Two-Column Script (AV Script)

What is it?

The two-column script is the standard format for video where picture and sound are planned together: the page split down the middle — VIDEO on the left (what's seen: shots, graphics, B-roll, on-screen text), AUDIO on the right (what's heard: narration, dialogue, music, effects). Each row is a moment, read left-to-right as "while this is on screen, this is heard." It's the working document of corporate video, documentary, news packages, and commercials.

Practical example

A 60-second explainer's two-column script, one row:

VIDEO	AUDIO
Wide shot of empty office, slow zoom in	VO: "Every great company started with an empty room..."
Cut to founder at whiteboard, B-roll of sketching	VO: "...and a single, stubborn idea."
Full-screen graphic: the logo assembling	MUSIC swells; SFX: logo chime

Anyone — editor, voice artist, client, motion designer — reads this and knows exactly what happens when. The format forces the discipline that separates amateur video from professional: deciding picture and sound as a pair, never writing narration and hoping for visuals later.

Key things to know (non-technical)

• The format's gift is synchronization thinking: it makes you plan what's seen against what's heard, row by row — the core skill of video writing that prose scripts (audio only) quietly skip.
• It's the universal handoff document: VO talent reads the right column, editors read the left, clients approve both — one page coordinating every craft.
• It's most valuable for constructed video (packages, explainers, ads, documentaries) where picture and sound are assembled deliberately — less so for live conversation, where pictures follow talk.
• The left column is effectively a text storyboard: it describes the visual sequence in words, the cheaper cousin of drawing it.

In Tupic Live

The two-column format is how Tupic Live's produced segments get planned: pre-recorded packages, explainer inserts, and as-live pieces benefit from VIDEO/AUDIO planning before they're built from the media library — and the post-live pipeline thinks the same way, pairing the show's audio (transcript) against its picture (clips, B-roll) to assemble narrated recaps and packages.