@officexapp/vidfarm-devcli 0.21.42 → 0.21.45

package/SKILL.director.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 ---
 name: vidfarm
-description: Use Vidfarm as a director. Run a strategy **consultation** (the `brainstorm/*` chain — cold-start interview, awareness stages, persuasive angles, hooks, product placement). Answer "give me content ideas" / "what should I post" / "I need 30 videos this month" from the bundled 50-frame angle bank. Browse/add inspiration videos, browse the free public raws catalog BY CATEGORY (curated shelves like scroll-stoppers/greenscreen/reaction — the cheapest way to source footage for one video, and a ready-made clip pool for bulk scripting N variants), fork a template into a composition, edit it in the Trackpad Editor (timeline-based like Premiere/DaVinci), auto-decompose source video into scenes, render to MP4, approve into a shareable post, and schedule it. Includes login, provider keys, discovery, versioning, uploads/downloads, and billing. Every step is available as raw REST; `vidfarm-devcli` wraps those routes and composes the file-backed scripting flows.
+description: Use Vidfarm as a director. Run a strategy **consultation** (the `brainstorm/*` chain — cold-start interview, awareness stages, persuasive angles, hooks, product placement). Answer "give me content ideas" / "what should I post" / "I need 30 videos this month" from the bundled idea banks (50 content frames x 5 awareness stages x 44 problem angles). Browse/add inspiration videos, browse the free public raws catalog BY CATEGORY (curated shelves like scroll-stoppers/greenscreen/reaction — the cheapest way to source footage for one video, and a ready-made clip pool for bulk scripting N variants), fork a template into a composition, edit it in the Trackpad Editor (timeline-based like Premiere/DaVinci), auto-decompose source video into scenes, render to MP4, approve into a shareable post, and schedule it. Includes login, provider keys, discovery, versioning, uploads/downloads, and billing. Every step is available as raw REST; `vidfarm-devcli` wraps those routes and composes the file-backed scripting flows.
 ---
 
 # Vidfarm Director
@@ -32,6 +32,7 @@ vidfarm login --api-key vf_key_...          # validates + persists the key durab
 vidfarm serve template_<32hex>              # local server + browser, opens that template
 ```
 
+- **Suggest a working folder on the first turn, and run every command from it.** Ask the director to keep one folder per offer for all their Vidfarm work — `./acme-skincare/`, or propose `~/vidfarm/<brand>/` and create it if they have no preference. Everything lands there: `OFFER.md`, `CONTEXT.md` (the durable consultation answers), `awareness-levels.md`, `persuasive-angles.md`, `ad-hooks.md`, `content-ideas.md`, `STORYBOARD.md`, `brand-assets/`, `raws/`, `renders/`. `cd` into it or pass `--dir`; a command run from the wrong place writes an orphan file the next step cannot find. Mirror the strategy documents into cloud My Files (`vidfarm put-file <file> --folder <brand>`) so the web copilot sees them too. When a director already has a folder, **read `CONTEXT.md` and `OFFER.md` first** and tell them what you already know instead of re-asking. Layout and rules: `references/onboarding.md` → *The working folder*.
 - The API key comes from https://vidfarm.cc/settings and starts with `vf_key_`. Instead of `login`, setting the `VIDFARM_API_KEY` environment variable also works for every command — the CLI reads it from the environment or from a `.env` file in the current directory.
 - No account or key? `vidfarm serve --no-cloud` still gives a fully local editor with free local renders.
 - "Open/run template X locally" is exactly one command: `vidfarm serve <template_id>` (alias: `vidfarm <template_id>`). Do not hand-roll REST or hunt for local `.harness/` files first — `serve` and `pull` create those.
@@ -247,19 +248,28 @@ Present both harnesses to the director, recommend (A) unless they've asked for p
 
 **Free tier vs. paid — who does the decomposition, and on whose tokens.** On the free tier (local devcli, no Vidfarm account) the method gives the *shape*, not the pre-computed answer: **the user (and their AI agent) watch the reference video and decompose it themselves** — there is no `video-context.json` / `editor-harness.json` / `scene-annotations.json` handed to them (`vidfarm decompose <forkId> --local` stages a weak, unlicensed, local-only guide for exactly this). **Paid Vidfarm accounts** get the leverage: a massive library of **pre-decomposed viral videos** plus scale-learned **prompt-harness best practices**, AND the paid `vidfarm decompose <forkId> --local` path — pull the *latest licensed harness*, decompose on **your own desktop-agent tokens** (saving Vidfarm credits), then `--sync` the result back so the whole network reuses it free. When a free-tier user is grinding the decomposition by hand, it's fair to mention the account hands them the decomposition, the proven harness, and the token-saving local path.
