Embedded Files
(Or, the wonderful world of spreadsheets.)
When I first decided I wanted to go into animation, I had no idea I would fall in love with a completely different side of the production process:
The world of ORGANIZATION and PRODUCTION MANAGEMENT.
I found myself thoroughly enjoying designing creative pipelines, and most of all, strangely enough, creating spreadsheets. Designing a good spreadsheet is like solving a puzzle -
How do you make it functional AND intuitive?
How can you ensure it will hold up, even when people are constantly editing things?
Can it still look pretty at the end of the day?
Organization is a living, breathing process that should grow with the project -
And that's the fun of it!
BELOW, I've included a few examples of my work, created for the production pipeline on our short film, for the CU Denver Sentry student newspaper, and for my comic project, respectively.
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Example 1: Animated Short Film Shot List
ENCROACHMENTSHOTLIST.pdfA shot list for our animated short film, The Encroachment.
We utilized and continued to update this spreadsheet for the year and a half of production on this project, and it has held up very well! I especially enjoyed having the ability to see the latest version of each shot directly.
HERE is the link to the example spreadsheet, made for Google Sheets.
SIGNIFICANT FEATURES
1) SHOT LIST FUNCTIONALITY
A live document for animators and director to collaborate, update the latest version of each shot, and provide notes.
Looking at the spreadsheet from left to right:
First, total number.
Second, sequence.
Third, shot number.
Fourth, a dropdown menu for the status of the shot.
Fifth, timestamp within the film edit.
Sixth, a brief shot description.
Seventh, camera movement.
Eighth, a visual shortcut to the latest version of the shot in the shared Google Drive.
Ninth, notes from the director.
Tenth, a dropdown for who the shot is assigned to.
Eleventh, a place for animators to provide their notes.
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2) AUTOMATED SHOT PROGRESS
A fully automated tab for animators and team members to refer to film progress.
Top left: Documents sequence progress, with number of shots, duration, and rough number of frames for each, and a total sum below.
Bottom left: Counter for each team member/animator, with number of shots assigned, total time, and total frames, with the amount left for each stage of the process per artist.
Top right: Countdown timer. See #3 below!
Bottom right: More general percentages done for each stage of the process.
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3) COUNTDOWN TIMER
A countdown timer that updates every minute. Can be adjusted to any deadline or due date.
Utilizes a hidden "Clock" tab where the deadline can be changed.
Contact me at siennafergie@outlook.com for access to The Encroachment !
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Example 2: Hourly Pay Tracker
PAY TRACKER FALL 2025 EXAMPLE - FALL 2025.pdfA place to track employee/freelance hours for each published article.
I implemented this system for the SENTRY STUDENT NEWSPAPER last year, primarily for use between the Managing Editor and the advisor in charge of payroll. It has been easy to work with, and to update new publish dates and freelance staff!
HERE is the link to the example spreadsheet, made for Excel.
SIGNIFICANT FEATURES
1) Automatic Hour Counting/Tracking
Tracks each person's total sum of hours, and checks whether each assignment is paid.
If all of the check boxes in a certain person's row are checked off, (meaning the person has been paid), there will be a green "NOPE!" in the box and no further action needs to be taken. If any of the boxes are left unchecked, a red "YES" takes its place until all boxes are checked. A total sum of hours left unpaid can be seen at the bottom left, and total hours from the entire pay period can be seen to its right.
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2) Tracking For Individual Publishing Dates
The manual input section of the spreadsheet, where the Managing Editor tracks the articles published by each author and inputs hours per publish date, while the person in charge of payroll checks the box when the artist has been paid.
New employees can be added easily, by adding a new row wherever you see fit. No other rows have to be changed for this to work. The same goes for adding new dates - just copy and paste the previous two rows to the far right!
The top line of each person's section are for notes on the type of work done, the hours earned go underneath, and a checkbox added to the right of the hours.
When any of the boxes are unchecked, the box to the right of the date will show up as red. When all boxes for a certain date are checked, it will return to green.
At the bottom, the box located in the same column as the date will sum up the total hours earned on this day. To the right of this, the total sum of hours yet to be unpaid.
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Example 3: Comic Page Organizer
MOONTOWNPRD.pdf
SIGNIFICANT FEATURES
1) Visualized Progress Log
The manual input for the tracker. Tracks page-by-page progress and the publish date for each.
First, a chapter dropdown menu.
Second, a status symbol to visualize through conditional formatting which pages are ready (green), which are in progress (yellow), which are in planning (red), and which haven't been started yet (black).
Third, scene/episode titles, organized by color.
Fourth, the page number, with a padding of four.
Fifth, the progress dropdown menu.
Sixth, a date selector for the publish date.
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2) Automated Page Statistics
A second tab to view chapter-by-chapter progress complete and published, as well as number of pages per chapter/episode.
The number of pages for each episode are automatically tracked, as well as the percent of pages complete and the percent of pages published for each episode. These percentages are also color coded for visual reference.
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3) Automated Statistics Overview and Progress Check
An automated overview in which only one tab should be manually adjusted by the spreadsheet user - the "Target Complete" date, which would set their goal for when they want all of the pages complete and published by.
From top to bottom of spreadsheet:
First, the total number of pages.
Second, the pages that have been completed (published or ready).
Third, the pages remaining.
Fourth, the total percent of pages completed.
Fifth and sixth, the aforementioned "Target Complete" date - how many days remain, and the date itself, the latter of which should be set manually by the user.
Seventh, the amount of pages to get done per day to complete everything by the goal date.
Eighth, the chapter progress percentages for each chapter as defined in the first tab.
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I have also worked in creating ORGANIZATIONAL PIPELINES for projects including:
The SENTRY STUDENT NEWSPAPER at the University of Colorado, Denver, as MANAGING EDITOR since Fall of 2024.
The animation pipeline for upcoming 3D animated short film, The Encroachment.
A variety of personal and small-group creative projects, from WEBCOMIC to TEXT-BASED VIDEO GAME.
I have experience in both MICROSOFT EXCEL and GOOGLE SHEETS, but I'm a quick learner and would be happy to learn any new production tracking software!
If you are interested in or curious about my work, please contact me at siennafergie@outlook.com! I am CURRENTLY OPEN TO WORK and would love to assist in organizing your next project!
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