Most production software plans the shoot and stops. Production Engine estimates on your own rate card, sends the call sheet, captures what the day actually cost, then actualizes, bills, collects, and closes the job in the same system.
Know what a job made while you can still do something about it.
PLANS FROM $149/MONTH · NO CARD FOR THE TRIAL
Day 2 crew came in 12% over plan, second-meal penalties on three roles. Captured on the day, before the invoices arrive.
Planning tools cover the first stage and hand you a spreadsheet for the rest. Each capability below has its own page naming exactly what implements it.
Everything that has to be true before the truck rolls.
What the day actually cost, captured while the day is still running.
Bid, budget, commit, pay, actualize, collect, close.
Describe the job and get structured line items, assumptions, and scenario totals priced against your company's own rates. Unmatched lines stay visible instead of quietly becoming policy.
Read the spec →Crew and cast calls, run of day, meals, vehicles, weather and sun times, hospital and emergency contacts. Sent to a derived recipient list with delivery tracked per person.
Read the spec →Daily production reports hold setups, company moves, set issues, and weather events. Overage becomes a number while the crew is still standing there.
Read the spec →Actualization against budget, billing readiness checks, vendor and payroll closeouts, collections and aging, archive verification, and an explicit close.
Read the spec →Standard option approved at 4:12pm. The selected scenario creates the initial project and budget without re-keying the line totals.
Delivered to 24 recipients. Crew imported from the project, so the rates on this sheet are the rates the budget is tracking.
Estimate on your rate card and issue client options that stay attached to the math.
One recorded client decision creates the project and its initial budget.
Call sheets go out; hot costs, set issues, and weather come back the same day.
Actualize, check billing readiness, close out vendors and payroll, then collect.
The estimator is open, free, and does not need an account.
They are a strong planning suite and the better buy for script-originated work: breakdown, stripboards, and sides are theirs, and we do not have them. We wrote the comparison with that section first.
The difference worth evaluating is what happens after the plan: committed money, the day's real cost, payroll, actualization, and collections.
Read the comparisonKeep the tools that work. Most teams start with one boundary (rate card, estimate, client option, approved budget) and expand only when that control has earned its place on live work.
That is why the producer stays in control. Structured line items and deterministic totals support judgment; they do not replace scope decisions.
Treat the AI output as a reviewable draft. Your rate card, explicit assumptions, deterministic math, and producer approval are the controls that make it useful. Where the rate card has no match, the gap is shown rather than filled with an invented number.
The trial is free and the test is small: run one brief you have already priced. If the estimate, the budget, and the close do not hold up against how you actually work, you have lost an afternoon.
No. The stages work on their own. Plenty of teams run estimates and budgets here while their planning stays where it is, then move the shoot day across once the money layer is trusted.
Existing work remains readable after cancellation. Project-based businesses churn and return; that is normal, and holding data hostage is not a feature.
Production Engine was built inside active commercial production, around the decisions producers make before, during, and after a shoot. The parts that make money visible (commitments, hot costs, actualization, collections) exist because the person building it was losing that money first.
Companies that want hands-on help moving their rate card and historical estimates across can work with us directly through the guided implementation program.
Start free with a brief you have already priced. If the estimate, the budget, and the close do not hold up against how you actually work, you have lost an afternoon.
PLANS FROM $149/MONTH · EXISTING WORK STAYS READABLE AFTER CANCELLATION