Episodes help you organize television and other episodic projects. You can create episodes in your project, assign them to scripts and breakdowns, and then see each episode’s work in the Day Out of Days. This is especially useful when you’re block shooting several episodes together.
How Episodes Work
Episodes belong to a project, so every script and schedule in the project can use the same list of episodes. You can assign episodes to:
- Scripts: When you create a schedule from a script, every breakdown from that script is assigned the script’s episodes automatically
- Breakdowns: Assign or change episodes on individual strips at any time
A script or breakdown can belong to more than one episode, for example a scene that’s shared between two episodes.
Managing Episodes
You can open the episode manager in any of these ways:
- On the Projects page, right-click a project’s card and choose “Manage episodes”
- On the Projects page, select one project and click “Manage Episodes” in the menu bar
- On a project’s page, click “Manage Episodes” in the menu bar
- Inside a schedule, click the “Manage” menu and select “Episodes…”, or press Shift + Ctrl/Cmd + P
Note: The “Manage Episodes” buttons on the Projects page and the project page are only available to the project’s creator.
In the episode manager you can:
- Create an episode: Click “Create an episode”, then type the episode’s name, such as “101” or “Episode 1 – Pilot”
- Rename an episode: Edit its name. Changes are saved automatically.
- Delete an episode: Click the remove button next to it and confirm
Assigning Episodes to a Script
To assign episodes to a script:
- Go to the Scripts page
- Open the script’s manager by right-clicking its card and choosing “Manage script”
- In the Episodes field, choose one or more episodes from the list
To create a new episode on the spot, type its name in the Episodes field and press Enter. To remove an episode, click the “x” next to its name.
A script’s episodes are shown on its card on the Scripts page, and in the script list when you create a new schedule, so it’s easy to pick the right scripts.
Tip: Assign episodes to your scripts before you create a schedule from them. That way every breakdown is tagged with the right episode from the start.
Assigning Episodes to Breakdowns
To assign episodes to strips in a schedule:
- Select one or more strips on the board
- In the breakdown pane, find the Episode field
- Choose one or more episodes from the list, or type a new episode’s name and press Enter to create it
If you selected more than one strip, the episodes are applied to all of them. To remove an episode from a strip, click the “x” next to its name.
Episodes in the Day Out of Days
When your project has two or more episodes, an episode dropdown appears in the Day Out of Days menu bar. Use it to choose how episodes are shown:
- Merged Episodes: One row for each element, counting their work across every episode. This is the standard Day Out of Days.
- All Episodes: A separate row for each element in each episode it appears in, labeled with the episode name. This shows you at a glance which days an actor works on each episode.
- A single episode: Only the work for the episode you choose
The dropdown is available once your board has day breaks. See Day Out of Days Overview for more about the Day Out of Days.
Episodes in Printing and Variables
- Printing the Day Out of Days: Use the “Limit to episode” option on the Dood tab of the print panel to print a single episode
- Breakdown sheets: Each printed breakdown sheet shows the scene’s episodes
- Variables: Use {project_episodes} to show all of the project’s episodes, or {breakdown_episodes} to show a strip’s episodes, in your banners and print headers. See Using Variables.
See Printing Schedules for more about the print options.
Episodes make it easy to plan block shoots and cross-boarded schedules, giving you and your team a clear view of each episode’s work while still scheduling them all together.
