Layered videos
Reelcraft doesn't have a separate way to make each kind of video. Every video is a timeline: tracks of things placed at times and places. A hand-drawn explainer, a slideshow with music, a short with word-by-word captions and a data video are all the same ingredients, placed differently. This page shows the ingredients and how the stages fit together.
The ingredients
Every ingredient is an asset of some kind, and every kind can be made during the run or uploaded to your channel's library and picked from there:
| Kind | Made during a run by | Or uploaded as |
|---|---|---|
| Pictures | Generate Image | Image |
| Cut-out characters | Generate Image on a plain colour, then Cut Out Background | Image |
| Clips | Generate Video, Flow | Video |
| Voice-over | Generate Speech | Audio |
| Background music | Generate Music | Audio |
| Sound effects | Generate Sound Effect; some are built in | Audio |
| Drawings (SVG) | A model draws them, Prepare Drawings checks them; some are built in | Drawing (SVG) |
| Motion graphics | Generate Motion Graphic, then Render Motion Graphic | Video |
| Any file from the web | Automate Browser downloads it | - |
Words, shapes, captions and the camera need no asset: they are part of the plan. Words can be in several colours (one word picked out of a line), written out by hand or typed letter by letter, and an arrow can join any two things on the screen and stay joined if either moves. See Compose Timeline.
The stages
- Make or find the assets. Generate them, or bind the library so a planning stage can see what you uploaded.
- Plan the layout. A Generate Text stage writes a plan: which asset goes where, and when it appears, by the words of the narration. Give it the catalogue of assets so it picks ids that exist. Tell it to pick only from the catalogue if you want only what you uploaded.
- Compose Timeline turns the plan into a timeline. It refuses an id that doesn't exist and says so, so a plan can't quietly use something that isn't there.
- Render Timeline makes the video.
The look comes from the planning prompt and the theme, not from a special stage. To make a hand-drawn whiteboard video, ask for a plain light background, drawings that are drawn on by hand, headlines written out and a soft sound as each thing appears. To make something else, ask for something else.
Motion graphics
Animated titles, charts, counters, diagrams, lower thirds and transitions are motion graphics. A model writes each one as code from your description (Generate Motion Graphic), and Reelcraft renders it into a clip (Render Motion Graphic). A transparent clip goes over other footage, and an opaque one fills the screen. The plan places the clips like any other video. Ask the assistant for "a narrated video of animated charts about …" to start from a worked blueprint.
Two ways to get the same asset
- Generated: nothing needs to exist in advance. Each run draws its own pictures, makes its own music, and so on. Every run is different, and costs whatever the generators cost.
- From the library: you uploaded the drawings, sounds, music and pictures to use, and told the planning stage to pick only from them. Every run looks like your brand, and nothing is made.
You can mix them in one video: drawings made in the run, a sound effect from the built-in set, and your own background music.
Try it
Ask the assistant for "a hand-drawn explainer about …". It starts from a worked blueprint with these stages. See the assistant.