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ShootBuddy · For unit publicists and photo teams
Note the scenes you want as you read the script, then import the one-liner. See what your plan misses while there's still time to act.
A 20-30 minute call with our team, then free access to a demo production to explore in your own time.
Web-based, nothing to install · From the team behind Image Approvals, trusted on 120+ productions
How stills get planned today
When the unit wraps, whatever you captured is what the campaign has to work with: the poster, EPK, social, festival deck and press. Planning by hand puts both the budget and that material at risk.
Without a reliable way to find the days that matter most, the budget goes on days that look busy. It's spent, and the key moments still aren't covered.
A scene moves, nobody catches it and the photographer turns up on the old day. You've paid for a day that missed the shot, and they hear “you should have been here yesterday” again.
You noted the scenes that matter while reading the script. When the one-liner arrives, finding each one by hand and deciding which still count is another evening gone.
Cross-checking PDFs, updating spreadsheets and rewriting briefs is repetitive, manual work. That time should go on the creative and strategic work that moves a campaign forward.
The steps you already take, in one place instead of a spreadsheet, an inbox and somebody's memory.
As you read the script, note the scenes you want in ShootBuddy, choose which to track and put them in priority order. No schedule needed yet.
Upload the PDF as it arrived. ShootBuddy reads scenes, cast, days and locations, and syncs your script notes to their scenes in one click.
Put photographers on the days that earn them, within your budget. Principals and key moments the plan misses are flagged while there's time to add a day.
Every change that touches your plan is listed for you, so you adjust in minutes instead of comparing two PDFs line by line.
Script notes
You already read the script with the campaign in mind. Now the scenes you spot go straight into ShootBuddy: add a note, choose whether to track the scene and give it a priority.
There's no schedule yet, and you don't need one. When the one-liner arrives, import it and sync your notes with one click. Every scene you noted is tracked straight away, with your notes and priority labels attached.
The script itself never goes into ShootBuddy. You only type your notes.
Script notes
Thornfield Manor · Episode 1
Elena and Marcus meet. Poster candidate.
The wedding, full cast. Group shot.
Rooftop chase. EPK and social.
Then the one-liner arrives
Import the PDF and your notes find their scenes. Everything below works from that one upload.
No script notes? Start here. The one-liner on its own builds the whole plan.
The planning board
Not the forty days in the schedule. The handful that actually deliver the images the campaign will live on.
Every scene, day, cast member and location is searchable, and the scenes from your script notes are already tracked, in your priority order. Flag a key person's first day on set so a guest star's debut doesn't go past you, and mark closed sets and VFX scenes to work around.
Ask the board
episode 3 · night scenes · Location B · cast 1, 3 and 5 together
That specific. One filter bar, no spreadsheet.
When the budget buys eight photographer days out of forty, you want the eight with the most principal cast on them, not the biggest crowd. The days-out-of-days view sorts every day by the cast on it, filtered to the faces the campaign is built on.
It's also how you find the group shot: search for a cast combination and spot the rare day the right people are on set together.
Coverage gaps
Live, at any point in the shoot, rather than reconstructed from memory the week after wrap. The cast view splits everyone in the schedule into the people your plan photographs and the people it currently doesn't, across unit, gallery, key art, EPK and social.
A gap is cheap to fix on a Tuesday and impossible to fix after wrap.
The same summary breaks coverage down by episode: how many shoot days each one has, how many of those carry photography, and what type. On a series where one day serves three episodes, that's very hard to hold in a spreadsheet, and it's how an episode ends up with nothing.
Crew & budget
Put photographers on days and the totals add up as you go: how many days, how many of them nights or splits, and who is covering what. Day, night and split shoots price differently, so you can see exactly what's driving the spend.
Then there's the directory. It's invitation only, and every photographer in it has been reviewed by Image Approvals before being listed, so you're choosing from people whose work we know. Tell it what the shoot needs and a strong local gets considered before a flight and two hotel nights do.
When the next one-liner arrives, ShootBuddy compares it with the version you planned against and lists what changed, starting with the changes that hit days you had covered.
You read a short summary of what it means for your plan instead of forty pages, and tell the photographer while there's still time to rebook rather than pay for a wasted day.
The quickest way to judge it is to see it working. In a 20-30 minute call, one of our team takes you through ShootBuddy on a demo production, from script notes to the change report.
Coverage planning is hard because it spans three roles who each hold a third of the picture. ShootBuddy gives all three the same view. The plan stays yours: your publicist runs it, with the evidence to back their calls.
Photo manager
Unit publicist
Head of operations
Access follows the job too: admin, standard, scheduler and read-only levels, and outside collaborators are invited into a single production with an end date, so a freelancer's access closes when the engagement does.
Unreleased schedules are exactly what a studio security review cares about. The script itself never goes into ShootBuddy, only your notes and the one-liner. The essentials are below, and we can supply a full security and data-protection pack for companies that need formal assurance.
UK-hosted and encrypted
AWS London, encrypted in transit and at rest, with encrypted daily backups.
Named accounts with end dates
Outside collaborators get an expiry up front, so access lapses when the engagement does.
AI reads it, it never learns from it
AI pulls the schedule out of your PDF under business terms. Your material never trains a model.
Everything is logged
Logins, permission changes and deletions are recorded, so “who had access?” has an answer.
The walkthrough
One of our team takes you through it on a demo production, from the first script notes to the change report, and answers the questions that matter for your shows.
In a 20-30 minute call, we'll show you how ShootBuddy plans a production from the first script notes to the last schedule change. From the team behind Image Approvals, trusted on 120+ film and TV productions.
Book a walkthrough