Scheduling / Budgeting -- What's everyone using?
- Thread starter Drew Ott
- Start date
adamrahn
Well-known member
I use a few laminated weekly and monthly calendars on my wall (in addition to several Google Calendars), and the occasional spreadsheet for scheduling stuff, and for budgeting I almost exclusively use spreadsheets. Once you find a good template, or can create one, updating budget stuff is a breeze. Other than having someone else do it for me I haven't found a better way. Side note: I haven't personally used Quickbooks or a similar service, but I know a lot of people swear by those.
morgan_moore
Major Contributor
Google sheets and slides.. three for a larger project
2016_03_15_MyClient_Project_Internal
internal calculations - not shared with client
2016_03_15_MyClient_Project_Client
budget and call sheets - shared with client, comments allowed
2016_03_15_MyClient_Projet_StoryBoard
story board with images - shared with client, comments allowed.
2016_03_15_MyClient_Project_Internal
internal calculations - not shared with client
2016_03_15_MyClient_Project_Client
budget and call sheets - shared with client, comments allowed
2016_03_15_MyClient_Projet_StoryBoard
story board with images - shared with client, comments allowed.
El Director
Veteran
I use Movie Magic. I could never go back to spreadsheets again after using it
AndreeOnline
Veteran
I realise everyone's needs are very different, but I've been happy with Freshbooks. It isn't specialised for movie making in any way, but I think it's nice to have a proper tool to manage everything from clients/contacts, receipts, cost of doing business and so on. It's also easy to generate professional looking estimates that split time based tasks from items that come with a fixed price. Once I had added my equipment and figured out my pricing for things like editing/grading, 2D animation, 3D animation and so on—creating an invoice is totally effortless and almost fun.
I also like that a solution like this allows me to send most things out digitally and it keeps track of if the client has seen the estimate and if it has been accepted. And there's an app of course, if you need to have a time tracker at the ready.
But like I said, this isn't so much about film budgeting per se, but more about finding a tool that works for you when running a (small in my case) business.
I think I might be answering another question here, and not what the OP meant, but maybe someone is looking for something like what I'm describing and gets a tip.
I also like that a solution like this allows me to send most things out digitally and it keeps track of if the client has seen the estimate and if it has been accepted. And there's an app of course, if you need to have a time tracker at the ready.
But like I said, this isn't so much about film budgeting per se, but more about finding a tool that works for you when running a (small in my case) business.
I think I might be answering another question here, and not what the OP meant, but maybe someone is looking for something like what I'm describing and gets a tip.