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Getting started · Stage 1

Post Production Paperwork

The documents you need to know before your first day in post

Reports, turnover lists, specs, QC and the delivery checklist: the documents that follow the footage, with examples.

Post production is a chain of handovers, and every handover is a document. This quick course follows the paperwork from the camera reports that arrive with the rushes, through turnover and technical specs, to the QC report and the delivery checklist that ends the job.

25 minutes · 3 modules · 9 lessons

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What you’ll learn

  • Know what arrives with the rushes and what each report is used for.
  • Know what turnover paperwork is: the EDL or AAF, the VFX list and the music and ADR lists.
  • Be able to read a technical spec and a QC report and know what happens when a file fails.
  • Know what a deliverables checklist contains and how material is archived and tracked.

Where this leads

By the end you will have written your own Stage 1 plan, checked yourself against MFJF's five Stage 1 statements, and know exactly what to do next: a mentor clinic, an Academy workshop, and Stage 2, the HotList.

Module 1

What arrives with the picture

8 min

Rushes never arrive on their own. The documents that come with them are what make them usable.

  1. readReports, manifests and the job number3 min
  2. readTurnover: the lists that leave the edit3 min
  3. checkCheck: what arrives and what turns over2 min
Module 2

The documents finishing runs on

8 min

Specs, QC reports and the text and music paperwork: what makes a master acceptable rather than merely finished.

  1. readTechnical specs and the QC report3 min
  2. readCue sheets, text files and the credits3 min
  3. checkCheck: specs, QC and the text2 min
Module 3

What leaves the building, and what stays

9 min

Delivery is a checklist. Archive is what happens to everything you made on the way there.

  1. readThe delivery checklist, the versions register and the archive3 min
  2. taskTask: build a delivery tracker3 min
  3. checkCheck: delivery and archive3 min
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Sources and references

Where this course comes from. Open any of them yourself.

Check it yourself

This course is written from our own experience of the industry. These are the authorities that set the rules, so you can check anything here for yourself.

Every link checked 19 September 2026.

You are not doing this alone

You have your own personal career mentor

That is us, the MFJF team. Book an MFJF Mentor Session with us every month: we guide you through this journey and answer all your questions, from which job is yours to your CV and your next application.

Book my MFJF Mentor Session

Where next

Your recommended next steps

Picked for Getting started. Signed in, they follow your stage and the roles your answers point to. See your whole MFJF journey, step by step →

  1. My MFJF JourneyOne page for everything MFJF has built, in the order you need it.
  2. My Reading ListThe books, blogs and bodies you have saved, in one place.
  3. Start the Stage 1 course: Getting startedTwo hours on what the job is, how people get in and what to do first.
  4. Get on the HotListPut yourself in front of productions looking for crew.
  5. Join MFJF DayPlayersDay work on productions for crew with the credits and the skills.
  6. Find your role in the career plannersEvery entry-level job by department, with a three-stage planner for each.
  7. Read the career guidesWhat each job is, the day, the way in and the pay: one guide for every role.
  8. See how it all fits on the career maps17 maps of how films get made: the people, the process and the departments.
  9. Who works whereEvery department on a shoot and every kind of film company: who is in each and what they do.
  10. Industry EssentialsThe books, industry bodies, websites and blogs worth knowing, department by department.
  11. Read the MFJF Survival GuidesStraight answers to what everyone starting out asks: how long it takes, what you get paid, and what to do every day.
  12. MFJF Academy workshopsLive sessions with people who do the job, and the monthly career clinic.
  13. Build your CV with the CV BuilderThe industry's format, built from your profile and your current CV.

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