Celtx

Welcome, Dungle.

I've never heard of Celtx, except I just looked it up. It looks like some media program, and I see it has a storyboard.

I use Word because I like it and it meets my needs. However, you would have to decide what works for you.

It's a great program for script writing of any kind, like a movie, teleplay, play, etc, as you pick which format you're writing for and it will set it all up for you. But if you're writing a story, fiction or non, then I'd say use Word.

Celtx is one of those programs that throws a lot of cool features your way to make it seem like it's easier to use...

Truthfully, for the writing I do... less is more. I prefer programs that don't have the cool features. That's one thing I've always loved about Microsoft Word is at it's core it's simply there to process words.

Celtx is a dangerous program if you're not an experienced writer because all writers are very easily distracted by shiny objects and pretty features. I'd rather spend days fiddling with a program's features than actually doing any productive writing.

If you're a screenwriter, which is who Celtx is built for, work on your writing and your dialogue and your scene descriptions. Worry about how to format them later. Celtx tries to kill a lot of birds with one stone.

You can use frigging NOTEPAD to write your novel. All that counts is that you have a properly formatted manuscript when you're finally ready to submit.

Dungle, do you write plays or screenplays? If so you definitely should use celtx, which is what I use. I see no point in writing a novel with it, but to each his own.

I use Open Office at home - because it's free. I use Word at work, cause they pay the licence fee.

I used to use Ability Write, which came with my laptop and is basically a complete rip off of word.

To be honest, it doesn't really matter what you use, so long as you are comfortable using it and the MS is correctly formatted.

What is important to check is that whatever programme you do use has the ability to 'Save As' a .doc file. as this is the most commonly used format.

third person said:

You can use frigging NOTEPAD to write your novel. All that counts is that you have a properly formatted manuscript when you're finally ready to submit.

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I use notepad.

You could use yWriter. It has some neat features for organization.

I love Celtx for screenplays. Novel writing is better served by Open Office.

About 12 months ago, because of a change to 64-bit Windows, I had to find a new word processor.

After a lot of time and evaluation, I settled on Atlantis. It contains many writer-useful features. It does everything for me that Word and WordPerfect did, except no tables. Cost, less than $40

It made me aware of WordWeb, the best thesaurus I have ever used. It is FREE. Atlantis contains in-built links to WordWeb.

Well worth a look if you're in the market.

Sentosa said:

About 12 months ago, because of a change to 64-bit Windows, I had to find a new word processor.

After a lot of time and evaluation, I settled on Atlantis. It contains many writer-useful features. It does everything for me that Word and WordPerfect did, except no tables. Cost, less than $40

It made me aware of WordWeb, the best thesaurus I have ever used. It is FREE. Atlantis contains in-built links to WordWeb.

Well worth a look if you're in the market.

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I have Atlantis on my netbook and love it to itty bitty bits.

Be careful of Celtx. The script format it's programmed to reproduce is the US standard, which is slightly different from the format used in the rest of the world.

For a novel, I'd stick with Word. Solid, cheap, reliable, does everything you need and more. Heck, I wrote a 100-page screenplay in Word in April; 3-tabs for name, 5-tabs for dialogue--easy as pie.

Dungle said:

What I am currently writing (my first serious piece) I want it to be a screen play if deemed good enough, but I am writing it in novel form as this is how I started it..... :-/

I got advised to just write and go with the flow, get the first draft out of the way and work on format at the end. Basically to just write the story.

This does actually bring me onto another question which I think I'll start another thread about!

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I did that for a screenplay I'm working on: I wrote a novel version. It's basically a treatment that got out of control. I'd love to be better at writing prose, but that's how it is.
It's basically about how you want to tell the story - do you just want to show the inner working of the protagonist's mind, or tell it in a verbal way? Or do you want it to be visual and performance-driven? These questions will decide if it's going to be a play or script or novel or whatever.

I've used Word, Celtx, and Final Draft. Final Draft, obviously, is for screen plays, and still my preferred program for them (probably because it's what I learnt with), however Celtx is a good substitute if you can't fork out the dough for Final Draft.

Celtx I've found really useful for comics scripts, so I use it exclusively for that now, but if you're writing for theatre or audio plays, it has script formats for those as well.

Word, however (or open office, depending on the computer I'm on), is still my preferred format for prose. You don't really need bells and whistles in a programme, and I find jotting down ideas and plotting easiest still in a hand written notebook.

It's basically what ends up working for you the best. I personally find I'm constantly formatting and spending way too much time on that while I write if I don't have a programme to do it automatically for me (probably because my mind is urging me to procrastinate).

Download Celtx if you want and test it out, see how it fits. Myself, I just find the bells and whistles that come with it unnecessary unless you have to strictly abide by a formatting style.

I'm with bearilou, Sentosa, and magicmint. Atlantis and yWriter.

I'd like to throw in my tuppence - the document map feature of Word is really nice. It's the primary reason I use Word instead of a plain old text editor. Great for navigating a big document, and can be used to get a high-level view of what your working on. If you are an outliner, you can make good use of this feature.

I have been mulling over downloading Celtx as well, I normally use Word (for novels) but am brainstorming on a screenplay now. I'd prefer Word, but heard the formatting is a hassle and that Celtx is, for a free software, good.

Yeah, Celtx is good, for scriptwriting. As for novels, well, it does have that feature, but it doesn't format it into the MS format and is basically a glorified text-editor; however, for scripts of any kind, it is great, and is ranked up there with Final Draft and Movie Magic (the de facto go-to programs used in Hollywood, but they aren't free, and aren't cheap -- Celtx IS free).

I just looked and saw there's what appears to regular Celtx and a Pro Celtx w/add ons, is it safe to say the regular one is sufficient?