How to Write a Screenplay on the iPad

By Biagio on April 6, 2010 in Tools with 77 Comments

screenwriting-iPad-02.png

Yes, We’re Geeking Out

Sure, Final Draft has announced that there will be some kind of iPad version of their screenwriting software, and Black Manna has a screenplay program that runs on the iPhone (which theoretically should work on the iPad in a zoomed in “iPhone” manner, but the company says they’ll be releasing an official iPad version soon.)

In the mean time, if you have your shiny new iPad, and want to write a screenplay in full on iPad mode…what to do?

Get Pages for iPad and Try Our Template

If you have an iPad, chances are you’re going to buy Apple’s iWork app Pages sooner or later. At $9.99 it’s not a break-the-bank piece of software, and it’s sort of a must-have for iPad owners, anyway.

The full, desktop-version of Pages ’09 has a screenplay template, but…alas…that template is missing from the iPad version. Besides, that template’s not very good…the margins are wrong, and it doesn’t work the way I’d like it to.

So We Experimented

Since I’m used to not sleeping these days, I stayed up last night and built a new screenplay template for Pages 09. We then took that template, added some hot keys, saved out a Pages doc, emailed it to Nate’s iPad…and voila! It worked!

Well almost…a few things didn’t come over. The style names look weird (they were chopped to the first two letters for some reason) and a there’s no F-Key support on the iPad, so you can’t use hot-keys to choose style elements. Still, you now have a way (albeit hacky) to write screenplays on your iPad.

Perfect?

Heck no, but we’re still geeking out. I mean, what fun is a new gadget if you don’t try crap with it? To write screenplays on your iPad, here’s what you do:

  • 1. Download our iPad Pages ’09 Joke and Biagio Screenplay Template.
  • 2. Email it to your iPad.
  • 3. Open the file and get writing.

    • Of course, if you don’t have an iPad, but would love to use a screenplay template in Apple’s Pages ’09, this template for the desktop version of Pages ’09 will do the trick.

    It has a few more bells and whistles than the iPad version, with instructions on how to use it as well. I may post a video on this somewhere down the line if there’s interest.

    So what do you think…just a bunch of geek nonsense? Is it cool? Am I working Nate to hard? Chime in!

    UPDATE: Because a few of you have asked, here is a link to the wireless keyboard Nate’s using in the video: Apple Wireless Keyboard (Retail Packaging)

    Speaking of Nate, here’s the video of us being way too geeky for our own good, demonstrating how to write a screenplay on the iPad:
    UPDATE: Apple has fixed Pages so you can now get the menu in landscape mode, making this template much more fun to use. Thanks, Apple!

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About Biagio: Biagio married way out of his league when he bamboozled Joke into saying "I do." Together he and his wife produce television, film, webisodes, and anything else that requires no sleep and a touch of crazy. Find Biagio on Twitter: @jokeandbiagio

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  • Brian

    So why should i sent $5 for this when i have Screenwriting for iPad? Screenwriting does exactly what a writer needs in terms of his masterpiece work. For a cost of $3 it is somewhat really useful from my aspect. Just have a look http://bit.ly/eewmaK

    • http://www.jokeandbiagio.com Biagio

      Brian: no need to anymore…when we put up this post, there wasn’t yet a single screenwriting app for the iPad. This was a hack/workaround (and I think it worked pretty well at the time.) Now, it would be silly to use this option if you didn’t already have pages for the iPad. Thanks for the question, and hope to see you around.

  • Mitch

    Call me silly, but not everyone is as clever as this… first of all when you email it to yourself – then what??? Did you unzip it first… and if so what is the name of the file? There’s a lot taken for granted here and a lot of people – especially writers – who are not computer savvy who can stare at these instructions for 5 days and not make heads or tails of it. What if I just file shared it from iTunes and sync with the Ipad… in either case there is nothing here on these pages that tell you what in the zip file is actually supposed to be put into the Pages on the Ipad. Us writers are completely stumped.

    • http://www.infinitemachine.com Justin

      Mitch,
      After you mail it to yourself, find the mail on your ipad, and open up the file in Pages. Then you have that file to start your script. From what I understand you’ll have to either email yourself another one of Biagio’s “blank” templets or duplicate the blank templates in your ipad Pages each time you write a fresh script.

      • Mitch

        Hey Justin. Thanks. But when you go to the email it’s a zip file. When you unzip it there are a bunch of files but I have no idea how to open them. I also have no idea how to open Pages first and load up the blank templete… There is no file in the zip actually called “template”. I wish I was as smart as you,

        • John

          I second this question. I’ve used templates in Pages before, and always those examples were a pages document with the template in-built. Then Pages would save that template to the user library and you could always easily access it. Your instructions work perfectly for that installation technique.

