Commenting on Assets

A comprehensive guide to Shade's commenting system, detailing how to leave time-stamped, anchored, and threaded comments to streamline collaboration and feedback for creative teams.

Introduction

Shade simplifies commenting, review, and client feedback by integrating these tools into a single, centralized hub. Whether you're collaborating internally or working with external clients, Shade provides time-stamped comments, range-based comments, threaded discussions, and emoji reactions to enhance communication and speed up review cycles.

This guide will walk you through how to leave, manage, and optimize comments in Shade to streamline your creative workflow.

Leaving Comments in Shade

Time-stamped comments

When you need to provide feedback on a precise moment in a video or audio-only file, time-stamped comments are invaluable. To leave a time-stamped comment:

1. Pause the video or audio at the desired frame
2. Navigate between frames using the '.' and ',' keys for fine-grained control, or click and drag the playhead to the desired spot
3. Enter your comment in the comment box on the right of the player
4. For video, provide an on-screen annotation to call attention to what you’re commenting on with the pencil icon

   • Choose your annotation style (arrow, line, box, or freehand)
   • Choose your color (red, yellow, or green)
   • Click and drag on the video or image frame to leave your annotation
5. Include relevant attachments with the Paperclip icon (supplemental files or image references for example)
6. Choose whether the comment should be Public or Internal

   • Public comments will be viewable to anyone with a link to the asset
   • Internal comments will only be viewable to internal workspace members who have access to the asset
7. Click Send (the purple arrow) or press the return key - the comment will be linked to the exact moment in the timeline for easy reference

Anchored Comments

For even more precise feedback, you can place comments directly on the video canvas:

1. Pause the video on the frame you would like to leave a comment
2. Click the anchor pin on the bottom of the video player, or active with Shift + C
3. Move your pointer directly to the video canvas and you’ll see its now the purple Anchor icon. Point and click on the exact thing you want to comment on
4. Write and submit the comment as you would normally

Anchored comments also include the ability to annotate, add attachments, and set as Public or Internal

Range-based Comments

Range-based comments are handy when you want to leave feedback about something that transpires over time, rather than on a specific frame. This is particularly relevant to on screen graphic animations over time, title durations, noting a moment of interest from a larger clip, and grabbing a key quote somebody said. Range-based comments work on any time-based media (i.e Video or Audio).

There are a few ways to leave a range-based comment:

• Shift-click the playhead to reveal handles, then drag the handles to set your desired range
• Mark in and out points with additional precession using your I and O keys
• Open the Transcript panel, highlight a desired text range to create a corresponding range-selection, and leave your desired comment

Range-based comments also include the ability to annotate, add attachments, and set as Public or Internal

General Comments Without a Timecode

If your feedback doesn't need to be linked to a specific frame or timestamp, you can leave a general comment:

1. Uncheck the timestamp clock next to the comment box
2. Type your feedback
3. Click send - your comment will be visible in the discussion but won't be linked to a specific frame

Commenting on Static File Types (i.e. Photo and PDF)

Shade also allows for commenting on supported static files like jpgs, pngs, pdfs, and more.

Many of the commenting functions mentioned above work on these file types, and will operate like a general comment without timecode. You can:

• Leave standard or anchored comments
• Include mark-ups and annotations
• Add attachments
• Make comments Public or Internal

PDF’s offer additional comment functionality with Text Annotation.

• Enable Text Annotation to highlight detected text within the PDF
• Leave comments on highlighted text
• Apply one of our provided labels for additional context:

  • Highlight
  • Insert
  • Remove
  • Replace

Notify Other Workspace Members

Shade gives you the ability to notify teammates through a comment via the @ key:

• As you write a comment, start typing @ and the team member's name to reference them in your comment
• The team member will receive an email notification bringing them to the comment you tagged them in

Navigating and Interacting with Comments

Threaded Replies for Contextual Discussions

Instead of creating separate comments on the same issue, threaded replies allow for focused discussions within a comment, making them ideal for team discussions, clarifying feedback, and addressing notes efficiently.

