The Screencake workflow
An idea becomes a beat. A beat becomes a scene. Scenes become shots, shooting days, and a record for the people who come next.
Start at any point, and return to rewriting whenever you need. In the app, Development → Prep → Scheduling → Shooting → Wrap brings relevant tools forward. Your chosen craft helps arrange them; your role and subscription still determine access.
01 / Development
A spark with somewhere to land.
A character. An ending. A person taking a very large cake on a very late bus. Start with what you have: a new script, a template, an episode, or a draft you already wrote.
Explore story developmentFree desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
02 / Development
A story plan connected to your scenes.
Arrange beats into acts, then promote a beat into a linked scene. Follow characters, plot threads and chronology while you work out why anyone brought twelve candles.
Explore story developmentFree desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio. Editable character profiles: Production and Studio.
03 / Development
Pages your next steps can build on.
Get the scene down. Formatting, autocomplete and scene navigation take care of the mechanics. Your characters, locations and scenes remain the source for the work ahead.
Explore story developmentFree desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
04 / Development
A stronger draft, with its history intact.
Hear the line out loud. Try the other one. Check pacing and character presence, bring in a reader, and compare what changed. You can always come back for another pass.
Explore table readListening and alternate lines: Free desktop. Shared feedback and cloud version history: Writers Room and above.
05 / Prep
Pictures, breakdowns, and stable references.
Find the shots inside the scene. Add frames, draw, annotate and test the rhythm with an animatic. Tag what the crew will need and issue numbered revisions when the pages need to hold still.
Explore storyboardsProduction and Studio. Production tools require an account.
06 / Scheduling
A shooting plan with people and paperwork attached.
Bring cast, crew, locations and availability into the schedule. Build shoot days, track tasks, coordinate travel and files, and connect budget quantities to the work you plan.
Explore production planningProduction and Studio. Production tools require an account. Budget actuals, fringes, scenarios, currencies and lock: Studio.
07 / Shooting
A shared plan, and a record of what happened.
Send call sheets and sides, track confirmations, and keep the crew up to date. Mark coverage, complete shots, log continuity and takes, and collect the hours behind the day.
Explore on set and wrapProduction and Studio. Production tools require an account.
08 / Wrap
The next person has what they need.
Carry the day’s records forward: takes for the editor, credits for the crew, approved hours and budget actuals for the office, and shared files with timecoded review notes.
Explore on set and wrapProduction and Studio. Production tools require an account. Budget actuals: Studio.
Co-writing, anchored feedback, roles and guest review can help at any point. Bring in the people the work needs, when it needs them.
Keep everyone in the same story →Making a two-column AV script? That’s an alternative workflow for picture, sound and timing, with sharing and review. It does not use screenplay beat boards, breakdowns or stripboards.
Explore AV scripts →Writers Room includes up to 10 collaborators; Production includes 25. Studio includes unlimited collaborators. Only the owner pays.
Find your plan →Cloud AI is off until you turn it on. Nothing you write is sent to an AI service unless you ask, and it never trains one. Natural voices and scene search run on your device.
Optional writing and storyboard help uses credits, with feature and plan limits.
How optional AI works →Write offline in the desktop app. Import and export Final Draft and Fountain; export PDF and Word. Sharing, encryption and production tools have their own online requirements and limits.
Read the offline limits →The full inventory
Type INT. and you have a scene heading. A name in caps and Enter puts you in dialogue; an open parenthesis makes a parenthetical. Tab cycles the element when the guess is wrong.
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Scene headings, character names, and transitions you have used before are suggested as you type. Enter accepts; keep typing to ignore.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Hide the surrounding controls while you write. Use the same shortcut to show them again.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
The line you are writing stays put and the page moves under it.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Inline styles that never change pagination, carried through PDF, Final Draft, Fountain, and Word.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
⌘F searches the whole script with matches highlighted as you type. Replace one or all in a single undo.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Press play and the script is read aloud, a distinct voice per character, the current line marked on the page. Use your computer's voices, or turn on natural voices: a one-time download that runs on your machine.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Rename a character across every cue, or a location across every slugline, in one undo. Extensions like (V.O.) stay intact.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Keep several versions of a line and step through them with ⌘⌥] and ⌘⌥[. Only the current one prints.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Two characters talking at once, side by side on the page. It paginates as dual dialogue and survives the trip to PDF and Final Draft.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Every slug line in a rail. Jump to any scene, or drag one to move the whole scene in one undo.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Search for commands and scenes from the keyboard.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Use keyboard shortcuts to set element types, move between scenes, and open commands. The shortcut reference shows the keys for your device.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Work out the story before the pages exist: beats on lanes for each act, colored and rearranged by hand, promoted into real scenes when ready.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Each scene appears as a card with its summary and length. Edit the summary or drag the card to move the scene.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Acts, sequences and scenes as one indented list, with the story's own order beside the script's, so a flashback is structure you can see.
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Name the plot lines, give each a color, and tag the scenes that carry them. A thread that goes quiet for thirty pages becomes visible.
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The shape of the script: scene lengths in eighths, day and night runs, returning locations, and how long a character has been off the page.
