Release 2026.10.17
References that reach the departments, five scenes prepped at once, a breakdown you can stop
16 new15 improved24 fixed
2026.10.17Oct 17, 2026ReleaseOct 17, 2026
References that reach the departments, five scenes prepped at once, a breakdown you can stop
Files you add as references are read when the breakdown starts and land where each department looks, and an outline can stand in for a screenplay; the breakdown asks how long the film should run, says what really stopped it and stops when you press Cancel. Full Pre-Production preps five scenes at once, and keeps scenes in one place on one script day in order so their light matches. The crew works to the film’s genre, references sit beside the pictures they steer, a window opened from another has Back, the name at the top of Casting, Costume and Props switches, the chat is as designed, a Seedance sequence opens on its Video, someone shared with a crew role sees their own lane, and the Shot generator checks the account that pays before a render goes.
ImprovedPre-productionFull Pre-Production preps five scenes at once. A long film is prepped in about a fifth of the time, and the run plan's estimate says so. Scenes in one place on one script day still go one after another, so the camera holds their light; a scene that starts alongside the one before it takes its lens, colour temperature and contrast from the nearest scene already prepped, not from stock values. Every scene keeps its own progress on the timeline, its own Cancel on the background dock and its own Did not pass; one scene that fails no longer holds up the others.
NewEditorThe name at the top switches. In Casting, Costume and Props the name at the top of the window now switches to anyone else in the cast, or any other item of the production, without closing the window — and under the name, who or what it is, in a few words.
ImprovedShot generatorA Seedance sequence opens on its Video. A sequence's Shot generator is the clip alone, with no stage list, the way the design draws it. Its Final frame comes in beside it when the sequence needs one: once the DoP's live action is loaded into it, or once it has a final-frame take. Until then, a still for the sequence is made in Render and picked From gallery.
ImprovedChatThe chat is simpler, as designed. No row of channel buttons in the crew panel, faces on the Team side that keep their places (a dot says who is waiting), people in the full chat listed by name, and a new group started from the + beside Groups.
FixedProjectsOld studios open on Wide. The first-run setup used to pick Vertical for you, and since 15.10 a studio set up before 27.09 started its new projects 9:16. Its default and its projects that hold no renders are 16:9 now; a project made vertical on purpose keeps its frame.
FixedProduction designReferences keep their ticks. A picture copied to a prop shows ticked under Use for, History's Show brings a run's pictures back onto the board, and a generated picture is labelled with the words it was asked for.
FixedCastingThe garment notice stands where you pressed. A costume look whose garment isn't designed yet says so right under the look buttons, with Open Costume, instead of at the top of the window.
FixedReferencesAdd key where a key is missing. When a reference search or generation fails for want of a key, the References tab offers Add key instead of a Retry that could not work.
FixedPropsProps shows its render when you come back. Reopen Props while a plate renders and the banner names the item, with its clock and Cancel, and the card reads Generating….
FixedStudioCancel stays on the card. On a render's progress card the status gives way first, so the clock and Cancel always stay inside the card.
FixedPropsRender always answers. On a prop it can always be pressed, and what is missing comes up in a popup where it can be done — a hero item's description to check and Approve and continue, or Open Production Designer for a scene with no set yet — instead of a greyed button and a line about approving somewhere else. Design now stands first among the sources.
ImprovedFeedbackThe roadmap fills in as the team works. A post the studio takes on now moves across the roadmap — Planned under the quarter it is aimed at, In progress, Shipped with the release it went out in — and if you left an email, you hear when the work starts and when it ships, with that release in the message.
FixedChatCan view can talk too. Someone the project is shared with to view now writes in the full chat — at the round table, in their groups and to each person — not only from the crew panel; questions to the crew still need Can edit.
FixedChatCan view can start a group too. Someone the project is shared with to view can start a group in the full chat and name it, and in a group's Details rename it, add people and choose who of the crew sits in it; a room of crew members only, and questions to the crew, still need Can edit.
