[New] Scene Production Dates

[AdultSun]

As @echo6ix pointed out in this Discord discussion (sorry, I know I'm a little late to the party), editors will need initial guidance on how to handle the new production date field in StashDB.

We're still discussing how planned features for Stash-Box like release groups could dictate our current approach here, so some of this may change in order to make the data migration for those features easier. We're also still interested in hearing more from the community to make sure our approach is as useful and intuitive as it can be. So even though these details aren't finalized yet, I'm posting it now since a lot of editors seem confused about what "production date" is even supposed to mean, let alone how they're expected to use it.

I ended up going extremely long here, so the TL;DR is that the production date is meant to be as close to the day of filming as we can get. Easiest way to find it is if the studio publicly lists an official Date of Production somewhere (usually shown within the video itself or on the back of a DVD cover), though most studios don't bother to share them these days.

For re-released scenes that don't happen to have an official DoP, take the release date of the scene's original release (or at least the earliest release you can find) and use only the year and month as the production date. For example, if the original scene was released 2024-05-06, then the re-release's production date should be simply 2024-05.

Everything else past this point just explains how we would resolve disputes for edge cases where the above method proves to be either impossible or insufficient. It also serves as a brain dump for myself in preparation for writing a shorter, cleaner, and (hopefully) more useful version for the guidelines website.

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First, some background. Production dates are meant to correct situations where the scene's release date is misleading, such as a re-release from months or years after the original scene's release. In some cases, even the original scene's release could be unusually far removed from the day it was filmed. For us, the production date represents the closest date to the day the scene was filmed, to the best of our knowledge. By saving them in a separate field, functions within Stash and Stash-Box will be able to choose between either the release date or the production date whenever one makes more sense than the other. For example, prod. dates could be used to calculate more accurate performer ages within a scene or to create alternative chronological sorting options and filters.

The promise of a separate field for production dates is also a big reason why we've always insisted on re-releases to use the date of the re-release and not the original (guideline link). While misleading in the short-term, it allows us to more easily clear up that confusion by adding a production date instead.

The general rule of thumb here is similar to the rules on The Price is Right: "Closest without going over." We're looking for the closest date we can find to the day it was filmed, while remaining confident we aren't overshooting to a date before it was filmed.

This is for two reasons. First, it's always helpful in these situations to be able to say, for example, "Always round down." Establishing a consistent method for resolving ambiguities makes it easier for both for the editors who need to make these calls and for the users who want to understand how we make them. Second, the reasoning for rounding towards our latest estimate instead of our earliest estimate is more practical. If we use the production dates to calculate and display a performer's estimated age, we want to err on the side of caution to avoid misleading anyone into thinking the performer was too young at the time of filming. Not everyone is going to understand that those ages are less accurate than they seem at first glance.

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The section below lists what sources could be used to populate or update a scene's production date. They are ordered from highest to lowest priority, similar to how I ranked the possible sources for scene tags in this guideline section. Higher-ranked sources trump lower-ranked sources. Bullet points are used to provide further context as to why each potential source is ranked the way it is.

It should also be noted that this list allows approximate dates (e.g., YYYY-MM instead of YYYY-MM-DD), but only in certain circumstances. First, they are at the bottom of the tier list, preferring more specific estimates whenever possible. Second, they are only useful when the MM in the approx. production date is earlier than the MM in the release date. If our best guess for the production date is too close to the release date, adding it would only serve to muddy the waters by making it seem like we have more information than we actually do. In those situations, it is better to leave the production date blank so that any functions in Stash or Stash-Box can use the release date as a fallback instead.

I will also point out that exceptions could still be found to this hierarchy, depending on the situation. For example, if a lower-ranked source calls the accuracy of a higher-ranked source into question -- like the earlier example of a scene's release date being earlier than the movie's listed DoP, or if a performer's particular "look" from a well-established period of time invalidates the date sourced from a photo gallery's metadata -- then the higher-ranked source should be discarded in favor of the next best source.

Unfortunately populating this field will always rely heavily on investigation, inferences, and guesswork, so we can't get away with hard and fast rules here. In order to get the most accurate data when resolving disputes, it'll often come down to making a determination on a case-by-case basis. The goal here is simply to provide a rubric for determining the best source for the vast majority of scenes, not to create a rigid flowchart that must be applied to every situation while ignoring all context.

