# Big Difference Between Amateur and Professional Writers - Brandon Violette ## Метаданные - **Канал:** Film Courage - **YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSdvWF4mkl8 - **Дата:** 19.02.2026 - **Длительность:** 14:51 - **Просмотры:** 13,723 ## Описание Our two new books... STORY QUESTIONS is currently 10% off! - https://payhip.com/b/ZTvq9 and 17 Steps To Writing A Great Main Character - https://payhip.com/b/kCZGd Brandon Violette was most recently the Head Writer for RoboGobo and Pupstruction at Disney Television Animation and the Co-Creator/Head Writer of CoComelon Lane (Moonbug/Netflix), one of Netflix's top-performing preschool series. His writing credits span hit shows including Dew Drop Diaries (DreamWorks), Pupstruction (Disney Junior), T.O.T.S. (Disney Junior), Thomas & Friends: All Engines Go! (Mattel), and Stretch Armstrong & The Flex Fighters (Hasbro Studios). In addition to his screenwriting work, Brandon is the host of The Story Series Podcast, where he interviews writers, showrunners, filmmakers, author and creators about story structure, character development, pitching and the creative mindset. Before moving to Los Angeles, Brandon studied at the Beijing Film Academy and continues to return to China as a guest lecturer, sharing insights on storytelling, animation, and the global landscape of entertainment. CONNECT WITH BRANDON VIOLETTE https://brandonviolette.com https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3069554 https://www.youtube.com/@bviolette https://www.instagram.com/storyseriespodcast MORE VIDEOS WITH BRANDON VIOLETTE https://tinyurl.com/bddhrd4r MORE VIDEOS LIKE THIS A Professional Script Vs An Amateur Script - https://youtu.be/GZxamnOUbXw 21 Ways To Structure A Screenplay [WRITING MASTERCLASS] - https://youtu.be/OPxxJ2wBNTA 3 Common Screenwriting Mistakes That Amateur Writers Make - https://youtu.be/moW9ZkNewlA 7 Point Story Structure Found In Every Great Movie - https://youtu.be/CK-5QEOhXVc Where Writers Go Wrong With Story - https://youtu.be/727CmHE3z8w Why 99% Of Stories Are Meaningless - https://youtu.be/v4wkx8LBH_s CONNECT WITH FILM COURAGE http://www.FilmCourage.com http://twitter.com/#!/FilmCourage SUBSCRIBE TO THE FILM COURAGE YOUTUBE CHANNEL http://bit.ly/18DPN37 PERSONALLY SPONSOR FILM COURAGE https://ko-fi.com/filmcourage SUPPORT FILM COURAGE BY BECOMING A MEMBER https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs8o1mdWAfefJkdBg632_tg/join SUPPORT FILM COURAGE BY BECOMING A PATRON https://www.patreon.com/filmcourage (Affiliates) ►BOOKS WE RECOMMEND: STORY QUESTIONS: How To Unlock Your Story One Question At A Time https://payhip.com/b/ZTvq9 THE NUTSHELL TECHNIQUE: Crack the Secret of Successful Screenwriting https://amzn.to/2X3Vx5F THE STORY SOLUTION: 23 Actions All Great Heroes Must Take http://amzn.to/2gYsuMf SAVE THE CAT! 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Started using this lens at the end of 2013 - http://amzn.to/2tbtmOq AUDIO Audio Recorder - If we had to do it all over again, this is probably the first item we would have bought - https://amzn.to/3WEuz0k LIGHTS - Although we like to use as much natural light as we can, we often enhance the lighting with this small portable light. We have two of them and they have saved us a number of times - http://amzn.to/2u5UnHv *Disclaimer: This video and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, we’ll receive a small commission. This helps support the channel and allows us to continue to make videos like this. Thank you for your support! #screenwriting #writing #writer ## Содержание ### [0:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSdvWF4mkl8) Segment 1 (00:00 - 05:00) Can you tell us the process for writing the first draft of an animated screenplay? — Oo yeah. So that changed from being like you as I've grown professionally, but now the way I do it, the way I think is way that works really well for me is write the bad version first. You have to write badly. I think early on there's this like thing that we get that professionals write perfectly and that professionals never write anything bad or you know it can't be like this or and that's not true. I really think the definition of a professional is someone who stays in motion. Meaning an amateur might freeze. Professional stays in motion. And even if that motion is bad writing and the reason I think that's important is because you need to get to the end and middle of the end, but especially in screenwriting and especially in TV where it's short shorter than feature. Uh it's real estate. It's like so to see the skeleton of something is so crucial because how often do we we've all done it or read scripts where like the beginning is perfect and then the ending is like it wraps up so quickly. It's because it's all the time we spent