The second film
Crew, supplier and location records stay with the production company instead of leaving at wrap.
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A model case: film production A feature film, sixteen weeks from an empty office to wrap.
An independent feature with a budget of about A$7.5M: eight weeks of preparation, 30 shoot days, two weeks of wrap, about 160 people, 22 locations and about 250 suppliers, built from nothing and dissolved sixteen weeks later.
Book a conversation → Modelled on industry research
Modelled
About 1,776 hours
back across the sixteen weeks, about 111 for every week the production office is open.
Modelled
About 39%
of that to the ten people who carry the film in their heads, mostly off the ends of the longest days in the industry.
Modelled
A shoot day not added
and a pickup day not needed are the biggest impacts, each worth more than all the hours together.
Modelled
About 1,600 calls
that carry a deal, a booking or a location term, written up for a one-minute check instead of by hand afterwards.
Where the figures come from. Modelled on published research and industry documents, and measured where a business’s own systems gave us the numbers. Once we model your business, your own data replaces every one of them. The time is capacity for your team.
A day today
The work no system does.
The systems each do their job. What none of them does is the work around them: the question, the chase, the handover, the redo. It is done on foot, by phone and from memory, and nobody counts it.
With Kula
One record for the whole production. The call sheet drafts itself from the schedule, last night’s out-times and the deals, with turnaround already checked, and the assistant directors correct and approve it. Times are captured as they happen, so the production report and the morning cost assemble themselves. A receipt is a photo at the till. A booking call made through Kula leaves a draft purchase order behind.
3:30pm, the call sheet
The second assistant director starts the call sheet, working each actor back from their time on set and ringing departments for what they need.
6:00pm, sent
The call sheet goes out. Anyone who has not confirmed by eight is rung.
After wrap, the report
The production report is assembled from the camera, sound and continuity sheets, the times and the meal breaks. The office leaves last.
All day, the question
“Is the crane confirmed?” “Which schedule is current?” Someone finds a person on the radio or the phone, and waits.
Every week, the paper
About a thousand timesheets written from memory, 2,400 receipts taped and keyed, and the cost report rebuilt by asking twelve heads of department what they still expect to spend.
At wrap, the memory
Every crew profile, supplier rate and location contact leaves with the freelancers. The next film starts from nothing.
What the research says
The loss is real before the model is.
The size of the losses in this model comes from published research, not from guessing. These are the findings behind it, with where each one came from.
11 hours plus
The working day, plus one to two hours of prep and wrap. Weeks of 50 to 60 hours are common, and 62% of crew say the schedule harms their mental wellbeing.
UNI Global Union, 28 unions in 22 countries, 2021, via TVB Europe2 in 3
Australian screen workers surveyed who have fallen asleep driving to or from work. Days commonly run 12 to 16 hours. The time the model gives back comes off the ends of those days.
MEAA Wake Up Call survey, 2021, 200 interviews1 hour in 12
A 12-hour shooting day leaves about 525 minutes for setups and one hour of reserve. One 75-minute company move takes a setup and most of the reserve, which is how a missed message becomes a lost day.
Tools for Film, The Math Behind a Shooting Day, 202640 documents a day
The second assistant director’s paperwork, with the call sheet out by 6pm and anyone unconfirmed by 8pm rung. One wrong call time costs an hour of the unit and overtime penalties.
Vancouver Film School, 2nd AD guide27% waiting
Waiting was the largest waste on one production studied, and 26% of mapped activity added no value. A single case, so a low-confidence figure, but the only one found.
Saputra and Purnomo, lean study of a film production1,600 calls a film
Carry a deal, a booking or a location term: suppliers, locations, crew availability, the cast’s representatives. Across business generally 44% of calls never reach a person on the first try, so on a film phone tag is where a location deal or a crane booking dies.
The feature film model; call statistic from Invoca 2026, via JustCall3 pickup days
A feature shooting four to six weeks budgets at least three pickup days, and overtime is usually cheaper than adding a day. The model’s biggest lever is one of those days not being needed.
SuperScout Pro, How to create a film budget, 2025 Who gets the time back
The same people, a smoother day.
Assistant directors and the production office
About 5.7 hours a week each. The evening paperwork, the call sheet and the production report, falls from about five and a half office hours a shoot day to about one and a quarter.
Accounts
About 11 hours a week each. A cost report built from live commitments, and the offset file filling as the money is spent.
Departments, crew and cast
Answers without finding a person, paid from times they have already confirmed, and one start pack kept for the next film.
Beyond the hours
What else changes.
Fatigue
The time comes off the ends of the longest days in the industry, where the office is the last to leave.
People make the calls
Kula never puts an AI voice on the phone. A person makes the call, it is recorded with a notice, and the caller confirms what was agreed before anything is written down.
Where the figures come from
Modelled on research, measured where we can.
No production has calibrated this model. The counts rest on published research about films of this size, every minute and every dollar is a working assumption, and the days are levers rather than a forecast. A line producer’s last film would replace most of it. Most crew are on weekly deals, so time given back is shorter days, not fewer people.
Every model is built the way an industrial engineer studies a factory floor: list every role and every task, count how often each one happens, time it as it runs today and as it runs with Kula, and multiply out. Real volumes are used where we have them and published time values where we do not. Every figure is replaced by the business’s own data before it is used for anything, and the time given back is read from what the team actually moves onto Kula, not from asking anyone to log their day.
Every loop, the minutes behind it and the sources are in the full model. We walk through it with you in a conversation, and then build yours from your own systems and a short walk-through with one of your managers.
Book a conversation → Other businesses we have modelled
About 197 hours a week
back to the team across five clubs. The biggest share is staff questions: about 460 a week, each a walk to find the manager today.
See the model →About 9,800 hours
back across the build, and the last house handed over about six months sooner.
See the model →About 430 hours a week
back to the team, so the business can take on more work without the next hires.
See the model → Start here
See what Kula gives back in your business.
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