Review and approval
Rough cut notes for an editor.
Written to be acted on, one at a time.
A rough cut note is only as good as the editor's ability to find the moment, understand the problem and know when it is finished. Here is how to write notes that pass that test, and how to send them so each one sits at its own timecode, carries its own conversation, and ends up as a marker on the editor's timeline.
Video hosting for filmmakers · 5 GB free · Paid plans from USD 9/month
By uncompressed.io · Updated September 2026
The problem with the memo
A notes memo is written once,
the editor decodes it line by line.
The classic rough cut note arrives as a document or an email: a list of timecodes and thoughts, typed while watching. It feels complete to the person who wrote it. To the person who receives it, every line is a small translation job.
The editor reads a timecode, checks whether it came from the same export they are cutting, scrubs to it, looks for what the note is describing, and guesses whether “this feels long” refers to the shot, the scene or the whole act. Questions go back by email, detached from the moment they are about. Answers arrive in another thread. By the second round there are two memos, a reply chain, and a mental list of what has and has not been addressed that exists only in the editor’s head.
None of that is a writing failure. It is a format failure: the note, the conversation about the note, and the state of the note live in three different places, and none of them is the timeline.
The room column describes the uncompressed.io review room. The memo still wins for a single sentence of feedback on a short cut; nobody needs a system for one note.
The craft
What makes a rough cut note useful,
and six that make one easy to close.
Whatever tool carries them, the notes themselves decide how the next cut turns out. These habits come from the same place every experienced producer learns them: watching an editor try to act on a vague one.
Watch once without notes
Sit through the whole cut before writing anything. A rough cut is judged on shape first, and a first-pass note on a scene often answers itself ten minutes later. Write the big notes after the first viewing, the small ones on the second.
Name the problem, then the goal
"The interview runs long here" is a reaction. "We lose the thread of the argument here; the audience needs the conclusion before the example" is a note. Say what is wrong and what the moment should do, and leave the how open.
One issue per note
A note that bundles a music change, a trim and a story question cannot be closed until all three are done, and one of them gets forgotten. Split them, so each can be ticked on its own.
Mark the weight
Say whether a note is a must, a strong preference or a passing thought. Editors spend their hours on the notes that sound urgent; tell them which ones actually are.
Say what works
Notes are not only defects. "Keep this transition" protects a good choice from being lost in the next pass, and tells the editor which instincts to trust across the cut.
Ask when you are unsure
"Is there a take where she finishes the sentence?" is a better note than an instruction built on a guess. A question invites the editor's knowledge of the footage, which is deeper than the producer's.
Three notes, rewritten
Too slow becomes: “The opening two minutes hold before we know whose story this is. Can we meet Ana before the landscape sequence? Must.”
Music? becomes: “The score arrives before the emotion does and tells us what to feel. Try letting the scene play dry until the phone call. Preference.”
Love this becomes: “This cut from the kitchen to the empty field is the best moment in the act. Protect it through the trims.”
Structure notes belong in one place, usually a single note at the start of the cut or on the scene where the problem begins, rather than scattered as symptoms across twenty timecodes. A reordering is one decision; describing its consequences note by note makes it look like twenty. Keep the producers’ voices consolidated where you can. When two people disagree, say so in the thread rather than sending the editor two notes that cancel out.
How the notes travel
Timecoded, threaded,
and closed one by one.
In the uncompressed.io review room, a note is written while the cut plays and is saved at the point in time where the reviewer paused. The format keeps the note, its conversation and its state together.
Upload the cut and send the link
The editor uploads the rough cut and shares a review link. The producer opens it in a browser without creating an account; the link is the access.
Notes land at their moment
The producer pauses and writes. Each note is stored at that point in the cut, with the author's name, and can carry a drawing on the picture for anything that needs pointing at.
Questions stay under the note
The editor replies directly under a note to ask what it means or to propose an alternative. Replies are one level deep, so the conversation stays attached to the moment instead of drifting into email.
Tick each note done
The account that owns the film marks each note done as it is addressed. Done notes drop out of the open list, so what remains is exactly what is left to do.
Notes record the round they were written in, and when the next cut goes up as a new version, approval is recorded per version under the reviewer’s name. A new note on an approved version withdraws that approval, so “approved, but one more thing” cannot slip through unnoticed. The review and approval guide covers versions and sign-off in full.
From the room to the edit
Pull the notes in as markers,
the timeline becomes the list.
The editor does not have to read the notes on a second screen. Free tools for Premiere Pro and DaVinci Resolve pull the room’s notes onto the timeline as markers at each note’s timecode, red for open and green for done, and refresh on the next pull (the Resolve script replaces only its own markers and leaves the editor’s alone). The working loop is short: pull the notes, work from marker to marker, tick each note done in the room, pull again, and the cleared ones come back green.
Setup and the details that matter before a deadline live in their own guides, and they differ by editor: the Premiere Pro panel is an installed extension, while the DaVinci Resolve script is run from the Scripts menu and has its own notes on film matching, versions and crowded frames. Final Cut Pro users get a marker bundle instead; all three are listed on the editor integrations page.
Before the first real round
When to skip all of this
When a memo is fine,
and when it earns its place.
A thirty-second spot with four notes from one person does not need a room, threads or markers. A short email with clear timecodes is faster for everyone, and the craft advice above still applies. The same goes for a producer sitting next to the editor: say it out loud.
The room earns its place on long-form and multi-round work: a documentary cut reviewed across time zones, a producer and a director giving notes on the same pass, a third round where nobody remembers which notes from round one were addressed. For that kind of project, the documentary remote review workflow shows how the pieces fit over months rather than days.
Questions
Frequently asked
How many notes should a rough cut get?
As many as the cut needs, but sorted. A first assembly can carry dozens of small observations and three structural problems; the editor needs to know which three matter before touching the small ones. Lead with story and structure, then pacing, then everything else, and say which notes are optional.
Should the producer suggest the fix, or only name the problem?
Name the problem and the goal first. A suggested fix is welcome as a second sentence, marked as a suggestion. Editors often find a better solution than the one proposed, and a note that only prescribes a fix hides what the fix was meant to achieve, so it cannot be judged when the fix does not work.
Who can mark a note as done?
The account that owns the film. Reviewers leave notes and reply to them; the owner ticks each one done as it is addressed. When the editor owns the upload, the editor closes the notes. When a producer uploads the cut, agree who ticks before the round starts.
Do replies become markers too?
Not as separate markers. The markers come from the notes themselves; the reply thread stays in the room. The Resolve guide lists exactly what its script imports, including how drawings are flagged.
Is the marker placed on the exact frame of the note?
Notes are stored by time in seconds, and the marker tools place a marker at the note's timecode on your timeline. Offsets, slates or a retimed review export can move that position, so run a two-note test on a copy of the timeline before a deadline round.
What if several producers give contradictory notes?
Settle it before it reaches the editor where you can. When it cannot be settled, the thread under the note is the place to argue it, in writing, at the moment in question, so the editor acts on the conclusion rather than on whichever voice arrived last.
Send the next rough cut as a room, not a memo
Upload the cut, send one link, and let the producer leave notes at the moment they apply. Reviewers need no account, and the free plan holds 5 GB and one film at a time.
Sources
- 1.uncompressed.io, client review room (product page, verified)
- 2.uncompressed.io, editor tools for Resolve, Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro (product page, verified)