Writing Your First Script in Celtx
From CeltxWiki
1. Open Celtx.
2. On the opened Start Page, select a Template.
3. The new Media Project will open in the Celtx application.
4. You will see the cursor in a gray box. This is your Scene Header, the name of your scene. Type this, and press enter.
7. Celtx has automatically inserted a line break, and switched you over to the "Action" setting. Now you can type a short description to set up the scene, explain some dialog a little, or just babble! Hit enter again.
8. You will note that you are still in the "Action" setting (by looking at the dropdown box in the toolbar above your header!). We want to be in the "Character" setting, so we have two options: drop down the drop-down and select "Character"... or look at our statusbar along the bottom of the screen and see what it has to say! For me, it says "{Tab} Char, {Enter} Action". This means, if you hit "Tab", the setting will automatically change to "Character". If you hit "Enter", the setting will automatically change to "Action".
9. Now, we get to enter the name of our character! Making sure you are in the "Character" setting, type the name of your character. Press enter.
10. You have just pressed enter, and looking at your setting drop-down box, you should note that it says "Dialogue". You have two options: insert a "Parenthetical" (a bit of text that helps the actor with how he should act the following dialogue) or type the dialogue itself. We want to go the hard route, so insert a "Parenthetical"!
11. Look down at your status bar again, and note that it says "{Tab} Paren, {Enter} Char". I'll give you one guess as to what we do to insert a Parenthetical... and you're right! We press "Tab"!
12. Now your cursor should be surrounded by parentheses like so, (|), except your cursor will probably blink. Now type in your parenthetical. We want to go back to the dialogue to write out what the actor will say, so we look at our statusbar, and hit "Enter", like it says.
13. Check out the drop-down, we are back in dialogueland! Now we can type out what we want our character to say! This is the fun part. Remember, unlike other word processors, you can no longer use "Enter" to insert line breaks (enter will bring us to a different setting), you have to use "Shift-Enter".
14. Two paths again! Want to insert another character speaking? Press enter, and go back to 9. Want to go back to "Action"? Follow my lead.
15. Press enter.
16. Go to the drop-down, and select action, or whatever you want to insert next. If you want to insert another scene... "Control-Enter"! Easy, right?
Congratulations! You just wrote a script!
