Am I laying out my script correctly?

[Loaded sumo]

I have just began my first draft for my very first script. It's a future shock, and I was wondering if I am laying it out correctly, putting in enough detail and description etc.
So here is an extract from one of my pages, about halfway through a page:

3. Medium shot of our main character, he is tall and slim, he has medium length, messy brown hair, blue eyes, a thin nose and a masculine, sharp-edged face. He is standing up in his pyjamas, the morning sunlight bathing his room.
BOX(Top left): The routine was normal, at first...
BOX(Bottom right): ...Until I noticed what was happening.

4. Large panel, zoomed out image of our character, floating around a foot from the ground, as if standing on an invisible platform, a faint, pale blue light surrounding him.

And you get the idea with that, any critique and advice will be greatly appreciated.

Ps: I've also been wondering how to go about a story synopsis, how big does have to be, what shall I include on it and such, if you have time to help I shall thank you greatly,
Cheers, Loaded Sumo

[IAMTHESYSTEM]

Right he's standing in a room? If you haven't described what room he is in before, bedroom/living room etc now's the time to do it. What else is in the room? Bed? Posters of giant assed hotties/peeling wallpaper etc. If it's a just nothing then it's a sure empty room but you might have mentioned this before so this is just picking up from the two panels you've shown here. 

zoomed out image of our character? Did you mean looking down on the character from above? From the side on?

You, the writer know what you mean as you can see it in your head but the artist probably isn't psychic and has to be able to get a view of what he has to draw just from your words. If you see it as a down shot say down shot. The artist may blissfully ignore this but nine times out of ten they tend to try and visualize your script from what you've told them.   

Sometimes a medium shot looking straight onto our character is called from Our Point of View or O.P.V for short.

If this seem's bitchy it isn't meant to be but you have to be able to tell the artist what he's got to draw. If your not sure how is he going to know? 

[Richmond Clements]

Here you go: http://www.futurequake.co.uk/submissions.php

[Art]

There's no standard format, though you can see how other people do it here:
http://www.comicbookscriptarchive.com/archive/?page_id=3

[Mardroid]

Right he's standing in a room? If you haven't described what room he is in before, bedroom/living room etc now's the time to do it. What else is in the room? Bed? Posters of giant assed hotties/peeling wallpaper etc.

Actually, the advice I've been given (by an actual Art Droid) is that lesser is better. I think a bit more description is okay in this case (i.e. state what the room is for example) but I think it's okay to leave the artist to do what they think. Nothing wrong with describing a couple of items and detail (peeling wallpaper as IAS says, etc).

Don't take my word for it. I've written a few scripts but I haven't actually submitted anything yet.

[Loaded sumo]

Thanks for the advice all

[Definitely Not Mister Pops]

Actually, the advice I've been given (by an actual Art Droid) is that lesser is better. I think a bit more description is okay in this case (i.e. state what the room is for example) but I think it's okay to leave the artist to do what they think. Nothing wrong with describing a couple of items and detail (peeling wallpaper as IAS says, etc).

Don't take my word for it. I've written a few scripts but I haven't actually submitted anything yet.

I've read that Alan Moore lays out his scripts in incredible detail, the article I was reading mentioned something about Moore's scripts describing the motivation of the grafitti artist who had scrawled a piece of grafitti on a wall in the background of one of his panels, he then (apparently) went on to describe how faded said grafitti was and what had caused it to fade. I can't remember where I read that, it could be a cunning ruse by my brain to make me look like I talk nonsense, my point is, I don't think there is a right or wrong way to do it. Just go with whatever works.

That's not useful at all actually, just ignore me

[Jared Katooie]

It's up to the writer how much detail they use in their script. John Wagner and Alan Moore are both great writers, but Moore has tons of detail in his scripts, whereas Wagner has very little.

I say it depends on the situation. If you have very definite ideas about how something should look, then it's necessary to go into more detail in your descriptions. Minor details can prove highly significant later on, depending on the story.

[TordelBack]

It's up to the writer how much detail they use in their script. John Wagner and Alan Moore are both great writers, but Moore has tons of detail in his scripts, whereas Wagner has very little.

