TillyGen vs Setkeeper

Production management platform focused on call sheets, contacts and on-set logistics. This page sets out what Setkeeper is built for and what TillyGen is built for, without claiming anything about features we cannot evidence.

What Setkeeper is for

Production management platform focused on call sheets, contacts and on-set logistics.

Production offices that live in call sheets and distribution lists.

Production management systems aim to be the single source of truth for the whole crew. That works as long as every department actually works inside it — and breaks the moment the director and DoP keep a spreadsheet on the side. So the question worth asking first is who opens the system daily and who only receives a PDF out of it.

Where Setkeeper is strong

A comparison that only lists your own upsides is not one. This is what speaks for Setkeeper:

  • Call sheets, contacts and logistics in one predictable place
  • Distribution lists stay maintained across a production
  • Clear for a production office that lives in paperwork

Where the limits are

And these are the points where teams run into limits in practice — not as a flaw, but as a consequence of the design:

  • The call sheet is maintained, not derived from a schedule
  • Creative artefacts are outside its scope

Where TillyGen takes a different route

TillyGen produces the call sheet as a by-product of the schedule rather than as a document to maintain.

TillyGen turns a brief into a shoot-ready package: shot list, storyboard, schedule and call sheet that stay connected. Change the creative direction and the affected shots are flagged rather than quietly left behind.

Which tool when

In short: Production offices that live in call sheets and distribution lists. If your bottleneck is instead getting from a brief to a plan that holds, that is where TillyGen starts.

The useful question before switching is not which tool does more, but where the process stalls today. Three bottlenecks come up again and again in production teams, and they call for different tools:

  • The plan comes together too slowly: days pass between the brief and a shoot-ready shot list, with the client already chasing.
  • The paperwork drifts apart: shot list, schedule and call sheet live in three files, and after the second change none of them agrees with the others.
  • Distribution eats the time: the plan is done, but every version has to be sent to twenty people by hand and chased up.

What to check before switching

The decisive question is whether your call sheets are authored or generated.

Switching tools mid-production almost always costs more than it saves on that job. The sensible moment is between two projects, with a pilot small enough to run twice if it comes to that. Check first whether the export formats match what post and accounting expect — migrations fail there more often than on features.

Frequently asked

Is TillyGen a replacement for Setkeeper?

That depends on what you use Setkeeper for. TillyGen produces the call sheet as a by-product of the schedule rather than as a document to maintain.

Can both be used together?

Usually yes. TillyGen exports shot lists and schedules as PDF, CSV and through the API, so downstream systems can carry on.