Locations

How locations work

Locations in Studio Color are the physical places where scenes will be shot. They come from two sources: proposed from your script and confirmed in Step 1 of the Breakdown Review (where you create, merge, or ignore each suggestion), or created manually by your team. Each location goes through a scouting status workflow before being confirmed for production.

Once a location is confirmed, scenes and schedule days can be linked to it — and on mobile, crew can browse all scout photos taken at that location.

Location identity & hierarchy

Studio Color identifies locations from the script itself — the slug heading of each scene (for example INT. ALICE’S HOUSE - PORCH - DAY) — not from AI-invented names. That heading is normalized into a stable key (alices house | porch) so the same place is recognized across drafts regardless of casing, punctuation, or dashes.

Parents and sub-locations

A compound heading becomes a hierarchy: Alice’s House is the parent, and Porch and Kitchen are its sub-locations. The Locations list shows this as a nested tree (children are indented and display their short name), and each detail page has a Parent location picker plus a Sub-locations section.

Script locations vs. physical locations

A script location (“Alice’s House”) is the place as written in the screenplay. The physical location is the real-world venue you actually film it at (“4 Aces Movie Ranch”) — and one venue often stands in for several script locations.

On a location’s Overview tab, use the Physical location picker to link a script location directly to a real venue — search the project’s existing venues or create a new one on the spot. The Locations list then shows a Physical Location column and a filter, so you can group every script location that shoots at the same place.

Merge memory (aliases)

When you confirm that two names are the same place in Step 1, that decision is remembered as an alias. The next breakdown will never ask again — and because identity is also proven by shared scenes, renaming a location in the app won’t cause the next breakdown to duplicate it.

Location scouting status

Each location moves through a scouting workflow:

• Needs Scouting — The location has been identified from the script but hasn’t been visited yet.
• Scouting — The team is actively evaluating candidate sites for this location. This status is automatically set when you add the first location source.
• Confirmed — A specific site has been selected and locked in. Automatically set when you lock in a final source.

Location sources

Similar to props, each location can have multiple candidate sources — specific properties or sites being evaluated for that location. This lets you track multiple options side by side before committing to one.

Adding a source

• Open a location from the Locations list.
• Click Add Venue and fill in the site’s details.
• Each source stores an address, contact information, notes, and whether it’s the current top choice.

Source pricing

You can attach a cost to each scouted venue to track location budget. The form supports two modes:

• Flat rate — Enter a single total cost for the venue.
• Per day — Enter a daily rate and number of shooting days; the total is computed automatically.

The computed total is stored as the source’s price. When you lock in a venue, that price is copied to the location as its locked-in cost, shown on the confirmation banner and available for budget rollups.

Reusing venues across locations

Physical venues can be registered once and reused across multiple script locations. For example, if “Greenwood Cemetery” will be used for both a day scene and a night scene (two separate script locations), you only need to enter its address and contact details once.

• When adding a scouted venue, use the Search existing venues field to find and pick a venue already registered on the project. Its name, address, and contact details will be filled in automatically.
• If no match is found, fill in the form normally — a new venue record is created.
• Shared venues show a Shared venue chip on the source card. Click the building icon to edit the venue's core details; changes propagate to every location it is linked to.
• Pricing and scene-specific notes remain per-location — the same venue can be booked for different numbers of days on different scenes.
• Photos are always per location-source, not shared.

Marking a top choice

When you’ve narrowed down your options, mark one source as the Top Choice. This flags it visually for the team and the location status moves to Scouting if it wasn’t already.

Locking in a location

Once you have a signed agreement or confirmed permission, click Lock In on the chosen source. This sets it as the final source, copies its price as the locked-in cost, moves the location to Confirmed, and the location is ready for scheduling. Click Unlock to revert to scouting if plans change.

Scout photos

Location scouting involves lots of photos. Studio Color has a first-class photo system for locations — you can upload as many images as needed per location, and optionally link them to a specific source.