FixedChatRoom to talk on a laptop. In Edit the timeline now gives up some height on a shorter screen, so the crew panel above it shows the conversation — not just its header and composer.
FixedSharingComposer saves. Choosing Composer for someone in Share no longer fails with Couldn't update access.
NewSharingA crew role shows its own lane. Someone you add in Share with a crew role opens the project on that role's lane and no other department — the Gaffer on Lighting, the DoP on Camera, the Composer and the Sound Designer on Sound; a Picture Editor sees the cut alone. Your role in the timeline's header says so. The owner and a workspace admin still see every lane, and No role gives someone the whole timeline.
ImprovedCameraLive action, not Reference. The DoP's tab that keeps a shot played by stand-ins — the clip, its frame, who is who, the acting — is now Live action, and its clip the Live-action video, so it is never mistaken for the references a generation is given. Same place, same Load into Shot generator.
NewHelpA path through the book for the AI operator. Documentation → AI operator walks the team's four real tasks in the order the work goes — a shot from its references to a Seedance clip, a prop, a character through Casting, Costume and Makeup, and moving between the project, Workflow and Render — fifteen steps, each opening the section that explains it, with what approving needs and what tends to bite.
FixedShot generatorFrom gallery says what a press does. Point at a picture and it reads like the button it is — Use as first frame, Add as @Image3; what is already in that slot wears ✓ @Image2 and an outline, and pressing it again no longer adds it twice. ★ Select on a picture is now the takes' own quiet mark, not something that looks chosen.
NewEditorBack to the window you came from. When one window opens another — Casting to Costume or Makeup and back, a scene's card to a department, Props to the Production Designer, a Blockers card to the window that fixes it — the window that opens has Back in its header, named for where it goes. It saves what you typed, closes, and opens the window you came from on the same character, scene, shot or Director tab, a few windows deep.
ImprovedEditorFirst steps, Blockers and Generation settings are a click away. Open the Next step bar and First steps and Generation settings are always there, done or not; the Blockers count on the Director's Overview opens the Blockers panel, with Back to the Director.
ImprovedShot generatorSeedance multishot, named where it is on. A sequence's Video stage says it makes one clip for the whole sequence and what Mode decides, and when Animate waits the line under it says why and what to change — attach a reference, or switch Mode to Image to animate a still.
FixedShot generatorFirst frame and Last frame, each with its ×. The Video stage's slots say which frame they are and show what is in them; × empties a frame whatever filled it — the approved still it opened on included — and a clip dropped on a frame is turned away instead of being sent as a picture.
FixedShot generatorA sound under 1.8 s is turned away before it uploads. Audio references says what Seedance asks of a sound, and a shorter one is refused on the spot with how long it runs — not after the queue. Every limit a video model puts on a reference is now on one page: What a video model takes as a reference.
FixedShot generatorThe account that pays is asked before a render goes. Beside its button the Shot generator shows what the fal.ai account its renders bill has left — the project's own key, else yours — and says when it is running low, with Top up fal.ai. A render the account can't cover is no longer sent to wait in fal's queue for a refusal: the window says what the account has and what the render would cost, as Render does, after asking fal.ai once more so money you just added counts.
FixedEditFull Pre-Production finishes on a long film. A scene whose connection drops is waited for as long as a scene really takes, not fifteen seconds; a scene that really fails gets one more try, and the run goes on to the next. At the end the studio names the scenes that did not pass — 38 of 41 scenes prepped — scenes 7, 12 and 30 did not pass — and Prep these again runs just those; the Next step bar keeps naming them until they do.
ImprovedTimelineAll props open folded. Hero props now start closed like the featured and background ones, so the timeline opens on the leads of the cast; click a group's name to open its tracks, and it stays open until you leave the project.
