How to streamline your to-do list with automated workflows in Silverstack

While a DIT’s workday is often shaped by (unpredictable) challenges, like complex technical demands or tough shooting locations, there’s also a fair share of routine tasks that need to be handled day in and day out. For example, managing multiple camera and sound cards typically means repeating the same steps over and over: offloading and backing up footage, generating and sharing reports, and possibly creating and uploading dailies. While juggling all of that, it’s also crucial to ensure no step gets missed and nothing falls through the cracks. To-dos add up quickly, and let’s be honest, some of them can get pretty tedious.

That’s where the new workflow concept in Silverstack v9.0 comes in, redefining how you approach your overall to-do list with the software: Workflows let you chain activities, such as offloads, backups, transcodes, and uploads, into a single, automated pipeline. Since Silverstack understands the full scope of the workflow up front, it can intelligently optimize execution and run tasks in parallel wherever possible. The result? Faster outcomes, fewer manual steps, and a clear, structured overview of your processes. It also makes it easier to replicate your routine, as you can save and apply workflows as presets when processing new cards.  

In this article, we’ll show you how the new workflow concept works in practice, using two typical DIT to-do lists as examples: one with Silverstack XT and one with Silverstack Lab. Let’s get to work! 

Introducing the concept: Workflows that work for you

We’ve replaced and unified the old separate wizards with a new workflow interface where you build and customize your entire process. As shown in the video below, activities you want to include in your workflow are added and appear as cards on the left. Selecting an activity card opens its configuration panel on the right, where you can adjust the settings to fit your needs.

Once your workflow is set up, you can start it with a single click, and Silverstack will execute all tasks automatically. For a detailed, real-time overview, switch to the redesigned „Jobs View“ in the bottom left corner. This view lets you track progress across active and completed workflows down to every individual job and task, so you always know exactly what’s (been) happening. 

Please note: The video demonstrates a workflow in Silverstack Lab. While most workflow activities are similar in both Silverstack XT and Silverstack Lab, Lab includes additional activities (transcode, cloud upload) specifically for dailies creation.

Silverstack XT workflow: Offloads, backups, and reports 

After this broad overview, let’s dive into a typical to-do list for DITs working with Silverstack XT and see how the new workflow concept helps you tackle it efficiently. For this example, we’ll assume you want to complete the tasks listed below.

To-do list:

• Offload multiple camera/sound cards throughout the production day
• Extract dynamic metadata from the OCF footage
• Create backups on three different volumes (RAID, two travel drives)
• Create one report for each offloaded card on every volume:
  • 1x Contact Print report as an overview of the recorded clips
  • 1x Clips report with basic clip metadata extracted from the clips

Build & configure your workflow

Previously, completing this to-do list required running each activity one at a time, waiting for each to finish before starting the next. You also had to manually track each step for every card to ensure nothing was missed.

With the new workflow concept, you can chain all these activities into a single, integrated process, making your work faster, easier, and less prone to errors. It also provides greater clarity, as you get a visual overview of all the activities you intend to perform – eliminating the need for manual lists to track whether each step has been completed. The graphic below shows a workflow configured for our example to-do list, covering all the necessary steps for your camera card.

To process sound cards, simply repeat the workflow. Once configured, there’s no need to start from scratch every time. Simply use a preset or let Silverstack automatically detect and apply the correct workflow based on the media type (e.g., camera vs. sound card).

As mentioned earlier, you can configure each activity just like in the old wizards. However, there are a few new features and improvements we quickly want to highlight: 

Error detection and quick fixes
While configuring activities, Silverstack highlights potential issues (e.g., a nearly full travel drive) and suggests one-click solutions (e.g., selecting a different destination). Errors, warnings, and info messages are now all displayed in a consolidated panel, so you can quickly resolve problems without reopening multiple settings dialogs.

Ingest metadata 
Add basic metadata about the production context already before launching a workflow, such as shooting day, shooting date, crew unit, episode, and camera. This metadata can then be used as wildcards within the workflow for automatic naming and structuring of your library outline.

Report templates in post steps
Automatically generate reports after any workflow activity using post steps. Apply report templates to tailor each report to the workflow, ensuring clear and consistent documentation.

Run & monitor your workflow

Once your workflow is set up, you can launch the entire pipeline with a single click. Since Silverstack XT knows the full sequence in advance, it can optimize execution and run as many tasks in parallel as your hardware allows (e.g., based on GPU or drive speed). For instance, it might calculate checksums on one drive while copying footage to another. With tightly linked processes like these, staying on top of progress and potential issues is key. As shown in the image below, the new workflow-centric „Jobs View“ provides a clear overview of all running and past processes. 

From this top-level view, you can drill down into individual workflows, jobs, and tasks for detailed insights and optimization. In the example above, you see one completed workflow for the first camera card A_0001_1DJH, with all green checks in the workflow history. Two more workflows have been started to process the next cards (A_0002_1DJH and A_0003_1DJH) in the same way. Blue progress bars show the current activity status, while greyed-out “Waiting” bars indicate what’s next.

