SmartPrep: Free Camera Prep Sheets
a 3dfilm tool · free forever
SmartPrep: free camera prep sheets for film & TV
The app you open on prep day, standing in a rental house with a lens in one hand. Build the kit list, check the gear in line by line, run the standard prep checks, work out your cards and batteries, and walk out with a prep sheet that says exactly what you ordered, what arrived, what did not, and what failed a check. There is nothing else like it, and like every 3DFilm Tool it is free: no account, no subscription, fully offline, and your data never leaves your device.
better together
SmartPrep and SmartLog are a pair
SmartPrep is the prep day. SmartLog is the shoot day. Finish your prep, tap Hand off to SmartLog, and SmartPrep writes a file that SmartLog imports in one step: production, every camera letter with its body, format and codec, the lens set and the filter kit all land already configured. You walk on set the next morning and the first take is ready to log.
Both apps are free, both work with no signal, and neither ever sees your data. If you already use SmartLog, SmartPrep will feel like home in about a minute.
HOW TO INSTALL + FAQ iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac and PC. Tap to open.
There is nothing to buy and nothing to install from the App Store or Play Store. SmartPrep is a web app, exactly like SmartLog: it opens in your browser, then sits on your home screen like a normal app and works with no signal.
Open this page in Safari, not inside another app's browser. If you tap a link from Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp or a messaging app, it opens in that app's own mini browser, which can wipe your jobs when it closes. If you are reading this inside an app right now, tap the ... or share icon and choose Open in Safari first.
How do I install it on my iPad or iPhone?
- Open this page in Safari. Not inside Instagram, Facebook or a messaging app. This step matters most.
- Tap the red Launch SmartPrep button above. The app opens straight away, ready to use. Ignore the Download button on iPhone and iPad, it will not give you a working app.
- Tap the Share button in Safari. It is the square with an arrow pointing up, at the bottom of the screen on iPhone and at the top right on iPad.
- Scroll down the share list and tap Add to Home Screen.
- Leave Open as Web App switched on. That is what makes it open full screen like a real app and keep your jobs safely.
- Tap Add at the top right. Done.
You now have a SmartPrep icon on your home screen. It opens instantly, fills the whole screen with no browser bars, and works fully offline in any rental house basement. No account, no subscription, and your jobs stay on your device.
How do I install it on Android, Mac or PC?
Android: open this page in Chrome, tap Launch SmartPrep, then open the browser menu (three dots, top right) and choose Install app or Add to Home screen.
Mac and PC: open SmartPrep in Chrome or Edge and click Install: the small install icon at the right of the address bar, or Install SmartPrep in the browser menu. It becomes a proper app window with its own icon. On a computer you can also use Download SmartPrep to keep the whole app as one file you own.
Do I need the internet to use it?
Only the very first time. When you open SmartPrep on a new device it stores itself in your browser, and after that everything works with no signal: building lists, checking in, running checks, the calculator, and exporting the PDF, CSV and JSON. Rental house basements and underground car parks are exactly where it is designed to work.
Where do the cards and batteries numbers come from?
Every camera body in the shared database is in the calculator. For a growing set of bodies the data rates were read straight off manufacturer spec sheets and official record-time tables, the source is quoted under every answer, and the engine is checked against 65 published figures before a build ships. For every other body the calculator takes the data rate straight off the camera's own media screen: you type what the camera reports for your exact resolution, codec and frame rate, and every figure downstream is computed from it, clearly labelled.
Nothing is ever guessed. Want your body promoted to fully verified? Tell us which one and it moves up the list.
Is it really free? Do I need an account?
Yes, free forever, and there is no account to create and nothing to sign in to. There is no cloud and no tracking. After first load SmartPrep makes no network requests at all, and everything you enter is stored on your own device.
How do I make sure I never lose a job?
Add SmartPrep to your home screen rather than leaving it as a browser tab, and never work from inside an app's mini browser. Those are the two things that put your data at risk.
