Projects & the shooting schedule

A project holds everything for one production: its schedule, crew, deals, approvals and pay.

Creating a project

On Projects, tap New project. The wizard has two steps.

1. Project details: Title, Production company and Billing address are required, because crew invoices are addressed to that company. KVK number and VAT number are optional and come pre-filled from your profile. Change them if the production company is a different one. Base of operations (a city) is optional.
2. Work rules: keep Fijn Weekend, the default, or pick Custom and adjust the rules right there. See Fijn Weekend or Custom.

The shooting dates follow from the days you add to the schedule. To change the details later, tap the pencil (Edit project) next to the project title. You also pick the Cost codes template there.

Project status

You don't have to keep the status up to date. Once the schedule has a production day, the project shows Planning until the first scheduled day, Active through the last one and Wrapped after it. A schedule with only office or travel days stays on Planning.

The status menu at the top of the project has three actions:

• Complete sets the project to Completed once wrap-up is done. It stays completed whatever happens on the calendar.
• Cancel project sets it to Cancelled and takes it off your project list and your co-producers' lists. Crew who haven't signed are released for good, while signed deal memos, timesheets and invoices are kept. Delete project in Edit project does the same thing.
• Reopen puts a completed project back on the calendar-driven status. Right after you cancel, you can still reopen a cancelled project from the same menu.

Only the producer who owns the project can cancel or delete it, so co-producers don't see Cancel project or Delete project. They can complete and reopen it.

While an upcoming day still has crew who signed for it, the project can't be completed, cancelled or deleted. Cancel those days first, so any late-cancellation fee is assessed.

Adding shooting days

Days live in the Schedule on the project's Planning tab. Select a date and tap Add day, or select a stretch of dates and tap Add days. How the calendar's views, filters and marks work is under the calendar. A day has these fields:

• Day category: Production, Office day or Travel. A production day also gets a Type: Prep, Shooting or Wrap.
• Times: Call time and Est. wrap. An office day has an End time instead of a wrap, and a travel day has a Departure time and Arrival time. The times decide whether crew show as free or booked when you search. Crew hours count from clock-in.
• Day length (shooting days only): Full day, Half day or Hourly.
• Lunch (full shooting days): Standard (break), Running lunch or French hours. With running lunch or French hours, overtime starts after the shorter continuous base, see Overtime.
• Location, or Departure and Arrival on a travel day. Location fields can suggest places as you type, see location suggestions.
• Notes.

Days are numbered in date order, separately for each day type, so the first prep day and the first shooting day are both day 1.

On a new day everyone works. Every department is Scheduled and follows the day's times. Switch Scheduled off for a department that has the day off, or give it its own times, location, day category, day length, lunch or per diem. Inside a department, Add crew exception does the same for one person. Crew who are off on a day get no schedule change to accept for it. Department and crew exceptions are set on a single day, so they aren't available while you create a range.

Crew booked for the whole shoot work every day on the schedule unless you mark them off. A day-player booked on specific dates doesn't get new days automatically. A new day joins their booking only when one of you proposes it in the schedule change request, see Schedule changes.

To fill a stretch of the calendar in one go, give the day an End date as well as a date (tap Add end date). The app creates a day for every date in between, up to 90 days at a time. Dates that already have a day are left exactly as they are. Skip Saturdays, Skip Sundays and Skip public holidays all start switched off, so a range covers every calendar date unless you say otherwise. That suits a production that shoots weekends. The count under the dates shows how many days will be created, how many dates already have one and how many the skip rules leave out.

Days on different dates can overlap in time too, such as a night shoot that wraps at 08:00 and a day that calls at 07:00 the same morning. When the day's call and wrap times overlap another day of the project, the day editor names that day under the times. The check compares the days' own times, not department or crew exceptions. You can still save. On Main, crew scheduled on both days at overlapping times show as a crew clash. A scenario shows no crew clashes until you promote it.

If the project's work rules grant a premium-free Sunday allowance, the schedule flags every Sunday or public holiday that falls outside it. You see the flag in the day list, and in the day editor while you pick the date, so a day with the Sunday or holiday premium never comes as a surprise.

Moving a day that already has logged hours shows a warning first: the entries keep their old date in reports and exports until someone corrects them. Tap Move day anyway to go ahead.

Once the day's date has arrived, you can set or correct its Actual wrap on the day page, see Actual wrap.

Location suggestions

Location fields suggest places as you type once you tap Turn on suggestions under a field. What you type then goes through CrewShift to Geoapify, an EU service built on OpenStreetMap data, which the credit under the field names. Pick a suggestion with the arrow keys and Enter, or tap it. Esc closes the list and keeps your text. If you type a place without picking one, CrewShift looks it up when you leave the field and keeps its map position only for a clear match. A business name that you didn't type is never taken as a match. Otherwise the text is saved as you typed it, without a map position. When suggestions are off or unavailable, the field works as plain text.

