Filed under: Software, Friday Favorite
Friday Favorite: Scrivener
Not long after I bought my first personal Mac in late 2004, I stumbled across an article that mentioned Ulysses, a text editor geared toward creative writers -- essentially the marriage between a word processor and project management software. It allows you to have all documents within a writing project at your grasp. As a journalist and author, Ulysses was a dream come true, but expensive. Costing more than $100 at the time, it didn't fit into a journalist's salary.
I wound up using CopyWrite for a time and was fairly satisfied with it until I read in a forum that people were having luck with a program which, at the time, was called Scrivener Gold. I gave the free beta a try and was blown away by the program's potential. When the full-fledged release of Scrivener came out in early 2007, I bought a license as a birthday gift for myself.
Scrivener pulls all the things needed for a complete writing project -- be it writing a script, novel, research paper or newspaper/blog articles -- together in one location and has so many features that even after nearly three years of use, I don't think I've fully explored all that it has to offer. I recently started work on writing my first graphic novel, and have really gotten the chance to flex Scrivener's muscles.
With a few clicks, I can have all of my reference material on screen as I write. That ability to combine reference material into Scrivener is what makes this program pure gold. You can drag things like .JPG and .MOV files into the references section and have them on hand as you write so you're not going back and forth from your draft to different parts of the project -- and then go into full-screen mode that fades out the programs in the background so you can focus on your writing. You can link specific chapters to reference material just for that chapter. You can add random bits of text by highlighting it in the original source and dragging it over the Dock icon. It'll be added to a Clippings folder that you can sort out into individual parts of the writing project.
One of the nicest features is the program's version of Time Capsule, where you can take a snapshot of your project at a certain point in the writing project. If you've made a major error, you can have Scrivener restore the project back to the snapshot and resume from there. Another strong feature are its Outliner and Corkboard views. You can either view your story as an outline or a corkboard with synopsis index cards and shuffle the parts of your writing about as you need.
Screenwriters are not forgotten as well. Though not a dedicated program like Final Draft, Scrivener does have basic screenplay tools. Then the script can be exported to another scriptwriting program for further tweaking if need be. Drafts can also be exported to another word processor or formatted from publishing from within Scrivener as well.
I can honestly say that Scrivener has made me a more efficient, organized writer and has been the most worthwhile program I've purchased for my Mac. Just from the random mentions around the TUAW water cooler, I was surprised (and pleased) to hear of how many of us use it. It's also a really good program for switchers as well. A close friend just made the leap to Mac and I steered her toward the program. While some features are a bit more complex, the interactive tutorial makes it easy for her to grasp. It's also good for students -- helping them to organize essays for class and keep track of different assignments.
Scrivener requires OS X 10.4 and above. A 30-day free trial with access to all of its features is available. A full license is $39.95, $34.95 for an educational license. You can also buy a copy placed on a pill-shaped USB stick for $49.95.
Note: Yes, this article was composed in Scrivener.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Esmeralda said 6:34PM on 6-26-2009
Thank you for the review of Scrivener. I’ve been using this program for about two years, and, like you, think of it as an essential tool on my Mac. I write books and essays. My current project, a historical novel, has been entirely written on Scrivener. I’ve been able to keep all my notes, research, music files and images together and it has been easy to find and process the material. It’s funny that you mention that you had not fully explored its power. Your article taught me something I didn’t know about: dragging bits of text into Scrivener on the dock, which creates a Clippings folder on the current project. It’s a new one for me, and one that I will use frequently. Thank you. Love this program!
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Megan Lavey said 10:15PM on 6-27-2009
The graphic novel I'm working on is partially set in a historic era as well, and it sounds like our setups are similar. Good luck with it! I'd love to read it whenever you get it published! *has a big weakness for historic novels*
affaires said 6:37PM on 6-26-2009
I just wanted to say thanks for this nice review! (I say that as a potential client.) I love it when people write about software they are regularly using and love.
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Wooster said 6:42PM on 6-26-2009
I transfered from Celtex to Scrivener. For free, you can't argue at all with Celtex, but it's very much portware. Nothing against multi-platform software, but I was getting really tired of it. Scrivener does everything I need with a pleasant amount of flexibility.
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vincentreusch said 7:59PM on 6-26-2009
Love it, love it, LOVE IT!
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superberg said 8:56PM on 6-26-2009
I adore Scrivener! It is great for organizing thoughts and sorting projects. I haven't used another word processor in ages.
