Importing a Script

A complete storyboard is not only made of drawings, but also dialogue, actions, and valuable indications. In Storyboard Pro, you can easily import a script into your storyboard project to help edit captions.

This section includes the following topics:

Storyboard View
Import Caption
Importing a Script from Final Draft

Storyboard View

The Storyboard view lets you import a script into your project. By default, this view has a caption field specifically for the script.

As opposed to the Panel view, whose content is sensitive to the selected panel, the contents of the Script panel stays the same no matter which panel is selected, allowing you to easily glance at information for the entire storyboard.

To display the Storyboard view:

Select Windows > Storyboard.

Project Information

This collapsible section of the Storyboard view is where information, such as the duration and number of scenes and panels are displayed. If your storyboard has sequences and acts, the total amount will also be displayed in that section.

You can click on the Collapse button to hide the section and leave more room for the Script caption field. Once it is collapsed, you can click the Expand button to display the entire section again.

Script Caption

This default caption field is specifically there for your script.

You can use the Caption Menu button to access the import commands and the Text Formatting button to display a handy toolbar to format your text. Once a script is imported into the Script caption field, you can drag and drop the text to other caption fields—see Formatting Text and Drag and Drop Text.

If your script is in *.txt or *.rtf file format, you can use the Import Caption command to import it into the Script caption.

To use the Import Caption command to import your script:

  1. In the Storyboard view, click the Caption Menu button and select Import Caption.

The Import Caption browser opens.

  1. Select your *.txt or *.rtf file and click Open.

The script appears in the Script caption field.

If you created your script in Final Draft, importing it into Storyboard Pro should be your next step. While importing your Final Draft script, you will retain the rich text formatting.

If you are working with Final Draft version 8, you can import the project file which is a *.fdx file. If you are working with Final Draft 7, you must export your project as an *.xml first—See Exporting Your Final Draft Version 7 Script as an *.XML File.

To import your Final Draft script:

  1. In the Storyboard view, click the Caption Menu button and select Import Final Draft Script.

The Select Final Draft browser opens.

  1. Select your Final Draft *.fdx or *.xml file and click Open.

The script appears in the Script caption field with all notes and formatting intact.

NOTE: Iif you are working with Final Draft 8, Storyboard Pro can directly import the *.fdx project file. If you are working with Final Draft 7 and earlier, you must export your project from Final Draft as an *.xml first, so you can import it in Storyboard Pro.

Exporting Your Final Draft Version 7 Script as an *.XML File

Here is a simple step by step to help you export your Final Draft *.fdr project to an *.xml file using Final Draft Tagger in version 7.

To export a Final Draft version 7 script as an *.xml file:

  1. Start the Final Draft Tagger software.
  1. Select File > Import Script, the keyboard shortcut is [Ctrl]+[I] (Windows) or [⌘]+[I] (Mac OS X).

The Import dialog box opens.

  1. In the browser, select your script file and click Open.

Your script appears in Final Draft Tagger.

  1. Select File > Export to XML.
  1. Close the Final Draft Tagger application.