Public holidays

CrewShift uses the Dutch national public holidays:

• New Year's Day (1 January)
• Easter Sunday and Easter Monday
• King's Day (27 April, or 26 April when the 27th is a Sunday)
• Liberation Day (5 May, every year)
• Ascension Day
• Whit Sunday and Whit Monday
• Christmas Day and Second Christmas Day (25 and 26 December)

Easter, Ascension and Whitsun move with the date of Easter and are worked out for each year. Other days off, such as regional or company holidays, don't count as public holidays.

• In the schedule. In Month view, Sundays and public holidays have an amber tint (see the legend). The panel next to the calendar and the day editor show the holiday's name under the date. When you add a range of days, Skip public holidays leaves these dates out. If you keep them in, the form lists the holidays the range includes.
• In pay. A day on a public holiday pays the Holiday premium on top of the day fee: the Sunday/holiday rate in the project's work rules, +50% by default. A holiday that falls on a Sunday pays the premium once. If the work rules grant premium-free Sundays and holidays, the earliest Sunday and holiday production days pay no premium, up to the share set in the work rules. Office and travel days on a holiday always pay it, see Premiums. Only the Daily + overtime pay model pays the premium. Flat-day, hourly, buyout and monthly deals have no holiday premium, see Different pay models.

Per diem

Per diem is set per day, in the day editor. Unless you saved a default, new days start without per diem.

• On a Custom project, enter the amount in Per diem (€). Save as default for new days makes it the amount every new day starts with. On a day that differs from the default, Reset to default puts it back.
• On a Fijn Weekend project the amount is fixed: €25 on production and office days, €50 on travel days. The only choice is Pay per diem on this day, on or off. It starts off on every new day.

A department or a single crew member can get a different per diem through an exception on the day. Per diem isn't negotiated in the offer. The deal memo shows the project default, and the day's own setting is what gets paid.

Removing days

Select a date in the schedule, or a range of dates, and the day panel offers Remove day or Remove days. A removed day is gone for good, so the app always asks you to confirm.

Three kinds of day can't be removed:

• an upcoming day with signed crew
• a day with logged hours
• a day that already carries a cancellation fee

The confirmation tells you how many days in your selection are protected and removes only the rest. To take an upcoming protected day off the schedule, cancel it instead. A cancellation keeps the record and any late-cancellation fee. Delete day in the day editor follows the same rule and doesn't show on a protected day.

Removing days changes the live plan, so anyone who can edit the schedule can do it. Inside a scenario, days are added and removed in the scenario and reach the plan only when you promote it.

Moving a day with signed crew

When you change the date of an upcoming day that has signed crew, CrewShift asks Reschedule this day? before saving. Crew keep their booking and are told about the new date. If someone can't make it, release them from the day. Their late-cancellation fee is measured from the original date. You can't move such a day into the past. If it already has logged hours, the hours warning from Adding shooting days comes first. How crew respond is explained in Schedule changes.

Changing a call time

When the call time of an upcoming day changes, whether on the day itself, a department exception or a crew exception, every booked crew member it affects gets a notice in their Inbox under Call time changes, plus an email. The notice shows the old and the new time. It needs no signature: crew tap Got it to clear it. Several changes in a row go out as one email once you've stopped editing for about ten minutes, and crew who are off or released that day hear nothing. After you save, a message tells you how many crew were notified.

Cancelling a day or releasing crew

Open the shooting day and tap Cancel this day…. Before you confirm, CrewShift shows each crew member's late-cancellation fee, worked out from their signed deal memo and how much notice you give. Notice counts from the date the day was first called for, even if you moved it since. When someone gets no fee, the preview says why, for example: they're paid hourly, they're on a buyout, it's a travel day, or you gave enough notice. On their own calendar, crew see a released or cancelled day with the fee when one applies, and otherwise as Paid or Not paid: paid when their deal doesn't depend on the day, such as a buyout.

• Release crew without cancelling the day. Tap Release individual crew instead, pick the people who are no longer needed and confirm. The day stays scheduled for everyone else.
• The fee becomes an invoice. Each fee turns into a draft invoice in the crew member's name. They check it and send it. It skips approval, because you agreed to the fee when you confirmed. See Late-cancellation fees. The day lists every fee with its status: Not billed, Awaiting crew invoice, Charged, Paid, Waiver proposed, Waiver declined or Waived. If billing failed for some fees, Retry billing (n) tries them again.
• Changed your mind? Reinstate day puts a cancelled day back on the schedule, and Re-add brings one released crew member back. Both drop the fee and its invoice, unless it's already paid, booked in the crew member's bookkeeping, or they attached their own invoice to it. Sort that out with them directly. Once the day has started (its date or call time has passed), you can no longer do this while a fee stands. From then on only a waiver the crew member accepts removes it, where the work rules allow one.
• Waiving a fee. If the project's work rules have Allow waiving by mutual agreement switched on, tap Propose waiver on a fee. The crew member gets the proposal in their Inbox and has to accept it before anything changes. Under the standard Fijn Weekend rules a cancellation fee can't be waived.
• Fees from a moved day. Releasing someone who can't make a new date creates a fee marked Reschedule · declined. You can always settle that one with Settle by agreement, even under Fijn Weekend. The crew member has to accept.