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Josh Packard said 9:28PM on 6-26-2009
Wrote my entire dissertation (300+ pages) on Scrivener. Split screen with research articles on top and draft on bottom was incredibly useful. I think it honestly sped up my dissertation timeline by at least 2 months.
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Lauram said 9:46PM on 6-26-2009
I've recommended Scrivener to several friends and even gave it to one novelist I know for her birthday. It has a great advantage over much 3rd-party software -- excellent support in the form of that terrific, lucid tutorial and help files, as well as a lively forum. The tutorial in particular makes the virtues of Scrivener understandable to people who are not especially computer-literature and nervous about trying new applications, like many of my writer friends. I suppose it makes sense, since it was created for writers by a writer (Hi Keith!), but oh how I wish more 3rd-party developers would invest in similar tutorials. There are some applications that I know are supposed to be good, but the documentation is so bad (i.e., DevonThink) that I've given up trying to figure them out. Most people don't want to to have to bang around on something to figure out how it works.
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Big Dick said 9:59PM on 6-26-2009
This was one of the reasons I bought my Mac about a month ago. The more and more I play with it, the more and more I love Scrivener I wish I had had access to it when I wrote my dissertation about 4 years ago;)
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JoeyBahr said 10:10PM on 6-26-2009
I've tried Scrivener before and I see it's potential, but I never seem to get the outline function to work like I want.
I would like to use it kinda like OmniOutliner, which the developer referenced on the site, but it doesn't seem to work as easy.
Then again, maybe I'm doing something wrong there.
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Nigel Hall said 11:34PM on 6-26-2009
I'm a copywriter and I've been using Scrivener for a couple of years too. I absolutely love it. There are so many features to rave about, but one that probably enhances my productivity more than any other is the ability to import a .mov file containing a recorded interview amd then go into split screen and transcribe the interview while controlling audio playback with keyboard commands, without ever leaving off from where I'm typing. I can't tell you how it much time it saves.
When I'm writing I just drag all of my PDFs files into the research directory for easy reference. If clients send me Powerpoints, I just print to PDF and import them. It's great have have everything in one place.
I enthusiastically recommend Scrivener to anyone who does any kind of writing.
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Bob Aman said 11:49PM on 6-26-2009
I cant tell you how much I love Scrivener. I use it for tons of different things, but most recently for Bible studies. It is absolutely ideal for this purpose.
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Marcus said 1:38AM on 6-27-2009
This is my No.1 writing tool on the mac. Scrivener + Papers are my 2 essential apps for academic research and publishing.
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drstarr said 6:43AM on 6-27-2009
How does Scrivener help with managing references and bibliographies?
Lars said 5:45AM on 6-27-2009
Well, then I can only chime in and say Scrivener is great for my novel-in-progress. The full screen editing without distractions is great and having source materials handy within the document is great.
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frosth242 said 6:58AM on 6-27-2009
I prefer Storybook. It is great for managing creative writing. It is open source and works on many systems.
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TR said 10:24AM on 6-27-2009
Interested in anything related to writing applications, I looked up StoryBook: um, most of us here at TUAW use Macs. =/ And in my case, I'm doing most of my writing on a 15" PowerBook running Tiger (because Leopard's useless on 512MB RAM), so even Parallels is out of the question.
I tried — and, stupidly — bought StoryMill. I disliked it immensely. I suppose I'm a visual person, and Scrivener just looks that much more like a Mac app. StoryMill has that OS 8/9/non-OSX look and I just couldn't feel calm and 'at home' writing in it, even though I bought it because of its timeline and character features. I'll have to remind myself why I buy Macs: not only because they're useful, but because they're good looking.
Over all, Scrivener's amazing, in UI and features. (21,000 words in, I've come to realize that I don't need anything StoryMill offers…)
Mike Nelson said 8:14AM on 6-27-2009
I too love Scrivener. I've used if for almost two years. It was a fantastic tool in helping me complete my PhD dissertation at Berkeley. I wish I had had it at the beginning of my processs. And I continue to use it for research and for preparing lectures. I'm glad it is getting attention here!
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Matt Young said 10:04AM on 6-27-2009
This article is great and timely. How have I not heard of this software before? I have a story I want to write, but I know it would work much better as a screenplay than anything else. However, I have never written a screenplay and don't think the $250 for Final Draft would be a worthwhile investment just yet. Scrivener might be just what I need to bridge the gap between straightforward prose to a more screen friendly format. Thanks!
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Christina Warren said 12:26PM on 6-27-2009
Scrivner is a totally great bridge app. If you find that you want to get more serious about screenwriting, Final Draft is excellent, but for just getting your story on paper, in the right format, Scrivner is awesome.