Start Writing Now, Buy Slugline Later
Try this. Open TextEdit (it comes free with your Mac), or any other text editor. Or use the Notes app on your iPhone or iPad.
Now start writing a screenplay.
Don't worry about formatting, just type the text of the story you have in mind.
Chances are, you’d end up something that looks like this:
That text looks kinda like a screenplay. Enough that anyone could read it and get the right idea.
Wanna know a secret?
You just wrote in Fountain, the plain-text format that Slugline uses.
Save that file as a plain text file (.txt), and open it in Slugline. It will look like this:
That's the same file. Slugline hasn't changed it at all. It just infers the correct formatting from the text, and displays it with proper screenplay margins.
The golden rule of Fountain is that it’s plain text that reads like a screenplay.
And an interesting byproduct of that is the Dirty Secret of Slugline:
Slugline is the first screenwriting app that doesn’t require itself.
In other words, you can start writing your screenplay today, without Slugline, using any app that makes text.
Don’t feel like buying Slugline yet? Fine. Get writing anyway. We’ll be here when you’re ready.