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1. Hard evidence of the exact date a scene was filmed

• Typically this is a social media post that explicitly says "we filmed this scene today/yesterday/etc.", but it could include any other primary source for the specific day of filming. For example, the release date of any livestreamed video would be the same as the day it was filmed. By comparison, all lower-ranked sources estimate the day of filming using some other unverified date.
• I expect this kind of source to be rarely used and hard to find. Even though this is at the top of the priority list, I would only recommend digging for this type of evidence if both of these statements are true: the release date is significantly different from when you suspect it was filmed and the other potential sources are either non-existent or insufficient. But if you happen to stumble upon a reliable primary source like this, absolutely do not hesitate to use it.
• While not "official" data, I would compare this to how we already correct release dates that were modified by the studio to make a scene appear newer than it actually is. We want the production date to be the closest date to the actual day of filming with the highest degree of confidence in its accuracy, same as wanting the release date to be the closest date to the actual day it was released to the public.

2. Officially reported Date of Production

• Most often found as part of a production slate in the beginning of a video, on the back of a DVD/BluRay cover, or even embedded in the original filename provided from the studio (I believe Brazzers used to do this). Sometimes referred to as a D.O.P. or Date of Manufacture instead.
• I expect this to be the most commonly used source by far since it is both relatively easy to find (compared to the others) and has a high degree of reliability.
• Doesn't always mean "day filmed", sometimes means "day production started" in a broader sense, or even "day we printed the DVDs." So even though it's "official" and almost definitely closer to the day of filming than the release date, it's also not always 100% accurate.
  • Only example I remember seeing of an official DoP being wildly inaccurate are for DVDs that compile previously released web scenes. Quite a few of these types of movies from Aylo (MindGeek at the time) seemed to have DoPs that referred to the date production started on the DVD itself, making that date more recent than the original digital releases of those same scenes.
• Some DVD backcovers include a list or range of dates for their DoP. In these instances where the exact date can't be differentiated for a particular scene, use the most recent date within the possible range. This is one example of where the "closest without going over" rule comes into play.

3. Embedded metadata from original files

• If there's no official DoP listed anywhere, sometimes you can get a date that's at least in the ballpark by digging into the official photo gallery for the scene. Outside of the rare exception (though I couldn't give you any specific examples), photoshoots are taken on the same day the related scene is filmed. And since ZIP archives preserve this metadata, the date taken/created/modified fields in an official gallery archive would most likely have been set by the studio themselves either on the day of filming or soon after.
• While the accuracy of these dates cannot be verified on their own, they can at least be used to provide a specific date that's closer to the day of filming than the original release date. I personally find that specific date useful enough to be worth preserving, but I can also understand if those specific dates are considered unreliable enough to warrant an approximate date (YYYY-MM) instead.

4. Estimated date (YYYY-MM) based on notable changes in a performer's appearance compared to other scenes or outside evidence

• The first of the approximated and purely speculative dates. Even if the estimated date is sourced from, for example, the exact day they got a certain tattoo, we would still want to use the approximate date (only YYYY-MM) to signal that the production date is based on speculation and not specific evidence. This is the same reasoning for using approx. dates elsewhere in StashDB.
• Useful when a performer has distinct "eras" to their appearance, such as before/after cosmetic surgery, changes in hairstyle, new tattoos or piercings, significant weight change, etc.
• Regardless of the exact method used, the burden is on the editor to cite their sources and explain their reasoning for the estimated date.
• Similar to choosing from a range of official DoPs, I would use the latest possible YYYY-MM combo that can be proven at the time for these kinds of estimates.
  • For example, if a social media post establishes that a performer had cosmetic surgery sometime in January of 2025, then a production date of 2025-01 could be used for any scene of theirs released in February of 2025 that was clearly filmed before that surgery. Then, if an editor realizes that Scene X features a distinct hairstyle of theirs that is older than January 2025, they could look through that performer's scenes to find that 2024-05-06 is the latest available production date where the performer has that same hairstyle. The editor could then cite that scene's production date to update the approx. production date for Scene X from 2025-01 to 2024-05.

