Script

Scene heading

Also called Slugline

What is scene heading in film production?

A scene heading is the capitalised line that opens every scene in a screenplay, stating whether the scene is interior or exterior, where it takes place, and whether it is day or night — for example, INT. EDIT SUITE - NIGHT. It is the line scheduling software parses to build a breakdown.

The three parts are load-bearing rather than stylistic. INT/EXT determines lighting and whether the unit is fighting daylight, the location string is what groups scenes together on the stripboard, and DAY/NIGHT sets the strip colour and constrains when the scene can be shot.

Inconsistent location strings are the most common cause of a broken breakdown: 'INT. KITCHEN' and 'INT. RAJ'S KITCHEN' will schedule as two locations and split a day that should have been one.

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Screenwriting software

Reviewed 2026-08-27

Related terms

Script breakdown: A script breakdown is the process of reading a screenplay scene by scene and tagging every physical element a scene requires — cast, extras, props, wardrobe, vehicles, stunts, special effects, animals. The tagged result is what the schedule, the budget and every department's prep list are built from.
Fountain: Fountain is a plain-text markup format for screenplays. A Fountain file is readable as ordinary text and needs no proprietary software, but carries enough convention — capitalised scene headings, centred character names, indented parentheticals — for software to render it as correctly formatted script pages.
Stripboard: A stripboard is the shooting schedule represented as one coloured strip per scene, ordered in the sequence the production will actually shoot. Each strip carries the scene number, length in eighths, cast IDs, location and day/night. Reordering the strips reorders the shoot.