Then open Settings and use the backup card. On Chrome, Edge and Android, pick an auto-backup file once and SmartPrep rewrites everything to it after every change. On any device, Back up now hands you a dated full backup, and Import on the Sheet tab restores it with full fidelity.
See it
CHECK-IN: 42 OF 45 IN, THE MISSING LENS FLAGGED IN RED · CARDS & BATTERIES: DATA RATE, MINUTES PER CARD AND HOW MANY TO BRING
On the iPad: the kit list built from templates, the library, the database or custom entries; check-in with everything flagged in one glance; and the prep sheet itself. Every line shows ordered against received with its state, and everything missing, damaged, substituted or failed rolls up into a red flags block the rental house cannot miss. One tap exports it as a PDF named after your production, ready to email.
HOW MANY CARDS DO I BRING · THE ANSWER, WITH THE SOURCE UNDER IT
What it does
- Kit lists four ways: start from a template, pull from your own gear library, search a database of bodies, lenses, filters, media, power and support, or add anything custom.
- Five job templates that populate a full list in one tap: single camera commercial, two camera drama, one man band doc kit, gimbal package and studio interview.
- Check-in built for one hand in a corridor: tap a line to cycle received, missing, damaged, substituted or returned, long press for a condition note. The screen stays awake while you work.
- Prep checks per camera body and per lens: back focus, sensor, mount, timecode jam and drift, firmware, hard stops, focus scale, filter threads and more. A set on the list expands into one round per focal.
- The FLAGS block: every missing, damaged, substituted or short-delivered item and every failed check, boxed in red on the sheet. The most useful thing in the document, impossible to miss.
- Cards and batteries for every body in the camera database: manufacturer-verified rates with the source quoted under every answer where they exist, and the camera's own reported data rate everywhere else. Nothing is ever guessed, because an invented figure is how someone runs out of cards mid-afternoon.
- A card-speed warning when a card cannot sustain your codec's data rate.
- Your own gear library: add it once, pull it onto every job after that. Anything added custom to a job saves to the library with one tap.
- Prep sheet PDF named after your production and date, kit list CSV for any spreadsheet, and a full JSON backup.
- Hand off to SmartLog: the shoot day starts already configured.
- Auto-backup file on Chrome, Edge and Android, one-tap dated backups on every device, and protected browser storage.
- Opens with a demo prep loaded so you can see a finished job before typing a thing. Delete it like any other job.
- Dark and light themes, adjustable text size, and your choice of font.
- Everything stored on your own device. No sign-up, no cloud, no tracking, and after first load it makes no network requests at all.
LOAD-OUT AT DAWN · THE KIT LIST RIDES ALONG
help shape it
SmartLog became what it is because working ACs, DPs and sound recordists told us what was missing, and most requests shipped within days. SmartPrep starts the same way. If you prep cameras for a living and something on this page is not how you would do it, we genuinely want to hear it.
Request a featurefrom the makers of the digital slate
SmartPrep is built by 3D Film Parts, the team behind the 3D-printed Digital Slate and SmartLog. All of it free, all of it built with the people who use it.
what's new
Build 2026-07-25 FIRST RELEASE
- Everything above, day one: jobs, kit lists, templates, the gear library, one-tap check-in, prep checks, the flags block, the prep sheet PDF, CSV and JSON export, the backup system and the SmartLog handoff.
- The cards and batteries calculator covers every body in the camera database. A growing set (ARRI, RED, Sony, Canon, Blackmagic, Panasonic) runs on rates read straight from manufacturer documents, checked against 65 published figures before shipping; every other body takes the rate the camera itself reports, clearly labelled. A body you want promoted to fully verified is a one-line email away.
- Opens in the light theme with the clean font at 115% text size, the combination that reads best at arm's length in a rental house. All three are yours to change in Settings.
Questions or feature requests: info@3dfilmparts.com. See how your data is handled in the SmartPrep Privacy Policy.