It's an idea adapted from the popular NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, in which participants pledge to write a 50,000 word novel (or a functional first draft of a novel) in the month of November. Essentially, the idea is to light a fire under your ass to get you writing in high volume, and even better, to make it a daily habit that you can continue even once the month has ended.
While the same organization that does NaNoWriMo every year used to have a screenwriting challenge as well, it hasn't done it in several years. Luckily for us, prolific screenwriter Scott Myers is reviving the challenge on his blog Go Into The Story, and he's calling it Zero Draft Thirty.
Credit: Dollar Photo Club
Zero Draft is what some writers call the vomit draft… or muscle draft… the just-get-the-damn-thing-done draft.
And thirty is… well… the number 30 which is… oh, yeah… the number of days in November!
Here's what Scott says about how the challenge will work, and what you can expect come November 1st:
- Each day, I will compose and upload a ZDT post. In it, I will include an inspirational writing quote, something motivational.
- I encourage writers who have taken up the challenge to come by each day, head to comments in the ZDT post, and share some thoughts on your process. You may just write something generally about how you’re feeling… good, bad, happy, sad, uplifted, frustrated. Perhaps you will note what page count you managed for that day or the week.
- Don’t upload actual pages!!! Keep those to yourself. This is not a workshop, rather a 30 day online forum where we can come together and support each other as we pound out pages.
So there you have it, the first inaugural Zero Draft Thirty. If you've got a screenplay idea that's been simmering in your brain for awhile, but haven't found the motivation to write it, this is your time. To stake your claim in this challenge, head over to the Zero Draft Thirty announcement post and leave a comment.
Source: Go Into The Story