Moore does indeed put megatons of detail into his scripts - a great example is the abortive publication of the annotated From Hell scripts, of which only the first volume ever appeared.  It's a great illuminating read in itself, and this in addition to  a book that already has appendices as long as the strip!  However, as that project showed, Moore's point (as an artist himself) is not that the artist draws every damn thing that he describes, but that the artist understands what Moore intends to convey with the panel or page in question.  Thus while Gibbons really does need to draw that Nostalgia perfume bottle rotating at just such an angle, Campbell doesn't have to draw each and every pedestrian that Gull's coach speeds past - but both need to understand the atmosphere and information that are key points of the story. 

Coming back to the hovering lad in the room, the OP only needs to describe the room if the description of the room is important to the story.  If we need to know that he's a messy teenager, or a prisoner in a windowless cell, then the writer needs the artist to convey that.  If the writer is happy for the artist to depict a room entirely from their own no-doubt rich visual imagination because the specifics don't affect the story, then stay schtumm (although a middle ground would be Moore trick of addressing the artist in a conversational tone - "draw whatever type of futuristic  room you think looks best as a background - the hovering man is the important bit").

I write as a complete ignoramus in the practical sense, but an avid consumer of published scripts.

[JOE SOAP]

Sometimes it's good to give an artist enough description that he can deviate from, otherwise he'd have nothing.

[Mardroid]

It's up to the writer how much detail they use in their script. John Wagner and Alan Moore are both great writers, but Moore has tons of detail in his scripts, whereas Wagner has very little.

I actually mentioned Alan Moore in comparison to John Wagner when asking advice on a writer's mailing list. The creator I mentioned in my previous post told me Wagner's more succinct method was the way to go for submitting to 2000 AD.

That's not to say that Alan Moore is wrong, but he is well established. In short the artist is co-creator in a very real sense in that they bring in their creative input rather than just drawing what we say...if that makes sense.

[Dog Deever]

As someone else has pointed out, in many cases I'd say less is better.
If the artist has no input into a story, why should they bother with it?
All that you're left with is the feeling that you're being viewed as an unimportant paid/ unpaid monkey for someone who can't draw.
Bear in mind that a story is a collaboration and not just the writers vision.
Jim Campbell makes some excellent observations on this: 'Rant: It's A Question Of Trust'.

Rufus Dayglo also posted somewhere (on his blog?) a revelation that might make some writers shit kittens with reference to his red pen. Can't find the post, but he started to basically go through a script and score out everything that he felt the writer didn't need to put in, allowing himself a little creative freedom. Something that all those detailed description just don't allow. Wish I could find it to link.

Basically, if you want that level of control, draw it yourself (or better still- go and write a short story or book)- if you can't or don't want to, then you are going to have to live with giving some degree of control to artists and letterers. After all, in theory, they know their jobs better than you know them.

As TB says- if it's an essential plot point, it needs to be conveyed to the artist- otherwise they'll not know. If not- leave it to the artist to design.

[Emperor]

There is also a danger that if you put too much in then the artist just gets overloaded (or simply bored reading it) and might miss the key points that you want to get in.

Also write the script as if the artist is a reader, so you hide details to make the reveal/twist punchier. If you need a candlestick emphasising early in the script as it becomes important later or if what the reader will see is a actually a dream, then say so when it crops up. If you have a location then it is a good idea to describe it once rather than drop feeding it out across the script and hoping that the artist can reconstruct it into a coherent whole. Ditto characters - if you can give the artist an idea of the character then you don't need to micro-manage every stance or movement - if they know the character is tired then they are going to be more slumped in their seat, for example. It can also be an idea to describe why you are doing something rather than trying to describe it in mad detail, get them into the right mindset (if this was inspired by something your grandfather said then tell them) as you never know what might spark further ideas. Then, throw in some knob gags.

However, don't feel like you have to pare the script back to Wagnerian standards, he has been doing this a while and knows just what to put in a script and what to leave out (helped by the fact that Dredd is an iconic character, largely due to his decades of careful worldbuilding, so both he and us know the character pretty well already). You could leave out something important and confuse the artist and then the reader or you might not be giving the artist enough material to get their teeth into - you'd really have to know your artist well to throw in "now three pages of fighting" and get away with it (I'm not sure if the story is apocryphal but it has been said... somewhere this was part of Mark Millar script for Nemesis but he had worked with McNiven a number of times so may have been confident he could pick up the ball and run with it). Basically, you need to write as much as you feel is needed to get the characters, setting and story over to the artist so they can do their job - you'll learn with experience what level is right for you and this will change with different subjects and collaborators.