Film Crew Roles Explained: Who Does What on an Indian Film Set

Walk onto a Film City set at 7 a.m. and most of the people you see will never appear on screen. Light men are rigging the first setup. The art team is dressing the room. The focus puller is measuring the distance to the actor's first mark, and a spot boy is already going round with tea. Each of them works inside a team for their own craft, and most could tell you whose call they wait for. 

This guide explains film crew roles the way an Indian set actually runs: who plans the shoot, who does what during a take, what happens after wrap, and how Indian titles line up with the ones in Hollywood guides. For the wider map of careers across the industry, see our guide to film industry jobs.

What Is a Film Crew, and Who Is Not on It

A film crew is everyone who works on a production without appearing in it. The cast is the people on screen, from leads found through auditions in Mumbai and other casting calls to the junior artistes in a crowd scene. The crew is everyone else, from the producer who raised the money to the light man coiling the last cable at pack-up. 

Two budget terms come up often. Above-the-line and below-the-line are budget and production-accounting categories: the first usually covers the director, producers, writer and lead cast, and the second covers the technical and craft crew and the costs of the shoot itself. They describe where a cost sits in the budget, not how or when someone is hired. Who outranks whom at the very top, producer or director, depends on the project and its contracts, and our guide to filmmaker jobs in India covers those above-the-line careers in depth. This article focuses mainly on the film crew roles performed during the shoot, with shorter sections on planning and post-production. 

Job listings often call the same jobs film crew positions. "Positions" usually means the slots on a call sheet, and "roles" the work itself. 

How the Film Crew Hierarchy Works on Indian Sets

On an Indian set, the film crew hierarchy is organized craft by craft. Each department generally has its own leadership, a head of department (HOD) with assistants working under them, while the 1st AD coordinates every craft on the floor. How HODs report to the director, producer, line producer or production manager depends on the production and on the authority each role has been given. 

HOD stands for head of department: the senior person who leads one craft on a production, brings in its assistants and answers for its work. The DOP is the HOD for camera, the sound recordist for location sound and the costume designer for wardrobe. The gaffer heads lighting, and the Media & Entertainment Skills Council (MESC) standard for a gaffer describes the job as the chief lighting technician who runs a team of lighting technicians to carry out the lighting plan. Standards like this describe what a role covers for training and certification, not reporting lines on a particular production. 

A film department hierarchy is this vertical chain: the HOD at the top, key technicians below, then assistants and trainees. Some Hindi film shoots also sort crew into informal tiers. The Hollywood Reporter India describes HODs at the top, an A-crew of key technicians, a B-crew of assistants and junior technicians, and a C-crew that includes lightmen, grip staff, construction workers and drivers. Everyone working the shoot on a given day is the unit. 

Indian units are also harder to chart than Hollywood diagrams suggest. Titles move: chief AD, associate director and 1st AD are used differently in Hindi cinema and across the regional film industry in India, and from one unit to the next. Small units also merge chains. On a three-day ad shoot or a fast micro drama schedule, one person may cover what a feature splits across several assistants. 

Before the Shoot: The Film Production Roles That Plan the Film

Most film production roles do their heaviest work weeks before the first shot. Prep is when a production decides what the film will look like, where it will be shot, who will be in it and what it can afford. It is also when the film department hierarchy fills up, as each HOD brings in assistants for the film crew positions below them. 

The producer brings in the money and the key hires, through the film industry hiring process. The line producer breaks the script into a budget and a shooting schedule, then holds the production to both. The production manager runs that plan day to day from the production office, handling vendors, transport, permissions and paperwork. 

The director settles most of the film's choices in prep, through script readings, casting sessions, look tests and the recce, the scouting visit to shortlisted locations. The casting director finds and auditions actors for each part, a process explained in our guide to how movie casting really works. The location manager finds and locks locations and arranges the permissions to shoot there. 

The DOP starts early too. MESC's standard for a director of photography lists determining the visual style, carrying out location recces, recruiting the camera team and estimating camera equipment, all before the camera rolls. MESC's art director standard has the art director designing the key elements of the set and coordinating their construction. 

On the Floor: Film Crew Roles During a Take

During a take, film crew roles divide into the people who run the floor and the people who serve one craft. The 1st AD coordinates the floor for the director, while each craft's crew works under its own HOD. 

The assistant director team sets the rhythm of the day. According to the Indian Film Institute, Bollywood productions usually run three AD levels. The 1st AD manages the set, the schedule and safety, the 2nd AD prepares call sheets and handles actors' schedules and background artists, and the 3rd AD manages extras and lock-offs. The 1st AD typically calls "lock it up" for quiet before a take and the director usually calls "action", though smaller units and background action can work differently. 

Camera crew roles are where titles get mixed up most often. The focus puller is the 1st AC and the clapper loader is the 2nd AC. MESC's national standard for an assistant cameraman centers on focus work: marking focus distances for each composition and refocusing the lenses during the shoot, along with setting up and packing the camera equipment. Artisty lists camera crew jobs by these same titles, from DOP and 1st AC to camera attendant. 

The table below covers the core film crew roles and responsibilities on a shoot day. Reporting lines vary by production, so read the last column as the usual arrangement rather than a fixed chart. 