Uploading photos

• Open a location and navigate to the Photos tab.
• Drag photos onto the drop zone, or click it to open a file picker. You can select multiple files at once.
• Each photo has an optional caption for context (e.g. “North wall — power outlet location”).
• Photos are automatically tagged with a stage (Pre-production, Production, or Post-production) when uploaded.
• Optionally link a photo to a specific venue source to keep scout-day photos organized.
• Prefer “or choose from gallery” under the drop zone to reuse a photo already uploaded elsewhere in the project — no re-upload. See Photo Gallery.
• iPhone HEIC photos are supported. Most browsers can’t display Apple’s HEIC/HEIF format, so Studio Color converts each HEIC upload to JPEG right in your browser before storing it — the photo then previews everywhere. The original shoot date is read from the HEIC before conversion, so EXIF dates are preserved. While a HEIC is converting the tray shows “Converting HEIC…”; if a file can’t be converted the tray shows an error and the original HEIC is not stored, so you never end up with a photo nobody can open.

Upload tray

When you drop or select photos, they are added to the Upload Queue — a floating tray in the bottom-right corner of the app. The tray shows each file’s real-time upload progress, the overall count (e.g. “Uploading 3 of 8”), and a progress bar for the full batch.

• Up to 3 files upload in parallel for maximum throughput.
• The tray persists across page navigation — you can browse to another location or section while uploads finish in the background.
• Each row shows a thumbnail preview, file name, the location context, and per-file progress.
• Failed uploads show an error message with a Retry button.
• You can cancel individual uploads or cancel all at once using the tray controls.
• Completed uploads can be dismissed individually or cleared all at once.

Photo stage tags

Each photo is tagged with a production stage: Pre, Production, or Post. The default stage is derived from the project’s current status — if the project is in Pre-production, uploaded photos are tagged Pre-production by default.

Before uploading, you can override the stage in the Upload settings panel above the drop zone. You can also add a caption there that will be applied to all photos in that upload batch. After uploading, click the pencil icon on any photo to edit its stage or caption.

Stage filter

Use the stage filter pills at the top of the Scout Photos section to narrow the photo grid to a specific stage. This is especially useful during production reviews when you want to see only photos taken during scouting vs. during production days.

Scout photos gallery

In the web app, the Scout Photos item in the Locations section of the sidebar opens a gallery view across all locations — a quick visual overview of all scouting activity on the project.

Each photo in the gallery shows a stage chip in the top-left corner. Hovering over a photo reveals:

• The venue or source name (e.g. “Greenwood Cemetery”)
• The daily rate or flat cost for that venue (e.g. “$1,500.00/day”)
• The photo’s caption or note if one was added

Clicking a photo opens a full-screen lightbox with the same details shown below the image.

Location detail page layout

The location detail page uses a four-tab layout so each type of information has a dedicated space:

• Overview — Location name, parent location, physical location (real-world venue), address, interior/exterior tags, times of day, notes, the confirmed banner (when locked in with an unlock option), sub-locations, and linked scenes.
• Venues — All scouted venue candidates, with top-choice marking, lock-in confirmation, and per-source scout photos. Badge shows the number of venues.
• Photos — General scout photos (not attached to a specific venue), with stage filter, upload settings, and drag-drop upload. Badge shows the total photo count. Click any photo to open it in a full-screen lightbox.
• Overheads — Floor plans, site diagrams, and overhead maps for the location, with drag-drop upload and a gallery picker. Badge shows the overhead count. Click any overhead to open it in the same full-screen lightbox.
• Discussion — The team comment thread for this location.

The sticky breadcrumb and status chip remain visible on every tab. Tabs are URL-synced via?tab= so direct links open at the right section.

Discussion & notes

Each location has a Discussion tab where any crew member can post notes, updates, or questions about that location.

• Posts show the author’s profile photo (or initials), name, and a relative timestamp.
• Click Reply on any comment to start a thread. Replies are indented under their parent.
• You can Edit or Delete your own comments at any time. Project owners can delete any comment.
• Press ⌘ Enter (or Ctrl+Enter) to submit a comment or reply quickly.

Linking locations to the rest of the project

• Scenes — Each scene has a primary location and can also be linked to extra locations, so a scene that shoots in more than one place shows up under every one of its locations here. Scenes are automatically linked to their primary location when imported from the Script Analyzer; extras are added by hand.
• Schedule — Schedule days are assigned to locations. The schedule day detail page shows all locations for that day and which scenes will be filmed there.
• Production equipment — Equipment can be linked to locations to plan logistics.
• Props — Props can be associated with locations for set dressing planning.

Deleting a location

Only super admins and the project owner can delete a location. Open the location detail page and use the Delete button in the top bar. A confirmation modal appears and, to prevent accidents, you must type delete before the delete button becomes active.

Permissions