The calendar

The same calendar sits on your Dashboard, with all your projects, and on a project's Planning tab, with just that project.

• Month, Week, Agenda. Switch views at the top of the calendar. Month shows the whole month, Week one week from Monday to Sunday with call and wrap times, and Agenda a list of the coming four weeks, with Show 4 more weeks to look further ahead. On a phone the calendar opens on Agenda. Today jumps back to the current date. On the Dashboard there is a fourth view, Slate (below).
• Marks. Each day of a project is a mark in the project's colour with a two-letter code, so two projects in a similar colour still read apart. A solid mark is a scheduled day, a struck-out grey mark a cancelled one, and € means a cancellation fee applies to the day, also when one crew member was released from a day that goes ahead. The small shape is the day type. A night shoot also shows its last hours on the next date, as a mark with a moon in Month and at the top of that date in Week and Agenda.
• Crew per day. Week, Agenda and the panel next to the calendar show how many signed crew work each day, and No signed crew when nobody has signed yet. Crew who are off, released or still awaiting signature don't count.
• Your projects. On the Dashboard the calendar starts with a line such as "6 projects · 3 working this week" for the dates on screen, then one row per planning or active project (a wrapped or cancelled project only when it has days on screen). Projects working on screen come first, then the rest by their next day. A row says where the project stands, such as Shooting · day 3 of 12, Prep from 26 Oct or Wrapped 2 Oct, with its signed crew, its open positions while the project runs, and any schedule changes waiting for the producer's answer, such as 2 changes to answer (the producer who made the deal answers them in their Inbox). Tap the row to open the project on the selected date. Tap the line to fold the rows away; on a phone they start folded.
• Slate. On the Dashboard, Slate shows one row per project and the days as columns, from the Monday of the selected date: as many whole weeks as fit the screen, six on a computer and two on a phone. It takes the full width, with the panel below it, and the project rows above it fold away. Each day a project works is a cell in its colour with the day type shape, and days of the same type run together as a band. The number in a cell is the signed crew working that day (crew who are off, released or awaiting signature don't count, and someone on two units counts once). A number in a cell's corner counts the units on that date, a cancelled day is grey and struck through (with € when a fee applies), and a crew clash gets an orange outline on the cell and an orange warning under the date. Weekends are shaded, a line marks today and the selected date is tinted. Next to each project's name (above its row on a phone) are its open positions while it runs, schedule changes waiting for the producer's answer, and where it stands, with its next day when that is past the screen. Tap a cell for the same card as in Week and Agenda, tap a date at the top to show it in the panel, and tap a project's name to open the project on the selected date. With a keyboard, the arrow keys move between dates and projects. The project filter applies here too: a hidden project leaves the slate.
• Filters. Tap a project's coloured code in that list to hide or show its days. Shooting, Prep & wrap and Travel hide shooting days, prep and wrap (office days included) or travel, and Hide cancelled clears cancelled days away. Filters only change the calendar: the panel always lists everything on the selected date.
• Opening things. Tap a date to see its days in the panel next to the calendar. In Week and Agenda, tap a day (or a night shoot's last hours) for a card with the project, the day type and number, the date, call and wrap, the location, the signed crew and any crew clash with its reason. Open day opens the day editor and Open project the project's Planning tab on that date. On the Planning tab the card only has Open day. The panel moves to that date too. Esc or a tap outside closes the card. In Month a tap on a date shows its days in the panel. In the panel, the project name opens the project's Planning tab on that date and the arrow opens the day. Going back returns you to the same week or month.

Crew clashes

An orange warning marks a date where someone is booked twice at the same time: two bookings whose hours overlap, on two projects or on two units of one project, including a night shoot that runs past midnight into a booking on the next date. Two bookings of different projects on one date where a call or wrap time is missing are flagged too, because they can't be checked. A clash across two dates shows on both. Bookings awaiting signature count too. Select the date and the panel names the person, lists each booking with its times and says why it clashes. Tap a booking to open that day and sort it out. The check compares call and wrap times in real hours (a night when the clocks change counts its extra or missing hour). It doesn't check rest between jobs or each project's work rules.

