How to keep your scripts and recordings organised

Name scripts so future you can search them

The instinct is to name a script after the topic. The problem is that you will have four scripts about the same topic within a month, and the topic will not tell them apart.

• Lead with the date in year-month-day order, so alphabetical order is also chronological order.
• Then the destination, because the same content gets cut differently for different places.
• Then the topic, in the words you would actually search for later.
• Mark the live one. A suffix on the version you actually recorded saves the worst five minutes in video.

If you cannot tell two scripts apart from their names alone, the names are wrong. Fix them then, not later.

Which takes to keep

Keep the one you published and the best alternative. Delete the rest the same day, while you still remember which was which. A folder of thirty unnamed takes is not an archive, it is a decision you have deferred.

The exception is anything with a moment you could not repeat: a good ad lib, a laugh, a demonstration that worked first time. Those are worth keeping even from an otherwise unusable take.

Writing on one device, recording on another

The common workflow is writing at a desk and filming on a phone, which only works if the script is already on the phone when you pick it up. Sync through your own iCloud account does this without an extra service or an account to manage.

1. Write and edit on the Mac, where the keyboard is.
2. Let the script sync before you leave the desk, rather than discovering it has not when you are set up.
3. Record on whichever device is framed best for the shot.
4. Do the final trim wherever you prefer, since the recording follows too.

If you shoot several videos in a sitting, queueing the scripts is the other half of this.