Blake Snyder (October 3, 1957 – August 4, 2009) was an American screenwriter, consultant, author and educator based in Los Angeles.
trilogy of books on screenwriting and story structures, Snyder became one of the most popular writing mentors in the film industry.
Snyder led international seminars and workshops for writers in various disciplines, as well as consultation sessions for some of Hollywood's largest studios.
Among them were The Funny Company, Hot Wheels, animated segments on Sesame Street, Big Blue Marble and Roger Ramjet.
At the age of eight, Snyder was hired by his father as a voice talent for an animated special starring Sterling Holloway.
degree in English from Georgetown University, and returned to Los Angeles where he began his career writing for the Disney TV series Kids Incorporated.
Or My Mom Will Shoot, which sold for $500,000 in a bidding war;[5][6] the film won the 1992 Golden Raspberry Award for worst screenplay.
[10] The book describes in detail the structure of the monomyth or hero's journey, providing a by-the-minute pattern for screenwriting.
Snyder writes, "It's the scene where we [first] meet the hero", in order to gain audience favor and support for the main character right from the start.
In the opening scene of the movie Frequency, for example, Frank Sullivan, played by Dennis Quaid, is a veteran firefighter who jumps into a manhole to save two workers from a gas explosion.
Snyder's system explored genre more fully, with categories such as "Monster in the House", "Golden Fleece", "Buddy Love" and others.
While previous screenwriting advice was more conceptual, Save the Cat points to specific pages of the screenplay where beats should happen.
[18] The software places Snyder's Beat Sheet and Board on an end user's desktop, phone, or tablet.
In 2008, Snyder and the software company Final Draft, Inc. specializing in script formatting, became partners in building import/export functions between the two programs.
Version 4 of the software and apps, which includes new templates for novelists and television writers, was released in the fourth quarter of 2018.