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Omit a scene and its number stays, marked OMITTED, so nothing downstream renumbers. Export only the revised pages when a draft goes out.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Compare action and dialogue, words per character, and scene lengths in eighths of a page.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Co-writers type in the same script at the same time, with live cursors so you can see who is where.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Notes anchor to specific lines, thread into conversations, and resolve when addressed.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Mention a collaborator in a note and they get an email with the line and a link straight to it.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Owner, admin, writer, editor, producer, and reader, scoped to workspaces and productions. A reader on one production sees nothing of another.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Keep writing in an already available script while offline; edits sync when connected again. Invites, delivery and server-backed production tools need a connection. See the offline limits before you travel.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Send a producer or reader a link and they read the script in their browser, page-accurate, without an account. Comment links let them leave notes under their own name; add a passcode or revoke the link anytime.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Name the recipient when you make the link and their name is stamped on every page they see, print, or download. Each link counts its views and downloads.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Connect a workspace to a channel and comments, call sheets and script changes post there. On the paid plans.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Screencake captures versions about hourly while you write. Save a named version at any time. Restoring a version keeps the existing history.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Pick any version and see what changed since, on the real page: additions tinted green, deletions struck through in red.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Compare scenes across saved drafts to see when each scene appeared or changed.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Issue revisions in the standard colors, from white through cherry. Changed blocks have margin asterisks on screen and in the PDF.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Lock pages and numbers hold still: new material spills onto 104A instead of renumbering the script.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Select the cake box and tag it as a prop. Fourteen categories, tints you can toggle, and nothing prints.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Every tag tallied by category with the scenes it appears in, exported as a CSV a props master can work from.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Select scenes to export sides as PDF. Plan shots in the inspector, attach storyboard frames, and print shot lists or storyboards.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
A shoot day is a date, a location, and scene picks. The sheet gathers cast, props, and shots from the script. One-page PDF, shareable by guest link.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Filter the scene navigator by character, location, time of day, or tag, then turn the result into sides.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Scenes as strips in industry colors, dragged onto shoot-day columns. The days feed the call sheets.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
See the days each cast member works and their total work days. Print or share the report.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
A library of real places — address, coordinates, pictures, tags and the sets each one stands in for — reused across every production in the workspace.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Every character with the actor playing them, their agency and contact details, availability, and the cast list in order.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
To-dos assigned to crew with a due date, pinned to a scene or a shoot day, and listed on your dashboard.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Prep, shoot and post phases, milestones, crew off periods and units, on the schedule page and in your calendar feed.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Record the days someone can't shoot. Any day that needs them is flagged, and Suggest days steers around their blackouts.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Build a top sheet with schedule-linked quantities on Production. Studio adds the cost report, fringes, scenarios, currencies, a lock and the read API.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account. Actuals, fringes, scenarios, currencies and lock: Studio.
Number scenes in both margins the industry way. Numbers lock to their scenes: a scene added after 12 becomes 12A, and a deleted scene leaves its gap.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Local Mode never needs the network. Natural voices are the one download you can choose, and they work offline once on the machine.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Opt in per script to encrypt its content before sync. Exports happen on your device; server-generated previews and production tools have limits. Keep your recovery key safe.
Writers Room, Production and Studio. Account and online access needed for sharing.
Protect your account with an authenticator app or a passkey. Keep account recovery codes for use if you lose access to your second factor.
Available to account holders; workspace policies depend on plan.
Workspace owners can require collaborators to use two-factor authentication.
Available to account holders; workspace policies depend on plan.
Import and export Final Draft files with screenplay elements and scene numbers.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Plain text in, plain text out. Your script stays readable in any editor.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
US Letter or A4, 1.5in left margin, 12pt Courier, 54 or 58 lines to the page. The PDF paginates exactly as the editor does.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Include the title, credit, author, draft date, and contact details in PDF, Fountain, and Final Draft exports.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Real Word styles per element with screenplay indents and the title page. Export-only; Word paginates with its own rules.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Import the file you exported and you get the same script back, scene numbers included.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Start a screenplay, import a draft, use a template, or organize episodes in a project.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Develop the people behind the character cues, with editable profiles connected to the screenplay. Existing profiles can be read in Reading Mode.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Draw on storyboard frames, add annotations, reorder shots, set holds and play a timed animatic.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Organize the crew roster and departmental contacts with access controls.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Version and distribute files, coordinate travel, and publish travel details to the production calendar.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Send call sheets, track recipient confirmations, and distribute current paperwork.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Mark coverage on the lined script, complete planned shots and review the daily progress report.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Log take details and circled selections, with continuity notes and references for each scene.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Communicate with the crew and collect hours for approval and reporting.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Export take records and circled keepers for the editor as ALE or CSV.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Prepare ordered crew credits and review production progress.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Export approved hours as CSV and share files with timecoded notes. Time cards estimate costs; they are not payroll.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Estimate the production’s footprint from recorded activity and include the report with wrap records.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
An alternative two-column picture/sound workflow with runtime totals. AV scripts support sharing and review, but not screenplay beat boards, breakdowns or stripboards.
Free desktop writing. Browser writing and sync with Writers Room, Production or Studio.
Verified-domain sign-on, access policies, an audit log and a workspace archive.
Studio.
Read projects, scripts and audit records, and subscribe to signed event webhooks.
Studio.
Publish crew openings with an email contact for applicants.
Production and Studio. Production tools require an account.
Request writing suggestions or storyboard frames where available. Cloud assistance is off until you enable it and ask; your writing is never used for training.
Opt-in credits. Available features depend on plan and workspace rollout; see the current qualifications in the documentation.
Start with an idea, a draft, or a shoot day.
Free writing in the app. Browser writing with a paid plan.