Convert Fountain to Fade In

• Reads every Fountain primitive — scene headings, characters, dialogue, parentheticals, transitions, dual dialogue, centered text, and title page metadata
• Outputs a native .fadein project for Fade In Pro — opens faster than Fountain import and plays better with Fade In's reports
• Runs entirely in your browser — the .fountain source never uploads
• Preserves bold, italic, underline, and centered text; Fountain notes, boneyards, and synopses are dropped as authoring scaffolding

Fade In Pro can import Fountain directly, but a .fadein project file opens faster, plays better with Fade In's reports, and survives round-tripping with collaborators. This converter takes your .fountain script and outputs a ready-to-open .fadein project.

What to expect

Fountain and Fade In's internal XML represent the same screenplay primitives, so this conversion is essentially lossless. Scene headings, characters, dialogue, parentheticals, transitions, dual dialogue, centered text, and title page metadata all transfer cleanly. Emphasis (italic, bold, underline) is preserved. Fountain-specific authoring markers — notes, boneyards, synopses — survive where Fade In has an equivalent and are dropped where it doesn't. The screenplay text itself comes through intact.

How it works

Your file never leaves your browser — conversion runs entirely client-side. The .fountain source is parsed into a Screenplay object by the native Fountain parser, then re-serialised into Fade In's XML schema and packaged as a .fadein zip.

Why a .fadein file rather than Fountain import

Fade In already imports Fountain — drop a .fountain file in and the app parses it.

So why convert at all? The answer is what Fade In can do after the file is open. A .fadein project carries Fade In's own scene metadata, revision marks, production-track flags, and report indices.

When you open a Fountain file Fade In treats it as an imported source — most of the production tooling is dormant until you save-as. Save-as is where things go wrong: a hurried save-as overwrites your Fountain master with a binary you can't diff, version-control, or open in any other tool.

Going the other way for a producer who lives in Final Draft? Use Convert Fountain to FDX from the same .fountain source.

What Fountain looks like

INT. BLOOM FRONT HALL - NIGHT (1987)

Edward is chatting up Will's pretty DATE to the homecoming dance.
She is enjoying the story, but also the force of Edward's charisma.
He's hypnotizing.

EDWARD (CONT'D)
The Beast jumped up and grabbed it before the ring even hit the
water. And just as fast, he snapped clean through that line.

WILL, now 17 with braces, is fuming and ready to leave. His mother
SANDRA stands with him at the door.

ON WILL AND SANDRA

WILL
(low but insistent)
Make him stop.

WILL'S DATE
What did you do?

A scene from Big Fish — slug line with year, descriptive action, two character cues with a (CONT'D) marker, and a parenthetical.

Source: Fountain syntax reference.