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Connector Spotlight: ftrack

Shane Workman Jul 20, 2022

Real-time syncing between Projectal and ftrack, a leading task management and asset management tool.

ftrack is a leading task management and asset management tool used at creative studios. Many studios using Projectal are also using ftrack for their artists to organize & review their digital assets and manage their tasks.

The Projectal Integration team has created a connector that provides seamless connectivity between Projectal and ftrack. The connector uses the Projectal API, webhooks and Python libraries to real-time sync projects, tasks and staff assignments between Projectal and ftrack. This means your Projectal and ftrack are always kept up-to-date with project changes, task changes and staff changes at your studio. This lets you accurately bid, plan, schedule and track your projects and always understand your staffing requirements.

Mapping data between ftrack and Projectal

The ftrack connector is very flexible and can easily be adapted to match the way you have configured and customized ftrack at your studio.

Here's some of the data that can be synced in both directions in real-time between ftrack and Projectal:

Projects and their details - including project identifiers, name, description, status, start & end dates, costs and task breakdown
Tasks and their details - including task identifiers, name, description, dates, duration, ETC, actual work effort, staff assignments, costs and status
Staff assignments to tasks - including staff identifier, name, email and work effort to date
Task breakdown & hierarchy - including breakdown of assets, sequences, shots and more
Task status values - including ready, in progress, client review, completed, change requests and more
Task order - from the first task to the last task
Task notes - including artist notes, producer notes and client notes

Real-time Sync Features

Both Projectal and ftrack have webhook features and our connector takes advantage of these webhooks to provide real time syncing between Projectal and ftrack. This ensures that your Projectal and ftrack are instantly updated whenever changes are made. There are no more manual steps, no more spreadsheets or double-entry of data. For example, when an artist updates a task in ftrack, these changes are automatically synced into Projectal so that your team tracking the project is always kept up-to-date. Or, when a Production team member assigns an artist to a task in Projectal, then this artist is instantly assigned and notified about this task assignment in ftrack.

The following screenshot shows the producer or supervisor's view of a project in Projectal:

...and the artists view of the same project in ftrack, synced in real-time:

Staging Features

When you are in the initial stages of bidding, budgeting or planning on projects in Projectal, you may not want these projects to be added into ftrack since it is too early and it could cause confusion within your Production team. Our connector can be easily configured to match your workflow so that only those projects that have been awarded are added into ftrack. This is a handy way of staging your projects as they pass through the initial bidding, budgeting and planning stages.

Availability

The ftrack connector is available now for free to all Projectal customers. Our Integration team will assist you to adjust it to match the way you have configured ftrack at your studio, and help you to install it so that your studio gets real-time syncing between your Projectal and ftrack.