Writing a script on the go has been hit-or-miss. Final Draft still does not have a dedicated screenwriting application on any mobile device (though a reader exists). If you've been looking for an easy way to write a script on your phone or tablet and quickly take it to your desktop - and vice versa - then John August and Stu Maschwitz may have created just what you're looking for with the introduction of Fountain:
A great workflow between Google Docs using Fountain and Final Draft:
Fountain is not really an application - it's a way to translate plain text into script form. John August was attempting to expand on his Scrippets app, and Stu Maschwitz was writing a spec for a similar idea - so the two decided to join forces and create a brilliantly simple way to write a script on any text editor, anywhere. This makes sharing a first draft with a partner vastly easier, and avoids many format issues.
I have had more than my share of issues trying to share screenplays with fellow writers and have everything work perfectly. If it can become a standard - supported natively by Final Draft and Movie Magic Screenwriter (as well as Celtx) - Fountain will make writing and sharing screenplays far easier. At the moment it seems that Final Draft does a very good job translating Fountain.
There have been plenty of times when I have gotten a story idea and just want to write down a simple scene - but have to deal with formatting once I get it into Final Draft. Fountain looks to make this as painless as possible, and since we're dealing with plain text files, they can be archived practically forever.
What do you think of Fountain?
Link: Fountain | A Markup Language for Screenwriting
[via Stu Maschwitz and John August]
