Screenplay Template for OmniOutliner
 

Hello to all OmniOutliner users and screenwriters:

I want to share an OO template I made for writing screenplays. Mainly, I want to make available something which I reckon could be useful to more than just yours truly. If sharing this with the community results in some feedback towards its betterment.... cool.

Why would anybody who is writing a screenplay want to use an outlining program over a dedicated screenwriting app? I think it boils down to how high you value the ability to reorganize what you’ve already wrote vis-a-via any of the other things. My story of how and why is below.

OmniOutliner versus dedicated screenplay apps
 

I’m writing a screenplay that is semi-preplanned (I’m a hack who is totally winging it) and multi-threaded (more than one narrative). To fit with my complex exercise, my needs in a screenwriting app are:

(1) Allows me to write non-linearly.
(2) Allows me to easily reorder scenes .
(3) Allows me to easily reposition blocks of dialogue within a scene. (*Getting into the weeds a bit on this one, this entails two separate pieces - a CHARACTER element and a DIALOGUE element - sticking together as you perform a drag-n-drop operation.*)

Montage, Movie Draft SE, Fade In, Celtx, Script It, Final Draft — I have had all these apps on my Mac at one time or another in one form or another (some purchased, some in trial version). Before even applying my criteria, other issues caused me to turn away from those apps. Some of those issues were: distracting interface/general dislike of the look-n-feel; potential abandonware; buggy; costly. With regard to my criteria, none of those apps really hit a home run. “Reorder-ability” - as I call it - wasn’t at an advanced level in any of them, at least not to the extent where #3 was satisfied.

Clean interface? Mature? Affordable? Advanced reorder-ability?

I already owned the app that was all that. Enter OmniOutliner Pro. I only needed a template that was formatted for screenplays. I searched the interweb for an OO Screenplay Template, but didn’t find one.

So I dove headlong into the process of defining tabs, margins, and whatnot — and rolled my own.

Somebody once said that writing is rewriting. Going with that, I think OO enables the 'moving stuff around' aspect of rewriting better than the other apps I've tried. So if you're a hack like me, who values the ability to reorganize above all - at least for your first draft - then maybe give OO a try.