A/V script: [Project title]

Client
Plays on
Audience
Takeaway
Action
Length
Team

Script

One row per picture change. Time is where the row starts, counted from 0:00.
Write the audio column first, then read it aloud. At about 140 words a minute it should land within five seconds of the target.
Let the picture carry what it shows. Narration adds what the viewer can't see: a number, a reason, what happens next.
Copy every sound bite word for word from the transcript, with its clip and its timecode in and out.

#	Time	Video	Audio
1	0:00
2
3
4
5
6

See an example

Riverside Food Bank, “Saturday Mornings” · a one-minute volunteer appeal for the website

1 · 0:00 · Video: CU: hands taping a cardboard box shut. SUPER: Saturday, 6:40 a.m.
Audio: NAT SOUND: tape, boxes, a radio playing.

2 · 0:05 · Video: WS: the warehouse, thirty volunteers at long tables.
Audio: V.O.: Every Saturday, before most of the city is up, these tables fill four hundred boxes.

3 · 0:12 · Video: MS: Ana Ruiz at the loading door. LOWER THIRD: Ana Ruiz, volunteer since 2019.
Audio: SOT ANA: “I came for one morning. That was five years ago.” Clip A014, 00:02:11:05–00:02:15:20.

4 · 0:20 · Video: B-ROLL: boxes into a van; a box handed over at a front door.
Audio: V.O.: Each box feeds a family for a week. This winter, we need forty more people to pack them. MUSIC: piano in, under.

5 · 0:40 · Video: WS: the empty hall at nine, the job done.
Audio: NAT SOUND: up full, the van doors closing.

6 · 0:48 · Video: END CARD: logo, riversidefoodbank.org/volunteer.
Audio: V.O.: Give us one Saturday morning. Sign up at riverside food bank dot org. MUSIC: out at 1:00.

Why it works: 46 words of narration in a minute. The sound bite and the natural sound carry the rest, and the narration never describes what the picture already shows.

Script terms

Term	What it means
V.O.	Voice-over: the narrator, heard but not seen
ON CAM	Someone speaking to the camera, in shot
SOT	Sound on tape: a sound bite from an interview, used as recorded
NAT SOUND	The natural sound of the scene, with no narration over it
B-ROLL	Shots that illustrate what is being said
SUPER	Text over the picture
LOWER THIRD	A name and title at the bottom of the frame
CU · MS · WS	Close-up, medium shot, wide shot

Notes for the narrator

Tone:
Pace:
Say it like this:

Footage, graphics and music

Item	Type	Rows	Source or status

Drafts

Draft	Date	Read aloud	Changes and sign-off

Before the shoot

Every line in the audio column has a picture beside it
Every SUPER and lower third is spelled and checked against its source
Read aloud at the narrator's pace, within five seconds of the target
Every item in the footage list has an owner, and a license where it needs one
The client has signed off on the latest draft