earlier in the script writing it and making it perfect and then the ending is like almost an afterthought. And I think by getting to just the bad version down, you can see where things fall, how much space you might need or time you might need to tell this part or this part, this part. And then you again like the key phrase for like being a professional is writing is rewriting. Like we hear that in class or film like everything and it's like oh whatever you know it's you kind of discount it but that is the job. And so if you just let yourself write badly first you will rewrite it but you need to get it down on paper get it out of your head because the longer something stays in your head the less it's on the page and that's really where the job is. And so I think time can be wasted like just keeping things in our head and you swim in indecision, but you need to make decisions even if they're the wrong ones because the rewriting is now making those decisions better. And so the first draft of an animated script, any script really, but it's just do the bad version first, go back and rewrite it and that's like the key thing. — I love that. So you said being a professional is motion. Keep moving. — Yeah. Yeah. Like amateurs freeze, professional stay in motion. like if you want to think of it that way because I remember I used to like especially starting out and when I first like my first professional script or second one on the Disney show uh it was like every word had to be perfect every line and then it would take so long because you could you get to the end but it's like it's too long and it's not the best way to write. It's just not and that's and I didn't like that process. I liked what I had eventually but it's not a fun and and you have to be able to go as a TV writer because it's a you know you have this and then you have this. So you can't just like waste time wanting things to be perfect from your head to the page. It's like no just get it down and then make it as close to perfect. It never gets there but as possible. Yeah. — Yeah. I like that. That's makes a lot of sense. Thank you. I enjoy that. — I like to think like that's kind of what writer's block is when people say writer's block is that it's not that you can't or you don't know. It's not that writer's block is that you don't have any ideas. It's that you have too many and you don't know which one to write. And so you you're spending too much time up here and it's like get it on the page and start moving it around. And that is I what I find gets me unstuck if I ever feel that way. Yeah. — And so when you were working these different uh writing jobs, were you writing on let's say a Saturday or Sunday your own stuff just to keep sort of like something in your back pocket? What else do you have? — Yes. or especially early on writing the for the show on a Saturday or Sunday because I was still writing that long way of like everything has to be perfect and getting in my head too much about like you know what is a professional script look like and just you know too much in your head and so it bleeds over into the weekend because you still got to get it done and so there would be some of that and then yeah always uh trying to like write on other things put your own pilot together or pitch it out there maybe you're lucky to have another freelance job or something. Yeah. Something would come up. [snorts] — Was writing at home something that was working for you or would you go out somewhere and write? — Um, yeah. I work at home would uh would be fine. Um, there's a cigar shop that I go to. — Okay. — That's kind of funny. Uh, that I've been going to for like 15 years and and I write I've written a lot there. And so, uh, yeah, for whatever reason, it's a weird thing, but yeah, home or there. Yeah. — Interesting. Yeah. I mean, especially too if it's a certain kind of story. I don't know, maybe a kid story wouldn't work there, but maybe it does. But if you're especially Chandleresque or something where you want to really get in that mindset of — of sort of the, you know, that cigar ### [5:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSdvWF4mkl8&t=300s) Segment 2 (05:00 - 10:00) culture and — Right. Right. Yeah. I can't say there weren't any there were no kids scripts written there. It might have been. But uh but yeah, it's something I think it's like a focus thing. — It's just nice. It's like some people, you know, do this, you go to the coffee shop. — I used to do that too all the time. But uh part of it is, you know, the pressure of the deadline kind of determines how much freedom you have in your process. It's like you got to get it down, you know? — Yeah, — that's great. I love it. — Yeah. — Can you explain how you never start from a blank page, but how you copy and paste a