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User guide

9. Shot Scaffold

Build your timed shot list — order, length on the song, and where each shot sits.

Shot scaffold produces your shot list on the editorial timeline: order, how long each shot lasts on the beat grid, which location each shot uses, and rough framing / motion hints — aligned to Acts and the clock from Inputs (full mix downbeats or a fixed / narrative-derived runtime).

This step owns structure only. Detailed generation text lives in Shot direction (Step 10).

What this step is for

A single agreed map of shots before you write detailed direction or spend time generating pictures — so everyone points at the same plan.

What each shot row shows

  • Shot number and timecode / duration on the left.
  • Pills — shot type (violet), character focus, angle, movement, lens, rig, depth of field, optional location.
  • Camera framing (italic line) and beat summary (what happens in the beat).
  • Blue pills — optional scaffold camera actions (0–3 short tags, e.g. “minor datamoshing glitch”). These are structural beats, not the long brief.
  • Edit — opens a modal to change all scaffold fields for that row (including camera actions as a tag input: type + Enter, up to three). For full-mix projects, use Use as vocal performance shot here (performer, model, crop) — not on Shot direction.

What to do

  1. Confirm Acts, Locations, and Audio analysis are locked unless you mean to change something earlier on purpose.
  2. Open Shot scaffold.
  3. Run Generate scaffold (or the equivalent button) and wait — it can take a few minutes.
  4. Skim the list in song order — use Edit on any row to fix cast slug, location, beat text, camera setup, or scaffold camera-action tags.
  5. Unlock the step if it is locked and you need to edit, then Lock again when the list matches creative intent.

You do not write the long AI shot brief here — that is Step 10.

Screenshot of Step 9

Click the image for the full-page capture. Scroll to zoom and drag to pan.

When to regenerate

Redo scaffold after big changes to Acts, Locations, or beats from audio analysis — so lengths and place names stay honest. Small copy fixes are fine with Edit on individual rows.

Next

Shot direction — AI brief per shot (what we see, action, negatives, directive camera notes). Structure stays here on Step 9.