Two of the film crew roles in that table blur on Indian units. Lighting and grip are separate trades in the Hollywood model, but on smaller ad and OTT shoots the same crew often rigs both, so check who is handling grip before you assume a key grip is on the call sheet. Song and action days also bring their own teams: the choreographer and the action director arrive with dancers or stunt performers who work under them for those days.

Production Assistants, Spot Boys and the People Who Keep a Set Moving

A production assistant supports the production team with logistics, paperwork and coordination, while a spot boy supports the whole unit on the floor. Indian sets treat them as different jobs, and the national skills standards define them separately. 

MESC's production assistant standard describes an assistive role across the production department: logistics, coordination, preparing documents and checking that equipment and materials are in place. It covers coordinating production activities, preparing a daily progress report against the schedule and budget, and assisting performers and crew. That is what a production assistant in film usually means on an Indian unit: someone helping the production office keep the plan on track. 

The spot boy standard covers the floor. A spot boy gets the location ready, loads and unloads shooting equipment, sets up background action as the ADs direct, looks after technicians and actors through the day and keeps the location clean. On Hindi sets, "dada" (elder brother in Marathi) is a fond name for long-serving crew, which is how Quartz came to profile a spot dada, a setting dada and a lights dada. 

Hollywood guides use "production assistant" as the catch-all entry job on set. On Indian units, the film crew positions that cover floor support are shared between spot boys and AD trainees, so read the job description rather than the title. Our guide to film production jobs in India covers how people land these first jobs, and jobs in the film industry for freshers covers getting hired with no experience. 

After the Wrap: Post-Production Roles in Brief

Once shooting ends, the film crew roles that remain move to post. The editor builds the film with the director from the footage. The colorist grades the picture during the DI (digital intermediate), the stage where the final look is set. The sound designer, foley artists and re-recording mixer build and balance the final soundtrack. Dubbing artists re-record dialogue, both to replace unusable set audio and to create versions of the film in other languages. The VFX supervisor plans effects shots on set and oversees the artists who finish them. Our guide to post-production jobs covers each of these careers, and AI-assisted post sits among the in-demand jobs in the film industry for 2026. 

Indian Titles for Film Crew Roles and Their Global Equivalents

Most film crew positions carry the same names in India and in Hollywood guides. A handful of Indian titles for film crew roles have only a closest equivalent, and usage varies by production and language industry. 

Many film production roles also have their own association. The Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) is an umbrella body for more than 30 unions in Mumbai, covering spot boys, makeup artists, lightmen, editors, dancers and other crew. Cinematographers, directors and writers have separate associations: WICA, IFTDA and the Screenwriters Association.

Getting Found for the Work You Can Do

On Artisty, you are listed by the exact film crew roles you do, from focus puller to 2nd AD. When you sign up, you pick every role you actually take on. Each project you add gets its own card with the role you held and what you handled on it. 

KalaAi, the AI built into Artisty, adds a second layer. A ten-minute skill check built from your skills, followed by a short KalaAi interview, earns a verified badge on your profile. Productions crewing up post each role under their project with the skills it needs, which is how a filmy network should work: people found by the craft they actually do. Productions can start with our guide to film crew for hire in India. 

Conclusion

A film set looks chaotic from the outside because so many people move at once. From the inside, each craft has its own head and its own assistants, and the 1st AD keeps the whole unit on one schedule. Knowing which team a role belongs to tells you who you will learn from and what you will be judged on. 

That is also the useful way to choose between film production roles: pick the role first, then learn the chain around it and the film industry skills it asks for. Then make your profile say exactly that. Sign up on Artisty, list the film crew roles you have handled on set, add a project card for each shoot and take the KalaAi skill check. 

Frequently Asked Questions

What are film crew roles? 

Film crew roles are the jobs on a production held by people who do not appear on screen. They include the director, producers and writer above the line, and the camera, lighting, sound, art, costume, makeup, production and assistant director teams below it. On Indian sets, each craft is led by a head of department, with assistants and trainees working under them. 

What is the difference between a gaffer and a key grip? 

A gaffer runs the lighting team and is responsible for the lights and power that carry out the DOP's lighting plan. A key grip runs the grips, who handle camera support and rigging such as dolly track, cranes, stands and flags. On smaller Indian units the same crew often handles both, so the split is clearest on large features. 

What is the difference between a 1st AD and a production manager? 

The 1st AD runs the set: the day's shooting order, the pace of each setup and the call for quiet before a take. The production manager runs the production office: vendors, transport, permissions and the daily cost of the shoot. The 1st AD usually works for the director on the floor, while the production manager typically reports to the line producer. 

How many people work on a film crew in India? 

There is no fixed number. How many film crew positions a production fills depends on the format, the budget and the day's work. A two-day ad shoot can run with a small unit, while a feature's song or action day adds dancers, stunt teams and junior artistes on top of the core crew. The most reliable guide is the call sheet for that specific day. 

Is an art director the same as a production designer on Indian films? 

Not always. On many Indian films the art director is the head of the art team and there is no production designer credit. On larger productions, the production designer sets the overall look of the film and the art director carries it out on set, managing construction, dressing and changes between setups. The credits show which version of the film department hierarchy a production used.