The Dashboard checks every project you own or co-produce. A project's Planning tab shows the clashes that involve that project, checked against those same projects for the dates on screen; as a co-producer you only ever see projects you co-produce. Crew with the Planning right see, on the Planning tab, the clashes inside the project they plan (within their departments, or the whole team when they plan for all), such as one person on two units at overlapping times. They see signed bookings only, nothing about other projects, and can't open the days from there.

Subscribe in your calendar app

Tap the calendar icon to the right of Production calendar on the Dashboard (Subscribe in calendar app on a wider screen) to see your projects' days in Apple Calendar, Google Calendar or Outlook. Tap Create link. Add to Apple Calendar adds it straight away, and Copy link copies it for another app: in Google Calendar on a computer (calendar.google.com) choose Other calendars → From URL, in Outlook Add calendar → Subscribe from web, and paste the link. Google then shows it on your phone too. On an iPhone you can also paste it under Settings → Apps → Calendar → Calendar Accounts → Add Account → Other → Add Subscribed Calendar. Add the link to every app you want it in while CrewShift still shows it. Every day of the projects you produce or co-produce shows up as an event such as "ZW · Shooting day 3A · Zoutwater", from call to wrap, with the location, how many crew have signed and how many are still awaiting signature, and a link to the day in CrewShift. A night shoot ends on the next morning, a day without both a call and a wrap time is an all-day event, and cancelled days are left out. Calendar apps check for changes on their own schedule: Apple about every hour, Google and Outlook can take up to a day, so check CrewShift for last-minute changes. The events are in the language set in your Profile.

Anyone with the link sees every day of all your projects, up to a year ahead, with locations, so keep it to yourself. CrewShift shows the link only once: to add another app later, use the link you kept. If the link got out, tap Create new link. The old link then stops working in every app, and those calendars keep showing their last events without updating, so remove the old calendar from each app and add the new link. Turn off stops the link altogether. Remove the calendar from your calendar app as well, as most apps keep the last events they fetched.

Day types

Each day has a type, shown by a small shape on the calendar:

The type decides how the day is paid. Shooting, prep and wrap are production days and use the full day-fee and overtime model. An office day pays a flat fee and tracks no hours. Travel days are paid on the time spent travelling, at their own travel rates.

A shooting day also has a Day length. Set it on the day, or override it for a department or a crew member who works differently. An hourly day pays the hours actually worked instead of a day fee, see Hourly pay.

The Day category also decides billing. Production days (prep, shooting and wrap alike) use crew-days, and office and travel days are free. See Crew-day credits.

Work rules

Every project runs on a set of work rules: base hours, overtime, premiums, travel pay and late-cancellation terms. They turn clocked hours into pay. Per diem is set on the days themselves, see Per diem. Settle them before you send the first deal memo, because a signed deal memo locks them. See Work rules and How pay is calculated.

Project info package

The info package is the overview of your production for someone deciding whether to take the job. It covers a logline, a short description, genre and format, a Budget band instead of an exact figure, the city crew are expected to travel from, and a content and safety checklist. Everything is optional, so fill in what you have.

Who is attached is a list you put together yourself. Nobody is added automatically. Pick confirmed crew from the project, or type a role and name for someone who isn't on CrewShift, such as a director or DP you've already secured. An entry is kept only when it has both a role and a name.

Links point to your own files: the script on your Drive, a lookbook, a mood board, a schedule. CrewShift stores no files. It only controls when a link is revealed, and once someone has opened a URL you can't take it back. Every link sits at one of two stages:

• During negotiation: what you're happy to share while a deal is still being discussed, such as mood boards and lookbooks.
• After the deal memo is signed: stays locked until the deal memo is signed. The script, the sides and the detailed schedule normally go here.

Picking a link type sets the usual stage, and you can change it. A link opens outside CrewShift, in a new tab or the phone's browser. CrewShift has no NDA step. Keep confidential material behind After the deal memo is signed and handle an NDA outside the app.

The package starts as a Draft and stays private until you Publish it. Publishing needs at least one field or one link filled in, so an empty draft can't go out by accident. Unpublish takes it back to a draft at any time.

Once it's published, everyone you have an open negotiation with sees a summary on the offer in their Inbox, and your confirmed crew get the full version on the project's Planning tab. Visibility follows the negotiation. If one ends without a booking (declined, cancelled or expired), the package and its links disappear from that person's app. A URL they already opened stays reachable on your own storage, though. What crew see is described in What the producer shares about the production.

Scenarios

A scenario is a copy of the plan where you try out a different schedule or team without touching the live plan, called Main. You compare its cost in the Scenarios section on the Planning tab and promote the changes you want to Main. Creating, comparing, promoting and deleting scenarios is explained in Scenarios.