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What is a call sheet?
Every production runs on one document that everybody reads and nobody argues with. This is what it is, what belongs on it, and who is responsible for it.
A call sheet is the single document that tells everyone working on a shoot day where to be, when to be there, and what is happening. Production issues it the evening before, usually prepared by the first assistant director and approved by the producer or unit production manager. It supersedes every earlier version, so when two documents disagree, the call sheet is the one that counts.
- Issued by
- Production, via the 1st AD
- Sent
- The evening before
- Covers
- One shoot day
- Authority
- Supersedes earlier versions
On this page
Read it end to end, or go to the part you came for.
In detail
The document, the people who own it, and the day it covers.
One day, one document, one version.
A call sheet covers exactly one shoot day. That constraint is the whole point. A schedule describes a plan across many days and is allowed to be provisional; a call sheet describes tomorrow and is not. It is the last word on when each person is due, where they are due, and what the day intends to accomplish.
Because it is the last word, a call sheet carries an implicit claim: everything on it is current as of the moment it was sent. That claim is what makes a stale call sheet worse than no call sheet. Somebody reading yesterday's version does not know they are reading yesterday's version, and they will act on it with total confidence.
The first assistant director prepares it. Production approves it.
On a conventional crew the first assistant director builds the call sheet from the shooting schedule, the production coordinator distributes it, and the unit production manager or producer approves it before it goes out. On smaller crews these collapse into one person, and on commercial, branded, and photo work that person is usually the producer.
It goes out the evening before the day it covers, once the current day has wrapped and the schedule has survived contact with reality. Sending earlier means sending something you will have to revise; sending later means crew are planning their morning without it.
Whoever sends it owns it for the rest of the night. Late changes are normal, and the job does not end at the send.
The blocks are conventional, and the convention is worth keeping.
A call sheet is a standardised document, and the standardisation is doing real work. Crew read hundreds of these and have learned where to look: general call at the top, their own name and time in the middle, the hospital at the bottom. Moving those around to be original costs a reader time they do not have at 5am.
The blocks are listed in full further down this page. In short: a header identifying the production and the day, the general crew call and estimated wrap, weather and sun times, the schedule for the day, cast and crew with individual call times, locations with parking and directions, meals, safety information including the nearest hospital, and notes.
It exists to make one version of the day authoritative.
A shoot day involves a lot of people who each hold a partial picture of it. The camera department knows the setups, the location manager knows the parking, talent knows their own call. The call sheet exists so that all of those partial pictures resolve into the same day.
The failure it prevents is not ignorance, it is disagreement. People rarely turn up having no idea what is happening. They turn up having a confident idea that is one revision out of date, and the cost of that lands at the worst possible moment.
A shooting schedule plans the shoot. A call sheet runs the day.
The shooting schedule, and the day-out-of-days that goes with it, are planning instruments. They cover the whole production, they change as the production changes, and they are read mostly by the people doing the planning.
The call sheet is an operational instrument for one day, read by everyone. It draws on the schedule but it is not a slice of it: it adds individual call times, logistics, safety information, and everything the schedule does not need to carry.
One practical consequence: a change to the schedule does not automatically become a change to a call sheet already sent. Somebody has to decide who needs to know, and tell them.
The standard blocks
What belongs on a call sheet.
The conventional set, in the order they usually appear. Not every production needs every block, but a reader looking for one of them expects it where it normally sits.
5 answers
Questions about what is a call sheet.
Who is responsible for the call sheet?
The first assistant director usually prepares it and the producer or unit production manager approves it before distribution. On small crews, commercial work, and photo shoots, the producer often does all of it.
When should a call sheet go out?
The evening before the day it covers, once the current day has wrapped and the plan is stable. Earlier means sending something you will have to revise; later means crew plan their morning without it.
What is the difference between a call sheet and a shooting schedule?
A shooting schedule plans the whole production and is expected to change. A call sheet is operational, covers exactly one day, adds individual call times and logistics, and is treated as the current authority for that day.
Does every crew member get the same call time?
No. The general crew call applies to most of the unit, but individual departments and cast frequently have their own times, and those are listed against each person on the sheet.
What happens when something changes after the call sheet goes out?
Production issues a revision. The important part is deciding who actually needs to be told, because resending to everyone makes the whole crew re-read the sheet to discover that nothing changed for them.