5. FOR RE-RELEASES ONLY, estimated date (YYYY-MM) inherited from the earliest known release date of that scene

• These kinds of estimates would not be useful for original releases since it would only serve to chop off the -DD from the end of the release date, adding nothing to its accuracy.
• Also would not be helpful for any re-releases that occur within the same month for the same reason.

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Stash-Box FR
Stash FR

[KlfJoat]

I have a special snowflake niche site that I legit purchase every scene from over their last 20 years of output and have made it my mission to get right in StashDB. And because they're so small (≅250 scenes over that timeframe), they don't always do things the way other studios do. For example, they don't have a database running the content of their website--when they release a new scene, they just copy a static HTML file and edit it. So in case any of my feedback makes you say "WTF", just check with me bc I probably have a specific example of why I'm asking the question.

Some DVD backcovers include a list or range of dates for their DoP. In these instances where the exact date can't be differentiated for a particular scene, use the most recent date within the possible range. This is one example of where the "closest without going over" rule comes into play.

This studio has, nearly without fail, a "date of production" on the 2257 notice at the beginning of each one of their videos. And as best I can tell from Twitter posts by them and actors, those dates are accurate to the day.

HOWEVER, they'll often have multiple DoPs on what seems like the simplest scenes. Their most recent says the following (emphasis mine for comedic effect).

Date of Production: July 26 amd November 22, 2024

And that's before you get to these monstrosities they have, where they're doing production for this thing over YEARS. They don't split it up into multiple 'scenes' because there's a plot and what happens in a prior scene affects a later scene in ways that are integral to the fetish. For example, they'll hire actresses who are planning breast enhancement surgery and intentionally film them before and after.

So what you've written is a little vague on this given the wildness I have to deal with for this studio (exact, official DoPs that match your # 2 and usually your # 1, but sometimes multiple dates). I hope the Guideline can be written to be a little clearer. I'd prefer something like "If there are multiple DoP from the same source, always choose the newest one." Or similarly clear direction.

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Again, because of the nature of the fetish, they sometimes do CGI on a video and re-release it. Very little has changed content-wise--usually a little longer scene in one place or the enlargement of a body part in another place. Or one time, a dragon. I think the max I noticed was a video extended/changed by 1 minute. It's NOT a "re-release", not the way every other studio does it.

That makes for an interesting DoP question that ties back to what y'all were discussing in #MoT. They've done PRODUCTION work on the scene since the initial release. Do I keep the FILMING date as the DoP? Or the new release date? Or do I do the ISO 8601 YYYY-MM? Or what?

[AdultSun]

As uncommon as these examples are, I believe my first draft from up top still applies pretty cleanly. Like you said, the final guideline language just needs to be more direct to clear up the confusion. It's a lot harder to find the relevant section in the middle of that big wall of text until then.

Each example represents a unique situation, so I'll go through them one by one. However, the reasoning behind each solution is essentially the same.

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I'll start with this example:

HOWEVER, they'll often have multiple DoPs on what seems like the simplest scenes. Their most recent says the following (emphasis mine for comedic effect).

Date of Production: July 26 amd November 22, 2024

I'll answer this with the same quote you included earlier, but with added emphasis:

Some DVD backcovers include a list or range of dates for their DoP. In these instances where the exact date can't be differentiated for a particular scene, use the most recent date within the possible range. This is one example of where the "closest without going over" rule comes into play.

This means we try to use the available evidence to narrow the list of possible DoPs first, then resort to rounding to the most recent date when we can't narrow it any further. The important part is that we don't round at all if we don't have to.

I should also explain the "closest without going over" rule at the end of this quote. The full version is further up that initial post, copied here with additional emphasis:

We're looking for the closest date we can find to the day it was filmed, while remaining confident we aren't overshooting to a date before it was filmed.

I go on from there to explain why we round to the most recent date instead of the least recent date, but the quote on its own defines the goal of everything else that goes into this guideline. All of the other rules and rankings and exceptions are all aiming towards achieving that one goal: finding a date that is as close to the day of filming as possible, but erring on the side of too recent instead of too early.

So for this particular scene, we have two possible production dates spanning a few months. If we don't have enough information to say which of the two dates is closer to the date of filming, then we default to the most recent date of 2024-11-22. Maybe filming took place in July, or November, or somewhere in-between. Or maybe filming was split across both months. The point is if we can't tell which date is closer to the day of filming, we use the most recent date.