NewMakeupA makeup look goes to the Director. Every look's card says where it stands — Awaits the Director's sign-off until someone who decides on makeup presses Approve, then Approved · Anna · Director · 17.10. It is the same decision Workflow and the Director's Overview count; Approve waits until the look has a render.
NewMakeupLooks designed from their period. Design looks first states the period the person's makeup and hair belong to — era, place, social layer, what makeup and hair were then and there, and what it is drawn from: the screenplay and the project's style — and designs every look inside it. The research stays on each look's card under Period research, to correct like any other field.
NewMakeupEvery look of a person in one grid. Looks and costume looks, above History in Makeup, lines the character up as the story changes them — a row per look with its face, a column per costume look — and each cell is the pair, dressed, or + to dress it. The scenes under a cell are where the two are worn together, so the pairs the shots need stand out, with a count of how many are dressed; a look's name opens its card. Each detail of a look now also shows its technique — how the makeup crew does it.
ImprovedCostsCosts are what the providers charged. The crew's hours are no longer priced at $100 an hour: Agents says which agent worked and for how long, with no dollars, and Costs' totals, its statement and invoice, and Usage & spend now count only the generations.
ImprovedCrewWhat MULTI-SHOT and SINGLE SHOT mean, under the DoP's seat. On Cast your crew a line under the DoP says what the one you picked does to the film — Scenes → shots, each shot its own clip from a choice of video models, or Scenes → shots → sequences, up to three shots in one Seedance clip of 15 s — and whether the set is built in 3D. Pick another DoP and the line changes with them.
ImprovedCrewEvery agent says how it works. In a seat's list on Cast your crew each agent has a line under its name, read off its own instructions — Vera Lang reads every scene for subtext and intention, Imani Cole plays scenes as unbroken takes — so two Directors or two DoPs can be told apart before you pick. An agent with no method of its own says so.
NewCrewChanging the Director asks first. Pick another Director once the one cast has written something and Cast your crew says what that means before the seat changes: nothing is recalculated, what stays as it is — the structure, the virtual edit, the shot lists and briefs of 12 of 40 scenes — and what the new Director changes from now on. Keep the one you have, or Change Director.
NewCrewThe crew works to the film's genre. Make a project a Comedy, a Thriller, Horror or Action and three of the crew work the way that genre plays: the Director covers every scene for it — the set-up and the pay-off in one frame for a comedy, the danger shown before the character sees it in a thriller — the DoP frames every shot for it, and the Production Designer designs each scene's space for it. Drama and the other genres are read as before. The crew by genre
FixedCastingA warning you close stays closed. The out-of-date line at the top of Casting counts only the takes on view, so the render that answers it clears it; its × — and the screenplay line's — puts it away for you through every render after, until what it was about changes again.
NewBreakdownThe breakdown asks how long the film should run. Its estimate opens on What's the target duration for your project?, filled in with the length the project was made with — keep it, change it, or press No target. Once you start, the crew fits the film to it instead of stretching or squeezing the screenplay on its own: the scenes stay as written, the sequences and pace are sized to the running time, the virtual edit's timing adds up to the target, and each scene's shots are planned to fill its share.
NewBreakdownYour references go to the departments. Files you add under References in the new-project dialog — a lookbook, a bible, character sheets, location photos — are read as the breakdown starts: characters are described the way they show them, and the pictures land where each department looks — a place's on the reference boards of the scenes set there, a person's in their Casting references, a costume's in that character's costume set for the look. The Producer's card says what was taken from each file, and why when nothing could be read.
NewBreakdownStart from an outline. No screenplay yet? Press Outline on the Script tab of the new-project dialog and upload or paste an outline or synopsis: the breakdown builds the scene list from it — one scene per event, the outline's own sentences as the action, no dialogue it doesn't quote — and the Screenplay tab says it was built from an outline.
