Working on a time travel script for an assignment. Needless to say, the times, dates, durations, etc. of events are of particular importance. As of now, I haven't been using them. I don't think they're of immediate importance in a rough draft. I've opted instead to make notes of where they're need so I can fill them in when I'm polishing the first draft. The script's almost done so I'll be needing to do this soon.

I feel like this is close to the process of choosing character names but even more tedious. I feel I've got the hang of naming characters. A name's got poignance. But this is something I've never had to deal with and is pure decision making, not something you could find in some book. I suppose I could have every date and time correspond with some special event in history or my own life but it seems like more trouble than it's worth and the script is complicated enough without having to think about these things.

Any suggestions for how to go about choosing this stuff?

It shouldn't even be an issue of when and where these event occur so I'm not sure what exactly you are looking for here.  

I have one script that sort of deals with this subject and it has a lot of events but the way I went about choosing the dates was as multiples of six.   So one date is when he's six the next when he's twelve the next when he's eighteen.   Concentrating on a multiple made it easier to time random things.

I'm not exactly sure of what you're asking, but here's what I suggest:

If you put some kind of relevance on the days and dates and keep it in a separate log apart from the script, it might help. The relevance need not be big important days like a birthday or Christmas. It might be Garbage Day in Bowden,   (which happens to be a Wednesday) and it's significant in the script because no garbage lands on the street that day; so Sandra and her husband must have taken a simple trip, forgotten or done some time travel business.

Point is, that I think it's probably a good idea to have this worked out ahead of time because then you're factoring in a whole lot of factors. Like there was an ice storm and power was out so, "How could the suspect have made the call from home when he doesn't own a cell phone, doesn't even own a computer because he thinks it's of the Devil.

Trying to randomly plug in dates sounds like a really hard task. I'm sure it works in some scripts, but it's tricky depending upon the situations you're creating. I'd love to hear more specifics. I might learn something.

Sandra

Working on a time travel script for an assignment. Needless to say, the times, dates, durations, etc. of events are of particular importance.
We talking a few years back and forth like TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE or the guy from HEROS kinda time hops or a few decades back and forth BACK TO THE FUTURE or TERMINATOR kinda hops or a few millennia like THE TIME MACHINE or PLANET OF THE APES kinda jumps?

When in doubt - cheat!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L.....cience_fiction_films
See what/how they did it.

Is there a magic phone booth or portal?
Is it a time piece that can be set or does it generate a fairly or wildly random period/time.
Is there a specific interval thingamajig?
The mechanism of time travel should determine the time, dates and durations.

Caveat Emptor: I'm on the loose (as always) to steal your mind... I mean IDEAS!!!
I'm plum outta my own.
I hear they're a dime a dozen in The Wood.

Everything that happens in the story should correspond to the theme.

What's the core, the essence of the story?

Select events that reflect the theme in some way.


EG Let's say the story was about race. The person would jump through time to see the KKK, or the Nazi's, to the election of Obama...whatever, you get the point.

Hi James. Like everyone else, not sure what you're after there.  

If your script involves time travel, then you should've written in the dates, etc, for each scene, as a super. Not sure why you wouldn't do this as you went?

stevie

Sorry for the confusion, guys.

To clarify, I need dates and times that appear and are referred to diegetically (e.g. in clocks, watches, the time machine itself, etc.) and would be specific down to the very minute. Otherwise, it wouldn't really matter.

I don't want to say too much about the story. The closest film I could compare it to is Primer. A real world time machine story, if you will. No superheros or robots in this one.

Quoted from James McClung To clarify, I need dates and times that appear and are referred to diegetically (e.g. in clocks, watches, the time machine itself, etc.) and would be specific down to the very minute. Otherwise, it wouldn't really matter.

Another avenue you could consider... a rash of video games use the "diegetically," concept  in several different ways.  

'Dead Space'  'Far Cry' even the 'Need for speed" to name some.  It couldn't hurt to take a gander atleast.  Might spawn a good idea.  Or maybe you have.  Of course, I could be missing the mark.

Side-note;  no time machine for me.  I hope your time machine stands out from all the rest in previous movies.

Good Luck

Ghostwriter