Post-Production
From wrap to delivery, tracked.
Post is where productions quietly overrun, because the work is invisible. There's no call sheet, no unit, no obvious daily progress — just a list of things that are nearly done for several months.
What is post-production software?
Post-production software tracks the work between wrap and delivery — editorial, sound, visual effects, colour, and the deliverables each distributor or platform requires. It records task status, ownership and deadlines, and manages the QC process that confirms deliverables meet specification.
What you get
A board per discipline
Editorial, sound, VFX, colour and titles as separate workstreams, each task carrying status, priority, an owner and a due date. They run in parallel and block each other, so one shared list is the wrong shape.
Deliverables with the spec attached
Title, format, resolution, frame rate, codec, due date, and the file when it exists. The spec travels with the deliverable rather than living in the email that commissioned it.
QC as a record, not a reply
Pass, fail or conditional against a specific deliverable, with each issue carrying its own timecode, description and severity. A rejection becomes a tracked item you can work through.
QC that knows what it is checking
A QC report has to be raised against a deliverable in the same project, so reports cannot drift onto the wrong cut.
VFX in the same project
The [VFX shot tracker](/vfx-management-software) sits alongside, so editorial can see shot status without asking the supervisor.
What is late, across everything
Due dates on tasks and deliverables together, so the thing blocking delivery is visible before the week it is due.
Why post overruns
Production has natural forcing functions. The unit is booked, the location is booked, the cast is booked — the day happens whether you're ready or not.
Post has none of that. Work can slip a week without anything visibly breaking, and it does, repeatedly, until the delivery date arrives and everything is urgent simultaneously. The failure isn't laziness; it's the absence of a mechanism that makes slippage visible early.
The deliverables list nobody builds
Deliverables are usually assembled in the final weeks, from contracts, from memory, and from a distributor's spec document somebody has to find.
Built at the start instead, it becomes a checklist that shapes the work — you know you need a textless master, an M&E track, closed captions in two formats and a specific colour space, and you plan the schedule around producing them rather than discovering them.
- Picture masters — format, resolution, colour space, frame rate
- Audio — mix stems, M&E track, loudness spec
- Textless elements and localisation masters
- Captions and subtitles, per required language and format
- Marketing materials — trailers, stills, key art
- Documentation — QC report, chain of title, music cue sheet
QC is a process, not an event
A QC failure two days before delivery is a crisis. The same failure found six weeks earlier is a task.
Tracking QC as a recorded pass or fail against each deliverable — with the specific issues logged — means failures are visible items with owners rather than emails that get read and forgotten.
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
- What does post-production include?
- Editorial, sound design and mix, visual effects, colour grade, titles and graphics, and the creation and QC of every deliverable a distributor or platform requires.
- Why does post-production overrun so often?
- Because it lacks the forcing functions production has. A booked unit and location make a shoot day happen; post work can slip quietly for weeks with nothing visibly breaking, until the delivery date makes everything urgent at once.
- What are deliverables?
- The specific files and documents a distributor or platform requires — picture masters, audio stems, M&E tracks, textless elements, captions, marketing materials and documentation like QC reports and music cue sheets. Requirements vary per platform.
- What is an M&E track?
- Music and Effects — a mix containing everything except dialogue, so the production can be dubbed into other languages. It's a standard deliverable and expensive to create retroactively if not planned for.
- When should the deliverables list be built?
- At the start, not the end. Built early it shapes the post schedule; built late it becomes a series of discoveries under deadline pressure.
- Is it free?
- Yes, on the free tier alongside the rest of the production chain.
Terms explained
- Conform
- Conform is the process of rebuilding the locked edit at full quality, relinking the offline edit's decisions to the original camera media. The result is the sequence that goes to colour grading and final delivery.
- Picture lock
- Picture lock is the point at which the edit is final and no further changes to shot selection or timing will be made. It is a formal gate rather than an opinion, because sound design, score, visual effects and colour all work to a fixed timeline that a later change invalidates.
- Assembly
- An assembly is the first edit of a film, containing every scene in script order and usually the preferred take of each shot, with no attempt at pacing. It is typically completed shortly after principal photography ends and is far longer than the final film.
- Dailies
- Dailies are the footage shot on a given day, processed and made available for review shortly afterwards — traditionally the following morning, which is where the name comes from. They are watched to confirm that what was shot is usable before the unit loses access to the location.
Get the templates and guides
Call sheets, breakdown sheets and DOOD grids as downloadable files, plus a note when we publish something new.
No spam, and unsubscribe from anything we send. See how we handle your address in the privacy policy.
Make post visible.
Tasks, deliverables and QC in one place. Free to start.