          “From what I understand you’ll have to either email yourself another one of Biagio’s “blank” templets”

          I do not get a blank template when I unzip the file linked. When I unzip the current download I do not get a pages file. I get a buildVersionHistory.plist, color-profile, index.xml, and three folders, all of which only contain image files. There is no way I know of how any of these can be opened in Pages. Help would be appreciated.

          • John

            Right. So I never figured that part out, but Celtx did release an app awhile ago which I didn’t notice. Sorry for the bother.

      • Roberto

        I emailed it to myself and opened it in Pages, but the drop down menu for the style elements does not appear. What do I do now?

  • http://www.infinitemachine.com Justin

    Biagio!
    Great hack!

    So for this is working great for me. Of course hotkeys and “auto tabbing” would be great, but I find this to be a better solution than the rest for now. I’m not into Celtix yet. I’ve yet to send the script to Screenwriter or Final Draft, but it’s good to just write on the ipad when needed – which is what I would like to do more often.

    Bravo!

    • Mitch

      Hey Justin….
      Sorry to bother you. I think I got the template working, but how do I change the title of the document from their template name to a name I want? If you know — thanks. Mitch

    • Mitch

      Okay… I got it. I guess there are no page numbers listed but other than that – it seems to be working. THANKS!

      • http://www.jokeandbiagio.com Biagio

        Mitch!

        Thanks for trying it out. Hope you find it helpful. I believe it’s structured so that page 1 has no number, but page 2 and beyond do, per standard screenplay conventions. Let me know if that ends up working.
        Best,
        Biagio

        • http://www.infinitemachine.com Justin

          Yeah, I don’t see page numbers on the page. I don’t have the latest pages on the Mac so I don’t know if it works there. I was lost at figuring out what page I was on but I saw that when you touch the right side of the page a sroll bar comes up that shows mini versions of the pages as well as their numbers.

          • Mitch

            Now when all is said and done, if you transferred this to Final Draft – which most writers use – you LOSE ALL THE FORMATING and basically have to start over. Any ideas?

        • Mitch

          NO… Never did get the page numbers but my more urgent matter is it’s great, I love it, but you cannot put it into Final Draft because I can’t figure out a way to keep the formatting, not even some of it. It all gets lost. :( Am I doing something wrong?

          • http://www.jokeandbiagio.com Biagio

            Sorry Mitch…like writing with most word processors, you’d have to import it into Final Draft…same as working with Microsoft word or any other program. This article should help:

            http://support.finaldraft.com/article.aspx?cid=1001&aid=1532

            Keep in mind, I created this as a hack before there was true screenwriting software for the iPad, so you might want something a bit more sophisticated now. I still use this from time to time, and use the steps in the article above to get scripts in.

            Best,
            Biagio

          • Mitch

            Biaggio -
            Yes, that was of great help. Thank you!!! Much easier now, and I really do like this until Final Draft gets their app out.
            Mitch

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  • MikeR

    This hack is great as far as it goes … what “official” apps are people now using on iPad to write their screenplays?

    Beyond Scripts Pro which is merely adequate (and cannot export to PDF) and vapourware from Final Draft (promised yonks ago and apparently beta testing) what are people using?

    I had to give up using the Pages template because I found it broke my flow too much to keep selecting between styles (tap – swipe swipe – tap) – pity Apple doesn’t make the styles list more accessible or support the hotkeys.

  • Pingback: How to Write a Screenplay on the iPad | writewhatyoudontknow

  • Roberto

    When I opened it on Pages on my iPad, the drop down menu for style elements did not appear. Why is that?

  • Jose23

    I would just go with an app like Scripts Pro, the best out of the bunch. It uses the standard screenwriting formats and it’ll do what the workaround is trying to do cept more easier. 

  • Leftfieldwriter

    You know, I’ve been using the mobile version of Fade In Professional Screenwriting Software for months now on my iPad.  It does Final Draft, too.  http://www.fadeinpro.com

  • Allen Lulu

    I’m confused. Did everything you said but when I email it to my ipad the only option is to open the file in my drop box or evernote. How do I transfer the template to pages?

    • http://www.jokeandbiagio.com Biagio

      Should open automatically or offer option to open in Pages…did you get Pages from the app store (it’s around $6). Also, this post is now fairly old…probably better solutions on the app store now. In its day this was pretty cutting edge :-) Now there’s cooler stuff out there.

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