Report wizard

An essential feature in Silverstack is the report wizard. It is a flexible and powerful reporting tool, offering users the opportunity to share clip information and thumbnails in well-arranged PDF documents. Reports can include all the metadata needed to document camera media traveling to different professionals involved in many stages across the entire film production pipeline. You can access the report wizard in different ways:

  • By clicking the toolbar button Report
  • Via the menu: File > Create Report…
  • Via the context menu of a Library item: Right-Click > Create Report…

Different report types#

You can export different types of reports that target specific needs:

  • Shooting Day
  • Clips
  • Thumbnails
  • Contact Print
  • Volume

All report types are customizable and allow you to choose which information is shown.

Report settings#

The user interface is divided into three main areas:

  1. Report types (left)
  2. Report settings (right)
  3. Report Destination (bottom)

Hereafter, we explain the different report types together with their dedicated settings. The report destination follows at the end.

**→ Icon (Quick Export Report)**By clicking the icon, the report is exported immediately using the current settings.

1. Shooting day#

The shooting day report gives you production information about the clips you have offloaded. Production information like director, cinematographer and DIT entered in the production field of “Project Overview” is shown in this report. You can include the following summaries:

  • Project: Production info, clips overview and relations
  • User Info: Backups and bins
  • Audio: Audio tapes and audio formats
  • Library: Labels, flags and ratings
  • Video: Video reels, camera sums and video formats

2. Clips#

Reports of type clips, thumbnails and contact print have basically the same UI elements but can be set individually.

Basic / Advanced
Switches between basic and advanced settings.

Layout
Sets a predefined layout for the report (similar to the library’s table view layouts). Layouts can be customized.

Table Contains
Defines if only clips or also other files are included.

Number of Thumbnails
Sets the amount of thumbnails in the report. When the option 3 is selected, Silverstack creates two thumbnails for the first and last frame of the clip in addition to the custom thumbnail. These three thumbnails are then shown in the report. In contrast to option 1, the option 3 requires online media since the additional thumbnails are created during the export process.

Thumbnail Quality
Adjusts the compression ratio of the thumbnail images (reduces file size).

Include Summaries
Enables including the following information into the report: “Production Info”, “Clips Overview” and “Relations”.

3. Thumbnails#

The thumbnails report is similar to the clips report but has bigger thumbnails to help identify clips better. The UI and settings elements of the thumbnails report are identical to the ones from the clips report (above).

4. Contact print#

The contact print report shows only the thumbnails available in the library for the selected clips. The UI and settings elements of contact print reports are identical to the ones from “Clips**”** (above).

5. Volume#

The volume report summarizes the information regarding the source and current location of the clips’ different copies registered in Silverstack. This report type can include checksums of different methods like XXH64 to confirm data integrity.

Select Volume
Determines the drive for which the report should be created.

Export the selected information
Defines the information to include in the report.

Include Summaries
Can additionally include Production Info.

6. Report Style#

Template
Allows you to choose between the classic and dual tone (dark/light) report templates. When selecting the dual tone template, you can also set an accent color for the labels in the reports.

Accent Color
Defines the accent color for the report labels when using template “Dual Tone.”

Include Report Note
Allows to add and create a general report note by clicking the pen icon. Accepts plain text or Markdown.

Location
Sets the export location for the report.

File Format
Sets the file format for the report. Options are PDF and HTML. The default is PDF.

Filename
Defines a naming scheme for the file name. When “Custom” is selected, click the pen icon to open the wildcards editor. Learn more about path wildcards.

Overwrite existing reports with same file name checkbox
When enabled, automatically overwrites reports with identical file names.

Open after creation
Opens the reports automatically after export.

Preset
Loads configured presets. Additionally, saves, deletes and updates report presets.

Cancel
Closes the Report Wizard.

Export
Creates the reports with the applied settings.

Good to know#

  • By default, Silverstack creates one thumbnail for each ingested clip and stores it in the library.
  • The position for the creation of additional thumbnails can be influenced by setting in and out points for a clip.
  • The Settings allow to change the position of custom thumbnails and disable thumbnail creation on ingest.
  • It’s possible to completely hide or skip thumbnails in clips reports. In order to accomplish that, just remove the “Preview” column from the table view custom layout.

Last updated: March 4, 2025