9 Important Steps To Consider In Production Tracking And Management Software

What Is Vani Software?

Vani helps you to track production from the start to the end whether it is a big or small movie project. It is among the Best Project Management Software as it allows you to assign as well as review the tasks and generate automatic reports like project status, artists performance, episode/ sequence progress, and much more.

It will allow you to customize project workflow as per your studio requirement and this is the best part that Vani offers. One of the reasons that most production houses prefer Vani is because no technical person is needed to operate. Studio owners or managers can handle on their own with ease.

In this article, we’ll look at what are the 9 Important Steps to Consider in Production Tracking and Management. So, let’s dig in without burning time.

1. User-friendly interface

• Vani provides its users with a simple and Eye-Catching UI Design which helps studios to understand it much faster. Just 15 minutes of training is required to get hands-on with Vani Software.

• Vani has a different UI for different roles which includes Artist, Lead, Supervisor, Production, Admin and same can be customized. Almost everything is accessible via excel import and export i.e task assignment, review, assets/ shots creation.

2. Project Bidding

• Any good animation project starts with a project bid. With the project bidding feature of Vani software, studio project managers review the scope and give competitive bids to get the project.

• Bid document is a Bible for the project hence it need to have all the details like scope assumptions, asset count, project duration, shots count, efx %, render storage assumptions and artist quota for all departments and many more which you can create easily in Vani. assign man-days for the project easily.

• The project bid also contains the Staffing schedule of the project. Besides scheduling the CG / VFX project on Vani through the project bid, managers can also do a proper cost analysis. Since the software accounts for all the project tasks in each phase of the pipeline, it is easy to manage the budget through the Project Management Software.

3. Customized workflow

• Every studio comes with its own set of workflow hence the standard tracking mechanism doesn’t work. For this, there should be a tracking tool that can do customizations in the department and workflow.

• Vani gives the option to Customize Workflow and the best part is any producer can easily do this. No need for any prior technical information is needed. Also naming and order of the department can be changed as per the studio pipeline and the same can be adjusted as per the project also.

4. Project Bidding

• Project Bidding is the bible for any project. If the producer follows the project quota and assumptions given in the bid then profit is guaranteed. Now, let’s understand what does project bidding means and how it can help to make the project more efficient.

• The process of project bidding initiates by obtaining relevant scope information from the clients. Based on inputs and quality references received from the client you can add the bids against each task. Against the total bids of each department, you can add the day rate and calculate the total cost for the client.

• With the help of Project Bidding the project would get more stability towards certain objectives of the project. Even producers can use this throughout the project to control the project scope.

• Certain detailing can be easily captured such as scope assumption, project duration, department-wise quota, render storage assumptions, EFX/ simulation%, and asset count. With the help of Vani project bidding, you would be able to do a proper cost analysis as well as can schedule CG/VFX projects. It’s a pro version of bidding that anyone can manage.

5. Inhouse Artist, Vendor, Freelance & Multiple Location Studio Management

• In the current scenario, there are a lot of studios that prefer to outsource or freelance the work to save the cost. While doing this, studios fail to track the Work Progress and updates. They keep separate outsource departments to track the progress and it increases the cost of the resources.

• No other software is capable of doing this but Vani helps in tracking vendor and freelance progress in real-time.

• Also, few studios are working from multiple locations and if one project is running on multiple locations then it’s difficult to manage to get a sense of project progress. In Vani, you can track multiple location users in real-time.

6. Integration With Pipeline & Review Tool

• Most of the studios have their own pipeline setup and they don’t have a tracking mechanism in place. In this case, studios prefer to use a professional tracking tool which saves a lot of costs and gives production insights.

1. Studios can Integrate their existing pipeline set up with Vani. With this, studios can save 70% tracking cost and get access to the world’s best tracking tool.

2. Review tool- If studios buy Review Tool licenses it costs them very high. Rather, they can buy limited licenses and integrate with Vani.

7. Project Reports, MIS, Production Dashboard, Financial / Investors Reporting Data

• The report plays a very important role in the success of any company. Without this, many studios get in trouble due to a lack of results.First priority of most of the studios is getting more profit from any project and this can be achieved with the help of a Production Tracking Tool . If tracking software gives you inbuilt reports then it will help to monitor progress on each level.

• Production can check the efforts spent against the bid days, the finance team can check project profitability by using data from Vani. If issues get flagged at the right time to the right person then he can easily fix and make money.

• Project Reporting is not just an overview of the status but it should also give project insights and analytical input to the project producer.

• Vani software provides its users an effective as well as an informative report which would convey all the important statistics, and data regarding the project. Moreover, Vani makes its ultimate impression in the production dashboard as it consists of 22 reports which cover every aspect of day to day production and 6 Production Dashboards plus crew planning (resource availability forecast). This would reflect a better result in project profitability.

• Vani software’s dashboard showcases project details, progress, task status summary, client details, retake %, pending reviews, and actual time spent, etc. Since Vani is providing inbuilt reports with an excel exportable option, studios can save data analyst salary costs as production & management can access direct real-time reports.

8. Client Support

• When it comes to client service value, Vani is at its best. Vani software ensures that its user gets high-end production tracking so that clients get growth in their business. The client can easily access the Vani support team via different platforms (call, email, Whatsapp, Skype, zoom, etc.)

• Also, Vani does not charge any additional cost for Software Support which you have to pay for other solutions.

• Vani supports you in:

• Detailed demonstration

• Dedicated executive to help account setup

• Smoot onboarding

• Training to all users

9. Reasonable Pricing

• There are few solutions that provide a solution but their pricing falls in the range of $30 to $50 per user per month. Whereas Vani Pricing starts from $6 which gives you a saving of around 70% to 80%. No hidden charges when you opt for Vani software.

• Other solutions are available in the market and those are quite complex to set up and use and also you need to keep a developer team to maintain the application. In the case of Vani, you can do it yourself. This results in saving more money and time.

• cost savings

1. Around 70-80% saving on software pricing

2. Software developer salary saving

3. MIS person, data analytics team salary saving

4. Due to increased efficiency, you will save time and get better results

10. Offline Version

• Everyone aware of software licensing compliance issues in the media industry hence small studios do not prefer to give internet access to the artist machine. Because of this, they do not prefer to buy online production tracking solutions.

• Vani introduced a solution for this and Vani is available in an Offline Version for Small Studios.

Conclusion

Thus, the above mentioned 9 important steps are a must to consider if you are planning for a production tracking and management tool for Animation & VFX Studio. Whether you are a small or big studio owner, investing in the right Tracking Software at the right time is very beneficial.