premise and outline? — Yeah. So that's a tip from uh Gobbus who was the my partner in Cooklon Lane. So uh I think that was around the time when I was early on in tots when he was the headwriter and I was spending a lot of time on those first drafts and the first draft of an outline or whatever premise and and just taking my time. And what I learned from him was for a script, he would take the outline, copy it into final draft, and start moving it around. And I thought, "Oh, yeah, that's the bad version. That's like the skeleton. " And then the writing is rewriting. Then you start moving it around, and you say, "Okay, this is working, and this is a good line. Okay, this. " And you just see it beginning, middle, and end. And so that was like, yeah, you take the premise, put it into the outline page, and move it around. This is beat A, B, and you don't have enough for an outline obviously, but you have the bad version, you have the skeleton, then you go back in and rewrite it. And so that was the thing of like cuz that blank page stops to, you know, it's the cliche like the blank page kind of everyone freezes. And it's like, so if you could just put the bad version down and it could be the literally the previous assignment. Um, take what works because you've already done the work. So why wouldn't you do that? And then you rewrite, but like take everything with you. So going back to square one on each stage actually doesn't make sense anymore unless you got so heavily noted that you need to go back to square one but generally it's like there's things you can take. Why not? Yeah. — I believe you said get in the script and get out of your head. What does this mean? — Yeah. Get in the script, get out of your head. That is goes back to that give yourself permission to write badly. And that's that means just get it on the page and it doesn't matter what condition it's in. and that it doesn't make you any less of a professional if it's bad because it always starts bad. Um, and so I think, you know, early on it was that voice of like, uh, every line has to be perfect because like what if the boss happened to look over and he saw a line and he's like, I hired you to write the script and like that's your process like you have, you know, and we, again, that's just stuff in your head that you think of it that never happened. No one ever looked over my shoulder and judged one sentence as I was writing it, but [snorts] we can allow ourselves to go there. And so the sooner you get out of your head and onto the page means you're not thinking anymore like abstractly. You're at least shaping something like clay. And you know how like how long are you going to think about shaping clay versus doing it, right? Like the real work comes in like you know touching the keys or right like so that's that is like a game changer I think is just but you have to give yourself permission to write badly. — Yeah. — You're I'm reminiscing of the scene in Ghost. Yeah, there's the kil. — Yeah, right. — It's just like that. — But, you know, and that goes back to what you said earlier of just like a professional keeps moving and I love that. Yeah. — Yeah. Exactly. — How much of the story do you have to know before you can write the episode? Well, in TV, by the time you write the episode, you've done the work of at least a premise, which is a one page, one and a half page summary, and an outline, which is like four pages of like beat A, beat C, and D, act two, four beats, act three, four beats. So, you should know the general shape of it. A lot of people will say outline is like the hardest part because, you know, it's almost literalized, right? But it's not quite. And so if you do a good job at the outline, you can script. And I think that there's some truth in that. I think that every I think the script is the hardest part. And every script is hard. Even doesn't matter how long I've been doing this now, maybe nine years or so. Uh every script for TV is hard. But it's hard in like the engaging way, the way that makes it fun. And so if it's ever easy or too easy, it's like this probably not a great script and maybe not a great fit for me anymore. So it should feel hard but in a way that you're like oh okay I want to crack this and so but you should be bringing enough to it to know where you want to go which is the outline the work that you did there. — Did you get bored in school a lot? — Yeah. I would always especially after like we touched on the rockers modern life and wanting to draw. I was always drawing in the margins of my textbooks always. And so yeah school was you know English was naturally a little bit better. Math was tougher. Uh and ### [10:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSdvWF4mkl8&t=600s) Segment 3 (10:00 - 14:00) yeah, so it was definitely