• Click Reply on an existing comment to add context or provide further clarification
• Keep all feedback organized and relevant by responding directly within the comment thread

Using Emoji Reactions for Quick Acknowledgments

When a detailed response isn't needed, emoji reactions provide a quick way to engage with feedback:

• Click the reaction button below a comment
• Choose from 👍, ✅, 🎉, or other emojis to approve, confirm, or celebrate progress

Marking Comments as Complete

To track progress, Shade allows users to mark comments as complete when feedback has been addressed:

• Comments can be marked by selecting the check icon on the comment
• This helps teams track which items have been resolved and which still need attention

Filter and Sort Comments

Depending on the media type, you’ll have a variety of filter and sort options. Use filtering hide or show the most relevant comments, and sort them in the desired order.

Filter comments by:

• Timestamps (Time-based media only)
• Annotations
• Anchored
• Mentions & Reactions
• Attachments
• Replies
• Public
• Internal
• Resolved
• Unresolved

Sort comments by:

• Timestamp (Time-based media only)
• Page order (PDF’s only)
• Oldest to Newest
• Newest to Oldest

Editing & Deleting Comments

If a comment needs to be revised or removed:

1. Hit the … on the comment to reveal the dropdown
2. Choose to:

   • Edit the comment to update feedback
   • Delete the comment if it's no longer relevant

Notifications

Shade allows you to receive notifications around various activities, across varying surfaces.

Setting Up Notification Preferences

Notification surfaces

Shades notification system supports notifications across:

• Our web and native desktop apps
• Your desktop with OS-level desktop notifications
• Email
• Slack

Activities

Per surface, you can dial in which activities you do or don’t get notified about, including:

• General Comments
• Mentions
• Comment Replies
• Comment Resolves
• Workspace Invitations (only available on Slack)

Interacting with In-app Notifications

Notifications are accessed at the top of the left-nav. Click to expand the notifications panel and view, All, Unread, or Read

• Click on a notification to go directly the asset and corresponding comment
• Click the 3-dot menu on any notification to

  • Mark as Read or Unread
  • Archive (archiving permanently deletes the notification)

Setting up Slack notifications

Connecting Shade to your Slack workspace

Within your Shade account:

1. Go to Settings > My Workspace > General > Slack Integration
2. Click Connect to Slack
3. Authenticate and choose the desired workspace
4. Choose which channels should receive notifications from across your entire workspace

Configure Drive-level Slack notification preference

You can configure more granular notification preferences on a Drive-by-drive basis, and point notifications from specific drives to desired Slack. Within Settings:

1. Go to Drives > click to expand the desired Drive > Slack Notifications
2. Choose the Slack channel(s) that should receive notifications from activities in the current Drive
3. Choose the Drive activities that will trigger notifications to the configured Slack channels.

AirPlay support

From our web or native desktop app, you can now AirPlay Video and Audio files to compatible AirPlay devices on your network.

1. Open the Video or Audio file you’d like to AirPlay
2. On the bottom right of the asset player, click the AirPlay icon
3. Select the desired device where you’d like to AirPlay content
4. Enjoy your content on the device you chose

Visual guides

Visual guides allow you to preview your videos files at varying crop aspect ratios when your outputting to various screens or platforms. Visual guides also include title and action safe guides to better help you frame your content.

1. Open your desired video file
2. Click the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the player
3. Click Guides
4. Choose the desired aspect ratio based on the screen or platform your creating for.
5. Optionally Hide or Show the mask to obscure the content that falls outside of the chosen aspect ratio

We offer a guides in a variety of aspect rations based on the most common screens and surfaces our customer are creating for. Submit a feature request to our team if there are additional aspect ratios you’d like to see!

Managing Access & Collaboration

Shade's granular permission controls ensure that the right people have access to the right content. Files, folders, and collections can be shared with commenting access.

Users that are accessing a published link with commenting permissions will not have to create a Shade account to leave feedback. This makes it especially convenient when working with external clients or stakeholders who may not be regular Shade users.

Final Thoughts

Shade unifies commenting, review, and media collaboration into one seamless platform. With time-stamped comments, replies, emoji reactions, and granular permissions, teams can work more efficiently - whether internally or with external collaborators.