How to script for association’s videos

If you know something about audiovisual content, you are probably familiar with some types of scripts: a literary script, a shot list, an open script… You probably also know that the main goal of a script is being useful; that is, for the people who are working on the video.

In Rabuso, in most cases we work with open scripts. For example, for all the interviews we do. Working with an open script means that before shooting we don’t know exactly what we are going to find, so preparation is key. We need to know what we want to achieve, what we want to get from the people we are interviewing, what is their value and, of course, the purpose and the focus of the video.

In order to do this, we have to know the subject very well, we can investigate, we can ask around, we can meet with the interviewees, we can consult the guides and publication, etc. All of this is going to allow us to create a basic structure with which to start filming and, if everything works out, then post-production is going to be a piece of cake.

However, we don’t always have time to do all of this preparation. In Rabuso, we create our own native content for every association, that is why we can’t always prepare elaborate scripts before shooting. What happens then? Well, in that case the role of the editor becomes very important. We have to begin developing the structure and the story after we have filmed. So we have to work with the material we have.

In this case, every editor has a different method. Some like transcribing, and that’s a good idea if you have the time. Nevertheless, and, specially if we are working with short videos, we can actually develop the structure directly on the editing software.

Getting familiar with the content is very important, we need to listen very carefully to what our interviewees are saying. This is going to help us develop the final structure. For example, in the case of the video for the ACIES guide, even though it was only one question, all the interviewees answered with their own ideas. During editing, we had to try and create a thread to join all these ideas in a natural way. In the end, editing is like assembling a puzzle, all the pieces have to fit together.