I barely made it out. Yeah. — Well, because you said that you want it to be hard in a good way, not in like if it's too easy. And so that's what I a lot of times people that you know maybe it was too easy or and they were sort of bored and — No, I wasn't like the effortless A student. I was like the you know, a lot of effort C student. But I think that there's a myth that like oh uh like for a professional writer that it should come easy or something like that. And I like to like [snorts] remind people that like it's hard. Every script is hard doesn't mean it's but what changes is hopefully your confidence in the process and meaning you're spending less time talking yourself out of doing something or having this inner dialogue of you're not good, you know, all that stuff. the confidence is like if I sit down and I write the bad version and I rewrite it by Friday at 4, I'll have an email to the headwriter or whoever with this done. So, so the discipline is there. It's not like it's super easy all of a sudden and you know how to tell every story. Every story has its own nuances and what makes it tough and and also ways to like maximize the story concept. you know, whatever story you're trying to tell is there what how far can you push it and do things you haven't done before and all that stuff. And so that's what you want to do every single script. And so it's not easy, but it's uh it should feel hard is what I tell people. Yeah. — Can we hear more about your outlining process? — Yeah. So, a typical like life of a TV episode starts at story break and or starts even at the springboard stage where you send a paragraph of an idea to the network and they'll either say yes or no and then it goes to story break. So that's like the writer's room where there's four or five of us and you put it up on the board, three acts with four beats in each one and you it comes to like rough life and you know it's the rough kind of map and you get the benefit of like the group think and you pitch gags and stuff like that and then it goes to one writer after that and then you do the premise which is like a page and a half summary. Uh and so again it's and it's written in pros. It's not final draft. It's like Microsoft Word and then that will go to the headwriter to do their pass typically and then the network and then they come back with notes and that's when you go to the outline. And so then the outline is now a more realized version of the premise longer. You're getting a little more detail of each what each beat feels like and still should be tracking the story. you know, it's not I'll have the premise, but I'll still have the story break grid open, too, and I'll refer back to it for specificity and making sure, okay, this was the midpoint. So, is this a midpoint in the outline? And just making sure that that rough uh shape is still there. And unless you're like heavily noted, it should still be there. Um, and then you're off to script after that. And so that process that you just described before off to script how many days or weeks or what how long is that? — Typically it could be average five four days to do a premise and a week and a half or two weeks to do an outline and which is pretty generous like typically for this for this kind of thing. Like that's enough time. Um but it's not uncommon you have that time. It's not uncommon to be finishing a second draft of another episode, the one that you did before that one. And so you're juggling a couple things as a TV writer. And so that's why they give you that space. It doesn't take two full weeks to write an outline, but you might need to because you're going to be you have to budget your time accordingly for the past work. And then, you know, it'll be your turn to break another story soon. So you're kind of you're always juggling. — [snorts] — Mhm. — And so then the screenplay part, how long does that usually take? — That two weeksish for a kids TV script, but it changes from show to show. It could be quick. It could be uh and procrastination will kill you. You know, you could have two weeks, but maybe you do all the work in the last three days. Like that is the thing. You know, you have to budget your time. And so uh I like to work under a little bit of pressure. And so it's like typically not started the day that you're assigned it. I mean, you might be finishing other stuff, but it's like usually in that like last stretch is when it really like really kind of drill down. — Yeah. Some people just work better on a deadline under pressure. Really? — Yeah. And you use that deadline to to as pressure to move forward. Yeah. Mhm. — Thank you for watching the video all the way to the end. Here is a complimentary question from our book story questions. --- *Источник: https://ekstraktznaniy.ru/video/18060*