individual who works with a writer to realise a first-class screenplay, script or written material for publication. There are many types of editors and each one has a different role in a production.

[ Society of Editors from http:// www.editorsnsw.com/esd/ ; from http://www.editorsqld.com ; Hewitt , P. (2005) from http://www.emendediting.com/ ; Society Freelance Editors and Proofreaders from http://www.sfep.org.uk ]

Electronic cinema/e-cinema
Electronic cinema is one where feature films are delivered directly to theatres by electronic means and are projected electronically.

Empathy
Empathy is felt by an audience when they identify with the characters by realising they have shared feelings in common. Empathy is one of the principal effects of good drama. It gets the audience on side.

Epilogue
An epilogue is the concluding scene set substantially beyond the time frame of the rest of the film, in which characters, now somewhat older, reflect on the preceding events.

Epic
An epic is a film with large dramatic scope or one that requires an immense production. Often referred to as bigger than Ben Hur.

Episodic script
An episodic script is one that has a sequence of events with no causal connection, that is, there is no cause and effect from scene to scene. Episodic scripts do not work and will not hold an audience. It usually fails to satisfactorily answer the questions of who, what, where, why, how, when and why. An episodic script is a failure of structure and as such cannot be ‘fixed'. It can only be scrapped and the script started again from scratch, but only if the idea is brilliant. Episodic scripts usually result from poorly thought out ideas.

Establishing shot
Establishing shot is a wide shot that shows much of the location where the dramatic action will take place. Every frame adds to the story. Nothing about the establishing shot is accidental or without meaning.

Excerpt
Excerpt is an extract or clip containing characters that are recognisable from a previously produced program.

Executive producer (film)
An executive producer or EP is an individual who is not involved in the technical aspects of the filmmaking process. They are responsible for the overall production by handling business and legal issues.

Executive producer (television)
An executive producer in television or EP is an individual who has oversight of the television production, which may be based on his or her idea. The executive producer employs a story editor to develop the idea and the characters and write a bible for the production. The execution of the scripts is undertaken by a story editor, a script editor and writers.

Existentialism/existentialist drama
Existentialism theorises that you are what you do and that people must be held fully accountable for their own behaviour. It was developed by Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980).

Exposition
Exposition is the art of unfolding, naturally, to the audience only that necessary information concerning characters and events that have taken place in the past. Simultaneously, the writer keeps the drama moving and the plot developing while bits and pieces of information are revealed along the way. Exposition, preparation and motivation overlap in script construction. Their main purpose is to get the audience to ‘suspend disbelief' and accept the actions of the characters as true and believable. The opposite of exposition is monologue and soliloquy. These are sometimes called ‘sloppy writing' by editors.

Expressionism
Expressionism greatly exaggerates perceived reality in order to express inner truths directly. Popular mainly in Germany between last century's world wars, expressionism in the theatre was notable for its gutsy dialogue, piercing sounds, bright lighting and colouring, bold scenery and shocking, vivid imagery.

Exterior
Exterior (EXT) is used in a slug line to indicate that the scene occurs outdoors.

Extra/non-speaking role
An extra is an actor who appears in film or television productions where a non-specific, non-speaking character is required, usually as part of a crowd or in the background of a scene.

Extreme close up
Extreme close-up (ECU) is a shot in which the subject is much larger than the frame. Provides more detail than a close-up.

Extreme long shot
Extreme long shot (ELS) is a camera cue in direction used to describe a shot taken by a long distance from the subject.

Eye line
Eye line is the direction an actor should be focused on, off-screen, so as to match a reverse angle or point-of-view shot.

Fade
Fade is the smooth, gradual transition from a normal image to complete blackness (fade out), or vice versa (fade in).

Fade IN
Fade IN begins the story in a script.

Fade OUT
Fade OUT ends the script.

Farce
Over-the-top comedy or light-hearted but gleefully contrived drama, usually involving stock situations used in a comedic way such as mistaken identity or unmasked lovers' trysts, punctuated with broad physical stunts and pratfalls.

Fast motion
Fast motion moves time more quickly than normal. It is written into the script.

Feature/feature film
A feature film is over 60 minutes long. Its intention is for theatrical release. The screenplay or script is timed at roughly one minute for each page, i.e. a 90-minute script will be 90 pages in length.

Feature film script/screenplay
A feature film script or screenplay contains characters, scenes and dialogue and is over 60 minutes in length.

Free television/free-to-air television
Free television is a free service provided directly to a home TV receiver.

Festivals
Festivals are a gathering of people for specific events and to premiere films.

Film noir
Film noir is a genre of film that typically features dark, brooding characters, corruption, detectives and the seedy side of the big city.

Filmmaker
Filmmaker is the collective term used to refer to people who have a significant degree of control over the creation of a film, that is, directors, producers, scenographers, screenwriters and story or script editors and script supervisors.

First draft
First draft , as set forth in the Australian Writers Guild Minimum Basic Agreement, is a first complete draft of any script in continuous form, including dialogue.

Flashback
A flashback is a scene that breaks the chronological continuity of the main narrative by depicting relevant events that happened in the past. It cannot save an episodic script.

Flashforward
Flashforward is a scene that breaks up the chronological continuity of the main narrative by depicting events that happen in the future.

Focus group
A focus group is made up of approximately 10-12 members of the public that represent a target audience for a film or television project. They attend a sneak preview and then offer feedback or their opinions to producers, before further technical editing takes place in the editing room. I hold my focus groups by eavesdropping on conversations, life stories, language, grocery shopping and literature that are held between groups of people at the back of a bus or similar public transport.

Freeze frame
Freeze frame is the optical printing effect whereby a single frame is repeated to give the illusion that all action has stopped. It is written into a script by the writer.

Front loading
In scriptwriting, front loading is used to pose a problem at the beginning of a series that will take almost the length of the series to resolve. It hooks an audience into watching a television production.

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