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Next example:

Again, because of the nature of the fetish, they sometimes do CGI on a video and re-release it. Very little has changed content-wise--usually a little longer scene in one place or the enlargement of a body part in another place. Or one time, a dragon. I think the max I noticed was a video extended/changed by 1 minute. It's NOT a "re-release", not the way every other studio does it.

That makes for an interesting DoP question that ties back to what y'all were discussing in #MoT. They've done PRODUCTION work on the scene since the initial release. Do I keep the FILMING date as the DoP? Or the new release date? Or do I do the ISO 8601 YYYY-MM? Or what?

I'd argue that from StashDB's perspective, this does count as a "re-release". Even when the content of a scene is different between two separate releases (e.g., extended digital release vs. shortened DVD release, watersports vs. no watersports, censored vs. uncensored, remastered vs. original), we would still consider them alternate releases of each other. We're currently discussing how best to link re-releases in Stash-Box while considering those possible differences in content, but its effect on the production date is still clear when using this definition: "Closest date we can find to the day it was filmed."

In situations where you have one scene with a single DoP from (assumedly) the day it was filmed, and a re-release that adds a second DoP presumed to be the day it was edited, the re-release would still inherit the older DoP from the original release. We know that the earlier DoP is closer to the day it was filmed (if not the exact day it was filmed), so there's no ambiguity to resolve by rounding up or down. Ignore the later date because we know it's not an accurate representation of the filming date. Use the earlier date instead.

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This last example sounded like the least common situation, so I saved it for the end:

And that's before you get to these monstrosities they have, where they're doing production for this thing over YEARS. They don't split it up into multiple 'scenes' because there's a plot and what happens in a prior scene affects a later scene in ways that are integral to the fetish. For example, they'll hire actresses who are planning breast enhancement surgery and intentionally film them before and after.

The scene from your example has a string of dates ranging from 2010-04-29 to 2012-08-14. We have no way to reduce that list of dates because any or all of them could be a filming date. So, we have no choice but to resolve that ambiguity by rounding to the most recent date within that range, 2012-08-14. That way we're still consistently rounding in the same direction throughout StashDB, whether that ambiguity is the result of not knowing which date is the filming date or the result of multiple filming dates.

[echo6ix]

@AdultSun I specifically joined this thread to caution about compilation releases, but it looks you caught the issue too.

Submitted production dates will need elevated scrutiny. While simple to find a production date (production year) using Adult DVD Empire and similar retailers, as they specifically have a production year field. That date may not accurately reflect the production date of a split scene submission if the date is being sourced from a compilation rather than its original release.

Luckily researching the scene on IAFD can help as they indicate if a release was a compilation, however their accuracy is hit-and-miss. There are many compilation releases of web scenes that are not flagged as compilations. Either because IAFD may not consider this type of a release as a compilation if it's not derived from movie scenes or simply because editors aren't omniscient about every detail of the material.

[sleetx]

For re-released scenes that don't happen to have an official DoP, take the release date of the scene's original release (or at least the earliest release you can find) and use only the year and month as the production date. For example, if the original scene was released 2024-05-06, then the re-release's production date should be simply 2024-05.

Why not just use the original release's official production date?

Production dates are meant to correct situations where the scene's release date is misleading, such as a re-release from months or years after the original scene's release.

Production dates are meant to identify the original date of production. There is nothing more to read into it.

If re-releases are misleading, it's because they are not being adequately identified as re-releases, nor being linked to the original release. That is a whole separate issue and should not be addressed here.

Populating this field will always rely heavily on investigation, inferences, and guesswork, so we can't get away with hard and fast rules here

I strongly disagree with this approach. If we have an official production date from the studio (or other hard evidence), then use it. If we do not, then leave the field blank. We want ACCURATE data, not guesswork.

[echo6ix]

@AdultSun For official guidelines, what do you want to do in scenarios where Production Date (e.g. 2010-01-01) is newer than the Release Date (e.g. 1999-01-01)?

Assuming all dates were correctly obtained, should the rule be to:

• A. change the Release Date to match the Production Date and add Missing Date tag, or
• B. change the Release Date to match the Production Date year only and add Missing Date tag, or
• C. leave scraped Release Date as is, and treat it like an anomaly as we do with improper grammar and spelling in titles.