Scriptwriting for Digital Media Production
Instructor: Lindsay Grace

 

Treatments and Step Sheets: Tools for Organizing "Big" Ideas

Step Sheet: A tool used to outline character development and key events in a narrative. The step sheet reads like an outline, and is primarily useful to the author. It allows the author to keep track of their narrative "flow" by simply describing essential events. Step sheets are written for screen plays, teleplays, and event short narratives like television commercials.

Treatment: A treatment is a full scene by scene overview of a narrative. Usually done for screenplays, it has minimal dialogue and provides a synopsis of a film concept. Some companies employ authors to write treatments as a test of their narrative writing skills before offering an opportunity to write a full script.