How to schedule a CGI project

The short answer

Start from the delivery date and work backwards. Put the final render and the delivery first, then each feedback round as a dated block with the client's name on it, then the production stages between them. Work out render time from frames, minutes per frame and the number of machines, and double it for the re-render you will need. Add one buffer at the end, not a little everywhere. Send the client the dates they own, in writing, and move the delivery date the day they miss one.

Why forward schedules fail

A forward schedule says "modelling takes a week, then lighting takes a week" and adds up to a date. It assumes nothing waits. In client work, a third of the calendar is waiting: for the CAD files, for the camera approval, for the marketing team to collect notes from three people. None of that is on a forward plan, so the plan slips from the first Monday and nobody can say by how much.

A backward schedule starts with the one date that cannot move and asks what has to be true on each day before it. It makes the waiting visible, because each feedback block is a line with a start, an end and an owner.

Step 1: fix the delivery date and what it means

Get the date in writing, and get what "delivered" means on that date. A product launch on the 14th usually means the files need to be with the client's agency on the 10th, so they can cut, caption and upload. Ask. The real deadline is often several days earlier than the one in the first email.

Write down the deliverables against that date: how many stills, how many seconds of animation, which resolutions and ratios. A schedule for "the renders" is not a schedule.

Step 2: list the stages

Most CGI jobs, whether product, archviz or a short animation, run through the same stages:

1. Inputs: CAD or architect files, references, brand guide, finishes.
2. Modelling and scene set-up.
3. Camera or animatic approval.
4. Materials, lighting and look development.
5. First full draft (stills) or first animation pass.
6. Feedback rounds.
7. Final render.
8. Post-production, compositing, sound if any.
9. Delivery and the small fixes after it.

Each stage gets an estimate in working days. Use your last three similar jobs, not optimism. If you track hours per stage, the guide on tracking budget against hours shows how to turn them into days.

Step 3: put the client's days on the plan

Every review is two blocks: the client's turnaround and your revision time. Give the client's block a length and an end date, and put it on the schedule with their name. Three working days per round is a reasonable default for a single decision maker; five if notes come from a committee.

This is the step most studios skip, and it is the one that saves the deadline. When the plan says "client feedback on cameras: 3 to 5 March, Northgate marketing", a late reply is a visible fact with a visible consequence, not a vague feeling that things are slipping. The guide on client feedback rounds covers how many rounds to include and how to keep notes in one list.

Step 4: do the render maths

Render time is the stage that surprises people because it is not labour, it is machine time, and it runs whether you are watching or not.

For animation, the sum is simple:

frames x minutes per frame / machines = render minutes

30 s at 25 fps = 750 frames
750 x 12 min / 3 machines = 3,000 min = 50 hours

Fifty hours is just over two days of three machines doing nothing else. Then add:

• A test render of a few frames per shot before the full run, to catch flicker and missing textures.
• A full re-render of at least part of the film, because a note always arrives after the final render. Plan for the whole thing twice; if you only re-render a third, you are ahead.
• Time to check every frame before compositing. A bad frame found in the edit costs a re-render of that shot.

For stills, render time per image is usually hours, not days, but final resolution renders at print size can run overnight per view. Count them.

Farm or local

A render farm turns 50 hours into a few, at a price per frame or per machine hour. Get a quote for the job before you schedule, and put the cost in the quote to the client. Local rendering is free per frame but ties up your machines, which means nobody works on another job's look development those days. On a tight schedule, the farm is often cheaper than the lost days.

Step 5: interim checks

Between the dated client reviews, put internal checks every two or three working days: a clay render, a lighting test, a playblast. They are not client meetings. They are dates on which you or the lead look at the work and decide whether the next stage can start. Problems found at an internal check cost an hour. Problems found at a client review cost a round.

If freelancers are on the job, their delivery date is one working day before your internal check, never on it.

Step 6: one buffer, at the end

Spread buffers ("add 20% to every stage") get spent. Each stage expands to fill its padding, and you reach the final render with none left. Put one buffer block between the final render and the delivery date instead, sized at roughly 10 to 15% of the schedule, and protect it. On a five-week job that is three or four working days.

A worked example

Fieldwork Visual, a three-person studio, is producing a 30-second product film plus six stills for a kitchen appliance brand. Delivery to the client's agency is on Friday 20 November. These dates are an example of the method, not a template for every job.

The final render is one day because the studio has booked a farm; on its three machines it would be three days and the buffer would vanish. Only one round of animation feedback fits, so the quote says one round on the animation and two on the stills, which render in an evening.

When the client is late

They will be, on some job, on some round. Decide your response before it happens:

1. On the morning the feedback block ends, send a short note: the notes were due today; if they arrive tomorrow, delivery moves from the 20th to the 23rd.
2. When they arrive late, send the new schedule the same day, with the delivery date moved by the days lost, in writing.
3. If the delivery date cannot move (a launch, a print deadline), say what gives: fewer stills, no second round, or a rush fee for a weekend render.

Do not absorb the delay by working nights. It sets the price of the next late reply at zero. The quote should have said this already; the quote template has a notes field for it.

Doing this in OIO

In OIO each stage and each deliverable is a ticket on the client's project, with a start and an end date, on a timeline. The client's feedback blocks are tickets too, so the waiting shows on the plan next to the work. Set a reminder for the day each feedback block ends. Every plan includes a calendar link for Google Calendar, Apple Calendar or Outlook, and Pro adds two-way sync with Google Calendar.

The client follows progress on a password-protected status link: each ticket name, its status and the updates you post, so "camera feedback due Friday" is in front of them without another email. Freelancers get a link to their own ticket with the brief, the files and the checklist, and mark it done there. There is no render queue or render tracker in OIO; the dates are yours to set. More on OIO for 3D studios, and the day rate calculator helps when you price the days.

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