Plan the light
before the truck is loaded.

It depends on whether you need to predict the result or communicate the intent. Tools like Set.a.light 3D actually simulate the image, modelling fixtures, falloff, and shadows, which is genuinely valuable for studio and product work where you want to solve the look before you touch a light. Storyflow does not do that and does not pretend to. What it does is faster and more shareable: a hand-drawn diagram with the reference frame pinned next to it and the kit list attached, sitting beside your blocking, shot list, and schedule. If your problem is predicting light, use a simulator. If your problem is that the gaffer rigged something different from what you pictured, use a board with the picture on it.

Not during early access. Storyflow is paid-only right now, with plans starting at $9.99 a month, and a Free plan launches before the end of 2026. Anyone a paid member invites to a board joins free today, so your gaffer can view the plans without paying. If you want a free option this minute, a notebook and a pencil have produced most of the lighting plans in the history of cinema, and photographing the page to send it works well enough.

At minimum the camera position, the subject, and every source with its position marked. What separates a useful diagram from a decorative one is the detail: the height of each fixture, its approximate distance from the subject, what modifier is on it, and any gel. Also mark the practicals in shot and any available light you are working with or against, since those are part of the picture whether you planned them or not. If the setup depends on something being blocked, such as a window negative-filled or a wall flagged off, draw that too, because it is invisible in the result and expensive to rediscover.

Because lighting is the slowest thing on a set to change. Reblocking a scene costs minutes; relighting it costs an hour once you account for moving stands, re-running cable, and re-balancing everything else. That asymmetry means advance decisions pay off more here than almost anywhere else on a shoot. The other reason is procurement: a look you invent on the day can only use the fixtures already on the truck, whereas a look planned in prep can shape the rental order. Discovering at nine in the morning that the plan needs a fixture nobody brought is the specific failure a plan exists to prevent.

Yes. There is a pen tool for sketching directly on the canvas, so you can draw overheads by hand the way you would on paper. The useful addition over paper is that you can drop the location recce photo or a floor plan underneath and draw over it, so the plan respects the real windows and the real ceiling, and you can pin the reference frame beside the diagram so intent and execution are in one view.

No. Storyflow does not model fixtures, falloff, shadows, or exposure, and it cannot render a preview of your setup. If simulating the resulting image is what you need, a dedicated 3D lighting tool is the right choice and worth the learning curve. Storyflow's role is communication and organisation: making the intent unambiguous with a reference frame, the diagram shareable, and the kit list derivable, all sitting next to the rest of the shoot plan.

Yes, and doing it this way round is what makes the list accurate. List the fixtures, modifiers, stands, gels, and cable each setup needs on that setup's card, then collate across setups for the rental order. Building the kit list per setup rather than as one production-wide list is what catches the specialist fixture required for a single shot, which is exactly the item that gets forgotten when the list is written from memory at the end of prep.

Yes. Share a view-only link and your gaffer opens the diagrams, references, and kit lists in a browser with no account. This is the highest-value share on the whole board, because a gaffer who has seen the reference frame during prep rigs much closer to the intent on the first attempt, which saves the expensive part of the day. If you want them to contribute, invite them so the plan reflects what the kit can actually do.

Yes, and the three genuinely belong together. Blocking determines where the light has to come from, the lighting plan determines how long the setup takes to rig, and the schedule is where that time has to fit. Keeping all three on one canvas is how you notice that the day with the most ambitious lighting is also the day with the company move, which is the kind of collision that otherwise gets found at about four in the afternoon.