2023 brings a couple notable changes.
Some issues script coordinators face seem to be impossible to root out, from deleted characters still persisting in Character Reports to files corrupting at 5:31 PM on a Friday preceding a three-day weekend. But some good news crests the horizon.
Final Draft Can Now Search Dual Dialogue
One of the longest-standing issues script coordinators have had with Final Draft is its inability to search dual dialogue. Any time a name, location, or other Find-and-Replace issue arose from yet a clearance email, it was up to the SC to manually deal with it.
But no longer! With build 12.0.7 (or possibly 12.0.6), Final Draft's search function now includes dual dialogue!
This is a significant development. Manually having to search dual dialogue for words to update added another step to the script coordinator checklist. It was especially burdensome on dual-language shows that used dual dialogue's visually smooth side-by-side nature to have English and non-English languages presented in tandem.
You'll notice above that FD appears to temporarily undual dialogue to make it searchable, but once your cursor leaves that field, it returns to its dual state.
Grammarly Desktop Now Works in Final Draft
If you have a Grammarly Premium plan, you have access to Grammarly Desktop, an app that runs in the background and peeks over your shoulder at what you're writing in Word, web browsers, and elsewhere. For a long time, however, this program was unable to scan what was written in a Final Draft window.
But no longer. Grammarly can now tackle grammar and spelling issues inside your Final Draft files.
Ironically, Grammarly doesn't recognize the baldfaced typo in the prepositional phrase "on her pace". How emparrasing.
This is a mixed blessing, like the inevitable monkey's paw of the universe that curls down yet another finger. Your attempt to suss out the "handful of typos" a reviewer noticed sprinkled throughout your pilot will require you to wade through 300+ suggestions, many of which are...shall we say, not great English.
It will also do nothing to assuage the self-doubt that comes when said reviewer reports your fifth revision of your Sherlock-Holmes-Meets-Remington-Steele pilot is "close to being ready" as a sample.
The Spell-Checking Alternative For Dummies
Tired eyes do you no favors when looking for errors, but when you're up against a showrunner who wants something published now, you don't have a lot of options. But for other people's material or, god forbid, your own, Final Draft has a built-in "table read" vocalizer.
Under Tools > Assign Voices, you can assign some built-in voices to your characters. The voices you have at your disposal are...not great. And Final Draft acknowledges this.
Actual screenshot.
But it reads everything actually as written, typos and all. If you have to step away and do the dishes, at least you can use this to "proof" your script while away from your keyboard.
But do wear headphones, for your roommates' and pets' sakes.
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