AI Dude can build and restructure your shooting schedule from the Stripboard — boarding scenes, setting up days and resources, checking for conflicts, and exporting the result. This article covers what it can and cannot change. For the procedure, see Reorder scenes with AI Dude.
Note: This operation uses Dude Coins. See What are Dude Coins and Plans, Dude Coins & Pricing.
Before you begin
What AI Dude can change
Building and boarding
Build the whole schedule in one request — units, locations, estimates, story days, sorting, and day breaks together.
Sort and reboard scenes by location, INT/EXT, cast, time of day, or a rule you describe. When you do not specify a rule, AI Dude groups by shooting location, then INT/EXT, then Day/Night.
Move scenes, swap shooting days, or shift a range of scenes.
Send scenes to the Boneyard and bring them back.
Reset the schedule to the original script order.
Resources, days, and limits
Estimate scene durations using production-type presets — feature, blockbuster, TV single-cam, or TV multi-cam. Each preset assumes a different shooting pace per page, and AI Dude adjusts for scene complexity on top of it.
Create shooting units and locations, assign scenes to them, or have AI Dude group them.
Label in-story days chronologically across the whole script.
Set day breaks using start dates, shoot days, holidays, page or hour limits, and banners. Unless you say otherwise, AI Dude schedules Monday through Friday.
Factor in cast availability, blackout dates, and calendars from files you upload to the chat.
Conflicts and restrictions
Reboard scenes around unavailable dates to clear cast and location conflicts.
Record and display active cast or location unavailability restrictions.
Customization and output
Choose which tag categories appear on the Stripboard and in its columns.
Export your schedule to PDF, Excel, or Movie Magic Scheduling.
Requests that only report
Some requests return findings and change nothing in your schedule:
Analyze the schedule for day balance, cast workloads, and scene complexity.
Show who has the most hold days — cast waiting between their scenes.
Scan for scheduling conflicts. AI Dude runs eight checks, described below.
View the Day Out of Days report to track cast work, hold, and span days.
Compare schedule revisions to see what changed and whether reconciliation is needed.
Use these before you commit to a restructure. To act on what they find, send a separate request.
The eight conflict checks
Two checks compare your schedule against dates marked unavailable. The other six are analytical — they flag patterns that cost you time or money, not hard clashes.
Availability clashes
Tag unavailability — a tag is scheduled on a date it is marked unavailable.
Location unavailability — a location is scheduled on a date it is marked unavailable.
An exact date match is reported as a conflict. A near miss of one day either side is reported as a warning, so you can see when a shoot sits right up against an unavailable date.
Caution: These two checks need shoot dates on your day breaks. With no dates, AI Dude cannot run them at all. With dates on only some days, scenes on the undated days are skipped. A clean result on an undated schedule does not mean there are no clashes. See Edit or remove day breaks.
Analytical checks
Turnaround — a day ends on a night scene and the next day opens on a day or twilight scene. Skipped when two or more calendar days separate the two shooting days, so weekends and holidays do not raise it.
Overtime — a day runs past the effective shooting time of a standard crew day. AI Dude also flags days that are approaching the limit.
Company moves — a cast member works at more than one location on the same day. This is not an error; company moves are normal. The check tells you where they are so you can decide whether they are worth it.
Location inefficiency — one location is used on non-consecutive shooting days, meaning you return to it after leaving.
Day/night zigzag — a single day alternates between day and night scenes more than once, which costs relighting time.
Missing data — scenes with no estimation, no location, or no unit. Reported as counts, so you know how much of the schedule is still unset.
Everything is reversible
AI Dude backs up your project before it makes a structural change, and groups every change from one request together. Ask it to undo and it restores that whole group — so you can roll back any recent request, not only the last one.
Before it restores anything, AI Dude shows you what the rollback will affect and waits for you to confirm.
Note: Backups are kept for seven days. After that the change can no longer be undone this way.
Previewing a reorder
For a reorder, AI Dude can show you the proposed board before anything moves. The preview is held for one hour — if you come back to it later, ask AI Dude to run it again rather than confirming a stale result.
What AI Dude does not touch
Locked scenes and locked day breaks. Anything pinned in place stays in place. See Lock a scene or day break in place.
Your breakdown tagging. Rescheduling a scene does not change the elements tagged inside it. AI Dude can change which tag categories the Stripboard displays, but that is a display setting, not your tag data.
Budgeting. Schedule changes do not propagate to your budget.
Scenes unrelated to your request.
Other projects. AI Dude works only in the project you have open.
How it handles your existing schedule
Day breaks and banners stay in place unless your request is to change them.
Scene metadata and unit assignments are preserved.
AI Dude asks for clarification when a request is ambiguous.
It rebuilds the schedule from scratch only when you ask it to build the whole shooting schedule.
Voice input
Select the microphone icon in the chat panel to give a scheduling request by voice. AI Dude converts speech to text and handles it the same way as a typed request.
Good to know
Each project has its own AI Dude conversation.
Closing the chat panel keeps the conversation — it is there when you come back.
AI Dude can also help in the Script Editor, Breakdown & Summary, VFX Breakdown, and Projects.