Jun 122010
- Final Draft 8 combines powerful word processing with professional script formatting in one self-contained, easy-to-use package specifically designed for writing movie scripts, television episodics and stage plays
- No need to learn about script formatting rules–Final Draft automatically paginates and formats your script to industry standards as you write
- Television show, screenplay, stage play and graphic novel templates are included to help get you started
- Have your script read back to you by assigning different male and female voices to each of your characters with text-to-speech
- New XML file format for compatibility with a wide variety of other products
Product Description
Use your creative energy to focus on the content; let Final Draft take care of the style. Final Draft is the number-one selling application specifically designed for writing movie scripts, television episodics, and stageplays.Amazon.com Product Description
Use your creative energy to focus on the content; let Final Draft take care of the style. Final Draft is the number-one selling application specifically designed for writing movie scripts, television epi… More >>
If you use a Mac – you might want to think twice before buying Final Draft. For some reason this new incarnation of the program keeps deactivating and to get it reactivated, you have have to call in, give a credit card number, wait for half an hour on hold and then hope that they credit your card back as they are not supposed to charge it for reactivation. They just won’t fix this flaw. It has happened 5 times now and I am sick of it. I am writing this as I am on hold with them now and not writing my screenplay as I’m supposed to be doing. Until they get their act together, I highly suggest Mac users avoid this one unless you don’t mind this annoying issue. It’s too bad too, because I really love the program and wish they could get this resolved.
Rating: 3 / 5
I find Final Draft to be a very buggy and supremely frustrating program. Format will look strange and require you to roll away and back to a page to correct, cursor will place itself incorrectly and a few other bugs they have never resolved. Overall they keep putting out newer versions with little value added for upgrading. I would switch to Montage or Movie Magic but… the catch is I am a professional screenwriter and I have to work with this piece of software as the production company I write for asked me to do so. Final Draft only controls the market because of an aggressive campaign. Not because of quality.
Rating: 1 / 5
I downloaded the trial version of Final Draft 8 for free at[...]. In the trial version, you get to use everything Final Draft 8 has to offer! The only setback is that you can only save up to 15 pages (which is great ’cause in my Screenwriting class we’re only doing the first 10 pages), and a watermark appears on every page (it’ll say “Final Draft 8 Demo”. It’s noticeable, but not distracting).
Is it worth the $200? If you plan on being a Screenwriter, sure!
Rating: 5 / 5
I have been studying the development of various screenwriting programs for the last couple of years. In this context, I tried out the latest version of Final Draft (8.0.0 Build 81) and can attest to its poor implementation. In the course of a writing session, I experienced numerous refreshing errors, as well as inconsistencies when using ScriptCompare. Certain issues stemming from earlier versions are still apparent in this update. For instance, CollaboWriter will not run on a server-client basis, and page locking mode is a mess when used for extended revisions.
Some features can be useful, like Scene View (new to version 8), or the somewhat older Format Assistant, and some features are clearly a marketing action. I am thinking of Text to Speech, or the Ask the Expert add-on.
However, in the majority of cases the software’s functions simply do not work to the author’s advantage, specifically the Scene Navigator and Panels System. Final Draft is not built around a human-centered experience, nor is it geared towards penning a blue print for a temporal art form… such as a movie. Someone described it as “a BASIC word processor tailored to screen and stage writing”, and that is what it boils down to.
It can also be obtrusive at times, meaning the software imposes itself on the creative process; this is partly because Final Draft has adopted the WYSIWYG model (What You See Is What You Get) which is common with word processors.
One more thing…
“Save as PDF” has been relocated from “File” to “File > Print… > PDF”, and, depending on your printer driver, you may not be able to include the title page when saving as PDF.
Rating: 1 / 5
Just add words
You may just add words but for me it is a convoluted mess. I am hoping that it is because this is my first encounter with any screen writing software. When you add features, you add complexity.
I have several started items in Microsoft word and find it easy to enter move and proofread. I have not been able to find a way to drag and drop it into the Final draft product. It looks like I will have to learn the tool and add from scratch. Even though it can get intricate, I am now trying to find a way to merge scene, narration, and dialog in a coherent, time line instead of on separate cards.
So fare I have found nothing mechanically wrong with the product. It installed with the minimum of effort (Vista 64). The product comes with a decent installation manual.
I am now reading the manual to hope to get a handle on where to start and how to combine the elements. Luckily or by design, the menus and option follow the Microsoft layout so I can pretty well guess how to get to the option I want.
Once I get past all the original setup details it looks like this will be a useful tool. The trick is not to pick up any bad habits like designing the script on Microsoft word first.
Rating: 5 / 5