Words are the most important tool we have. They give us memories, concepts beyond our in-hand reality, and the ability to stitch together the past, present and future. So, we have stories, news, fables, histories, textbooks…

What does a picture give us? “A picture is worth a thousand words.”

When we merge the two modes of communication we can have graphic novels, comics or films.

Have you ever read a filmscript? It has a very specific format that may be, for some, as foreign as reading music. A script deals with the immediate. What you can see or hear is all you can read about. The rest is in your own imagination.

Because those in the film business focus on the visual, a tool they use to organize their understanding of the scenes and the plot-arc is the storyboard.

What if those of us not in the film business had the assistance of reading a script accompanied by its storyboard on each facing page? I call that format a “pictoric”. Words plus pictures. The visuals are rough sketches that merely guide one’s imagination quickly through the action. You fill in your own creative detail and colour pallet.

Watch for Pictorics to be available here soon.

In the meantime, would you care to peruse a script?

Mad God of the Toltecs

Ben Nuttall-Smith has transcribed his fascinating novel into a script.

Follow the up-tight Irish priest, Father Finten, as he is taken by marauding Norsemen on a journey to the New World where his acolyte and spiritual rival marries a chief’s daughter and becomes a shaman, contributing to a spiritual crisis for the priest, who escapes into madness.

The shaman-monk is summoned by visions to rescue the priest from forces of evil. Battles are fought and good men die. When everything seems to have been resolved, fate steps in, fulfilling the mystery, beauty and horror of the Quétzalcoatl myth.

Shroomtown

All he wanted was to have a quiet resort in the forest where he could finally try those fabled magic mushrooms. As a successful Vancouver lawyer, with a straight-laced aerobatic pilot of a wife, Bram knows he has to work into it slowly and carefully. With the reluctant help of a destitute Downtown Eastsider, he sets up his private resort “for the benefit of clients to de-stress after a difficult court case”. The local cop and his buddies have a different idea. Does Bram ever have a chance to drink some tea?

Protocol Omega

David Uhde is an elite spy. His fellow workers think of him, rightly, as a dickhead. After getting beat up yet again – by some punk teenager in Ramallah, no less – he wants out. His boss finally obtains special permission to offer David Protocol Omega – the last option.

This takes him to a place he finds worse than the hazards of Palestine. Detroit. He gets beat up again. And again.

Escaping from the fun world of capitalism, David thinks if you can’t beat them, join them. So he insinuates himself into a local gang. However, his spy instincts, and a blossoming love interest, put David at odds with his forced dark side. He uncovers a wide-ranging plot to assassinate a large number of leaders from a secret capitalist group. Saving the local victim puts him and his girlfriend, with the wounded victim, into a small plane flying at night to Toronto.

If you would care to purchase either of these scripts, for your personal reading enjoyment only, they are $16 CDN each, plus shipping:

You may fill out your order via PayPal or send your request via this form: