Docs / Guides / Studio: from concepts to the final film

Studio: from concepts to the final film

Studio mode opens a local board where you choose a concept, compare it with the others, leave notes, approve a storyboard, and only then does the film get built. This guide walks through one real run, step by step, with a screenshot of each step. The video is a 20-second trailer for Tidepool, a fictional notes app that ships with showtime as sample material.

Say this#

"Show me options first for a 20-second trailer that tells note-takers everything they write stays on their own machine."

"Options first" (or "studio") is the trigger. Without it, your agent goes straight to a draft.

1. Your agent starts the session and builds the board#

It makes a job, attaches a studio session to it, writes the concepts into studio/board.json, and renders one to three style frames for each concept. Then it checks the board and opens it.

A terminal: showtime studio init, two showtime studio frame runs that render three frames each in under 3 seconds, showtime studio board printing "board OK: rev 1, 4 concepts", and showtime studio open printing a local link.

The terminal output is trimmed to the lines that matter; showtime studio frame runs once per concept. The link is local (127.0.0.1) and carries a key. It opens nowhere else.

2. Open the board#

Round 1 is the question "which direction feels like a Tidepool trailer?". There are three concepts and one wildcard. Each card has its frames, a one-line pitch, the hook of the first three seconds, a palette, type, music and the risk. One concept is marked Recommended, with the reason.

The studio board at round 1: the heading "Which direction feels like a Tidepool trailer?", and cards for C1 Low tide, C2 Macro (recommended) and C3 Keystrokes, each with a style frame.

3. Compare two concepts#

The Compare tab puts any two concepts on one frame. Drag across it to wipe from one to the other.

The Compare tab: one frame split by the wipe line, C1 Low tide on the left with its wave line and the words "Q4 planning draft", and C3 Keystrokes on the right with the app's command palette.

4. Pick, like and comment#

Pick chooses a concept. The heart likes one, and you can like a concept you did not pick, to say "keep this part". The speech-bubble button opens a comment. Here the reviewer picks C2, likes C1 and writes that the film should land on C1's sunrise.

A comment box on C2 Macro with the text: Frame 1 reads instantly. Land the name on the sunrise from C1.

Every click is saved on your computer in studio/feedback.json. Press Feedback to read what you left:

The Feedback panel listing the pick, the like and the comment, with a box to add a note and a Copy for your agent button.

5. Your agent reads it and answers#

You tell your agent you are done. It runs showtime studio feedback, repeats what you said in a few lines, logs the decision in decisions.md (append-only) and brings out the next round. What you typed on the board is quoted as your opinion about the video; it is never run as an instruction.

A terminal: showtime studio feedback printing the pick C2 Macro, the like on C1 and the comment, then showtime studio decide appending D-002.

6. Check the storyboard#

Round 2 is the storyboard of the concept you picked: every shot with its time range, what is on screen, and a note on how it moves. The thumbnails are rendered from the draft project at those moments. Open the Storyboard tab, and use Note under a shot to say what to change.

The Storyboard tab: the first three shot cards, C2.1 to C2.3, each with a thumbnail, a time range such as 0:00.0 to 0:02.5, what is on screen, how it moves and a Note button.

A comment box on shot C2.1: Hold the first shot a beat longer.

The Animatic below the storyboard is a rough cut with the music, to judge pace before anything is rendered; n adds a note at the moment you are watching.

7. Approve#

The Decide tab has the questions your agent still needs answered, two dials (energy and pace) and an Approve button for the concept you want built, with a box for final notes.

The Decide tab: Energy and Pace sliders, "C2 · Macro, ending on the sunrise" chosen in the Ready box, the note "Lock it. Cuts on the beat." and an Approve button.

Your agent reads the approval, logs it and builds the film. This is the last point to change your mind cheaply.

A terminal for steps 6 and 7: the storyboard thumbnails rendered, the board checked at rev 2, and showtime studio feedback printing APPROVED: C2 Macro, ending on the sunrise with the final note.

8. See the final#

showtime render draws every frame on your computer, and showtime qa checks the file. For this film the render took 45 seconds for 20 seconds of 1080p.

Four frames of the finished trailer: the words "Sync: local only" in macro focus, a task being ticked, a note on local-first software, and the end card: Tidepool, Your notes, kept on your own machine.

In quality mode (the default), a critic reviews the finished film and you can leave notes on it too: Leave notes on a video and get them fixed. The finished trailer from an earlier run of this same session is example 09.

How long it takes#

Measured for this guide on a 6-core Intel Mac, while nothing else was rendering:

Step	What ran	Time
Style frames, one concept	`showtime studio frame ... --html` (3 frames)	2.8 to 3.2 s (39 s the first time, while the browser started)
Storyboard thumbnails	`showtime studio frame ... --project --at` (8 frames)	9.6 s
The final render	`showtime render <project> --job <job>` (20 s, 1080p)	45 s

Your agent's writing of the concepts and your own time on the board come on top and were not timed.

Phrases that change it#

"Show me options first", "studio", "I want control": opens the board.
"Only stop me for concepts": your agent fills the other stops with its recommended answer and logs them as assumed.
"Resume the studio": it reads brief.md and decisions.md and carries on; it never asks a settled question again.
"Export the board": showtime studio export <job> --inline makes one HTML file you can send.

Limits#

The board is local. Anyone you send the link to cannot open it; export it if someone else must look.
The style frames show a direction, not the film. A concept can look right in frames and still be hard to animate.
Music beds and voice samples also go on the board; this run skipped them to stay short.
To keep the run short, the project that was rendered in step 8 is the finished project of example 09, copied to a plain folder; the storyboard thumbnails and the final film come from it. The clicks on the board were made with a headless browser, the way a reviewer would make them. The board pictures were captured again later from the same job at a higher resolution, with the board and its feedback put back to each round as it was.
The commands behind each step: Studio mode; the board file: Board format.

View or edit docs/guides/studio-concepts-to-final.md on GitHub