Why do YOU start a new draft?

[tonym]

Usually I start a new draft of my screenplay whenever I'm about to delete a lot of writing and I'm not completely sure I won't regret it.

Why do you start a new draft?

[mscherer]

Tonym,

I start a new draft each time I 'touch' my screenplay. By 'touch' I mean either an edit or adding additional scenes.

For example, if I was working on a script called DELUDED -- say it's a first draft and I'm continuing to write -- I will save the previous draft as DELUDED_041510 -- adding today's date. I would then save that version and reopen the original DELUDED and continue on. Same for edits. When the days writing is complete I back everything up on a flash drive for safe keeping.

By the time I'm done I will have dozens of drafts saved on my hard drive -- a complete record of every change ever made. Sounds redundant and silly, but it has saved my butt more than once after doing something stupid -- like accidentally deleting files.

Keep Writing!

[Ambrose Chapel]

I start a new draft when I have concrete improvements to make or a new idea that won't leave me alone.

I don't subscribe to the idea popular in creative writing circles to write every day even if you have nothing to write.

I suspect I'll get a lot of flack for this, but there is too much inconsequential writing. I throw out most of my ideas. They have to have me both fired up and bursting with thoughts on where to go with them. Sometimes I don't write for long stretches.

The naysayers will argue that you'll go rusty if you don't write constantly. But I find I get whatever touch I have back inside of a half hour, once I start.

And I wouldn't trust that flash drive. First, it has a finite number of read/writes before it will quit. And second, it is so small and loose that it will end up getting lost, crunched, or washed in a shirt pocket.

While I use flash drives, they are not my backup location. I use Gmail. I send myself all my drafts with a date scheme like you use. The draft resides both on my PC and Google servers.

NOTE - The one thing you have to be religious about with this method, however, is to download and save the draft from the email you open BEFORE editing it. If you just open the emailed draft and start working, your saves will disappear when you close the file. That's because the opened draft is just a temp file until it is actually saved to the hard drive. I lost half a day's work before I learned this.

[violet]

I start a new draft when I finish the old one- sounds simple, but at first I just kept starting to write, changing the outline mid-way through, starting again, adding, subtracting scenes.

Then I'd have a hundred incomplete drafts.

And I'm done with that method.

Now, I think long and hard before I start writing- I take notes maybe, scribble some stuff down, whatever. Until I have the whole plot worked out. Only then do I start writing- an outline, and then a draft that follows the outline. Even if I realize all the mistakes in the outline as I'm writing, I'm not allowed to change anything until the entire draft is complete.

Then I'll start writing a brand new outline- and a brand new draft. No using old scenes- I have to rewrite them from scratch, even if they're exactly the same. Once I'm sure the plot is completely worked out and I'm satisfied with the script (which is at least three drafts later) I'll re-read the old drafts for nice little details and bits of dialogue that might work in the latest draft that I might have forgotten. But usually, the second time I re-write the same scene I do a better job-it's more concise, and more dramatic.

Once I'm happy with the overall plot/scene arrangement/character arcs, I begin re-working individual scenes, to make sure they've got as much drama and detail in them as possible. I refuse to work on scenes until I know that I'm definitely going to be needing them/keeping them in the script.

[songswithoutwords]

I start a new draft because my old one sucks.

[Deleted]

Being in the IT field, I like to have multiple copies of the same file as you never what mind happen to your PC or a particular file for that matter.

As far as a new draft, I use Celtx, and I create multiple script files within the same file. I usually break down a script into different acts, which are all in different script files, and then add them to one Complete Script file. That way if I have any rewriting to do, I can make a copy of that section, edit it, and then save the edit into the completed script. It is not as complicated as it sounds.