And that’s it! Of course, this is just a simplified high-level overview of what workflows can do. Naturally, your specific to-do list may differ and include additional steps, like QC, for example. We’ll explore how to combine automated workflows with such manual processes in the second part of this article, where we’ll focus on Silverstack Lab. For a full breakdown of all available workflow activities in Silverstack XT and their detailed configurations, please check out our Knowledge Base.

Silverstack Lab workflow: Data management, dailies creation, and handover

Let’s take things a step further. When working with Silverstack Lab, your day likely begins the same way: offloading and backing up footage. But since Lab is designed for dailies creation, additional tasks come into play – like syncing audio, applying looks, performing QC, and delivering dailies to downstream teams. To show how the new workflow concept helps streamline all of this, we’ve divided the to-do list into three parts – some of which can now be automated, as we will discuss further below. 

To-Do List: 

Part 1: Data Management:

• Offload multiple camera/sound cards throughout the production day
• Extract dynamic metadata from the OCF footage for the reports
• Add metadata on offload about production context, such as shooting day/date, crew unit
• Create backups for every card on three different volumes (RAID, two travel drives)

Part 2: Dailies prep: 

• Sync audio and video by timecode with manual spot checking if TC didn’t drift over time, and potential fine-tuning/nudging of the audio-video sync
• Add additional clip metadata to the library, such as slate information or in/out range
• Apply basic grading, match looks (e.g., from Livegrade), and make manual adjustments
• Quality control, labelling & rating clips (e.g., checking critical focus, checking for crew in shot/boom in frame, etc.)

Part 3: Transcoding & handover: 

• Create transcodes and dailies with different technical requirements
  • Client previews (e.g., 720p with H.264)
  • Dailies for editorial (e.g., DNxHD 36)
• Upload dailies to a cloud platform
• Handover metadata to editorial (ALE, XML)
• Backup transcodes on travel drives
• Create different reports
  • 1x Shooting day report for the production company
  • 1x Clips report incl. metadata (e.g., for editorial)

Configure & run your workflows 

Looking at this to-do list, it’s clear that some steps require human input and manual attention. This includes, for example, adjusting grades for consistency or performing a basic QC. But with Silverstack Lab’s workflow concept, you can automate many of the repetitive tasks that happen around those manual steps. This allows you to focus on the parts of your job that truly need your eyes and judgment, while Silverstack Lab handles the rest. In our example, the first and third sections of the to-do list can be automated, while the second is performed manually. Let’s take a closer look! 

To-do list part 1: Automate offloads and backups  
Start by creating an offload workflow that covers the first section of your to-do list. In the example below, we’ve chained offloads and backups into a single process and also included metadata ingest for key information like shooting day, shooting date, crew unit and so on. Once configured, this workflow runs automatically – no more need to trigger each step manually. Again, use the „Jobs View“ to monitor all processes. 

To-do list part 2: Prepare your dailies manually 
The second part of your to-do list requires human judgment. This is where you step in to sync audio and video by timecode (and adjust if needed), insert metadata, apply looks or basic grades (e.g., from Livegrade), and perform QC – adding labels, ratings, and comments as you go. With Silverstack Lab’s workflows running in the background, offloads and backups continue automatically, so you can stay focused on your current tasks without interruption. 

To-Do list part 3: Automate transcodes & uploads
Once your clips are synced, graded, and QC’d, it’s time to deliver. Let Silverstack Lab handle this final step by running a transcoding workflow using your prepared assets as input. As you can see in the image below, we’ve configured the workflow to let Silverstack Lab transcode to multiple formats, copy files to various destinations (like travel drives) and upload dailies to a cloud platform. The „Jobs View“ shows real-time status updates of all involved processes. After all automated workflows are completed, you can jump back in and create reports that include all the information on OCF, transcodes and your manual adjustments.

Again, this is just a quick overview of the new workflow concept and its capabilities. Your specific to-do list and daily routine may differ, but you can easily customize, configure, and combine automated workflows in Silverstack to fit your needs. For detailed information and configuration instructions, head over to the Knowledge Base.

Conclusion

Overall, the new concept aims to embrace automation in the right places to free up your time and mental energy to focus on what truly requires your expertise. Instead of repeatedly launching individual backup jobs, you can spend your energy on QC. Rather than waiting for transcodes to finish before copying to travel drives, you can communicate with continuity and script to gather production context for the next card. Instead of manually reordering jobs for optimal execution, let Silverstack handle the scheduling so you can focus on overseeing the second unit and keeping everyone aligned on goals and progress. Being a DIT or Data Manager means juggling complex demands and countless responsibilities. Silverstack simplifies the routine where possible to make your life a little easier.