ImprovedBreakdownFirst scene is prepared. The moment scene 1's shot list is saved — not before — the Director's card and the progress window say so, with Open scene 1 to go straight to it. Scenes no longer read ready the moment the screenplay is parsed: each one says queued, running, prepared or on demand. A tab left open on the project fills in by itself — the first scene and its shots appear without a reload.
FixedDesignDesign the set as soon as the scenes are broken down. The Production Designer no longer waits for every stage of the read — no more Run Layer 1 first: the set is designed from the scene's breakdown card, with its shots and brief when they exist. If the breakdown hasn't reached the scene yet, the window says so and offers Continue breakdown.
ImprovedDesignA scene's references in one place. Found, generated or your own, every reference picture is on the scene's References tab; Plan and the Concept sketch keep only what the pictures are drawn from.
FixedDesignThe concept sketch's progress is honest. While a sketch renders, its window and its card on Generating now show the time since you sent it, beside Stop and Cancel, with no bar or time left made up from a guess.
NewDesignEvery version of the concept sketch is kept. Reshoot as often as you like: earlier sketches wait in a Versions strip under the picture, open full size, and Make current puts any of them back as the scene's sketch.
NewDesignReferences beside the pictures they steer. The concept sketch, the Space and every prop open the scene's References right there — search, generate, upload, history, favourites. Tick Use in Concept sketch on up to four pictures and Design draws the sketch from them; Use for an item copies a picture among the photos its Design renders from.
FixedDesignYour pictures reach the concept sketch. A photo you upload or a picture you generate on the scene's References is ticked for the sketch as it lands, while it takes fewer than four.
ImprovedDesignDesign the set reads a crowded scene first. A scene with two or more people or three or more things is read from its own words — who is in it, where each stands and moves, everything in frame — and the Space is built from that reading. Redesign space reads it again.
FixedDesignReferences say how a generation is going in plain words — Queued, Rendering…, 1 of 4 done, Done — and Failed with the reason, instead of the provider's code.
FixedBreakdownA stopped breakdown says what really stopped it. The progress window, the Director's card, First steps and the Next step bar name the stage and the reason the studio recorded — the error it ran into, the two-hour limit it ran past, or that it stopped answering and when it was last heard from. It says Stanislavsky was updated only when it really was, while that stage ran. A stage that goes quiet says so in the window while the studio still waits for it, and Show progress on a breakdown the studio is still reading follows it live.
NewBreakdownCancel a breakdown while it reads. Cancel breakdown at the foot of the progress window stops the read on the studio, not just in your window; you stay in the project, the stages already read are kept, and the breakdown says it was cancelled, when and by whom. Resume from that stage or Start over — both now wait for the cancelled read to stop first, so a new read never runs alongside the old one.
ImprovedCastingThe tier changes in one place, and says what moves first. The tier beside a character's name is a label now, not a menu. Moving someone between Lead roles, Supporting cast and Extras — or Reset to auto — happens under Character → Casting tier and asks first: their tracks move to that group in Character, Costume and Makeup, the project passport follows, and nothing is rendered or deleted.
FixedCostumeA dressed look wears the look as it is now. Dress reads the look's description as it stands in Costume, with its garment — not the words the garment was first made from — and reshooting or replacing a look's garment marks what was dressed from it out of date, in Casting and the gallery.
NewCastingEvery view says where its render stands — after a reload too. A headshot, a full length, a dressing or a sheet being made says Queued, Rendering or Failed with the reason, and who started it. The studio writes it down when the render is sent, so a reload, another tab or a teammate opening the window no longer sees “No render yet” over a render that is on its way.
FixedCastingDressing a look with no garment says what to do. Pressing a costume look in Casting before its garment is designed now says the garment isn't designed yet and is designed in Costume, with Open Costume to go there — instead of a programmer's message. Makeup's Dress says the same.
← Older · 2026.10.15Vertical and square, one steady bar, runs that outlive their windowNewer · 2026.10.18 →Full Pre-Production goes on with the tab closed
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