Definition:
At the end of every shooting day, the footage from that day gets transferred and made available for review. Those raw, unedited recordings are the dailies. Also called rushes. They are the quality control checkpoint that prevents a production from finishing a shoot and discovering in post that something critical is unusable.
What It Means in Movies:
The director and DP watch the dailies to check performance, focus, exposure, and framing. They are confirming that what they thought they captured is actually on the recording. A performance that felt strong on set can fall flat on playback. A focus pull that seemed clean can turn out to be slightly soft.
Why It Matters:
The nightmare scenario in filmmaking is finishing a shoot and discovering in post that a crucial scene is technically compromised in a way nobody noticed at the time. Dailies exist to make that nightmare less likely. Productions that skip them or review them carelessly tend to find out why that was a mistake during the edit.
Example:
On a two-month shoot, the director and producer review dailies every evening to check performances, monitor visual consistency, and flag anything that needs revisiting before the company moves on. The editor sometimes watches simultaneously from a remote location, beginning to assemble the cut in real time.