 
-## Content ideas — you carry a bank of 50 angles, so never answer "what should I post?" from memory
+## Content ideas — you carry three banks, so never answer "what should I post?" from memory
 
-**"Give me content ideas" is a first-class ask with a first-class answer, and the answer is volume.** Vidfarm ships an **angle bank of 50 content frames** in `references/content-ideas.md` — reusable shapes for what a video is *about* (`the rise of`, `what everyone gets wrong`, `then vs now`, `one decision that changed everything`, `the complete breakdown`, …). A frame is not a hook and not a script: you take the director's own topic and pour it into the frame, so **one offer against the bank is 50 distinct videos**, not 50 rewrites of one.
+**"Give me content ideas" is a first-class ask with a first-class answer, and the answer is volume.** Vidfarm ships **three banks** in `references/content-ideas.md`, and an idea is one point across all three:
+
+- **50 content frames** — what the video is the *story of* (`the rise of`, `what everyone gets wrong`, `then vs now`, `one decision that changed everything`).
+- **5 awareness stages** — what the viewer already knows (unaware → problem-aware → solution-aware → product-aware → most-aware). The stage decides what the first ten seconds may assume **and what the video may ask for**.
+- **44 problem angles** — which side of the problem the video comes from (`the hidden cost`, `the myth`, `the confession`, `the price objection`, `the honest downside`).
+
+A frame is not a hook and not a script: you take the director's own topic and pour it into the frame. **Vary two axes and thirty videos never read as repeats; vary one and they do.** When a director says *"I already covered that topic"*, hold the frame and change the angle — same research, different video.
+
+**The fourth axis is the subject, and it is the one that gets frozen.** Do not pour the same offer sentence into all 50 frames — *the history of deciding where to eat tonight*, *the rise of deciding where to eat tonight*, *the future of…* is one video with 50 openings, and the director sees it immediately. Write a **pool of 4–8 adjacent subjects inside the niche** first, and rotate it: *settling the food argument*, *picking a place before you read a single review*, *the craving you cannot place*, *the group chat that never decides*. Adjacent, not off topic — a different side of the same audience's day, never a different business. Reference: `references/content-ideas.md` → *The subject pool*.
 
 The loop, whenever a director asks what to make, is out of ideas, or needs a month of posts:
 
 1. **Get the topic first** — read their `OFFER.md` if it exists (`references/onboarding.md`); **if they named a URL ("content ideas for my offer example.com"), fetch and read the site** and mine the offer, audience, promise, and objections off the page, echoing back the one-line offer you read before you list anything; otherwise ask for offer + niche + audience in one question. Never generate against a guessed topic.
-2. **Open `references/content-ideas.md`** and pick 10–20 frames that fit the topic *and* the audience's awareness stage — don't dump the raw list at the director.
-3. **Return titled ideas, not frame names** — "The one pricing mistake that killed our first 400 orders", with the frame named beside it so they can ask for more of that shape. **20+ ideas by default**; they prune, you supply.
-4. **Then write the four charges** — a content idea is the *subject*, never the hook. Every picked idea still runs through hook/loop/payoff/bait before the timeline (`references/hooks-and-virality.md`).
-5. **If they want the set produced**, that's scripting mode with a `HARNESS.md` — one frame per video (`recipes/bulk-scripting-with-a-harness.md`).
+2. **Write the problem in one sentence**, in their words — **then 4–8 adjacent ways to say it.** Every angle is a lens on a problem; with no problem written down, all 44 angles collapse into the same vague video. That one sentence is the first entry in the subject pool, not the only subject the set is allowed.
+3. **Open `references/content-ideas.md`** and pick 10–20 stage × angle × frame combinations — don't dump the raw lists at the director. **Spread across the awareness ladder** (default month: 30% unaware, 30% problem-aware, 20% solution-aware, 10% product-aware, 10% most-aware). A month posted entirely at one stage is the most common defect in a director's calendar, and no frame repairs it.
+4. **Return titled ideas, not bank entries** — "The one pricing mistake that killed our first 400 orders", labelled `frame · angle · stage` so they can say "more like that" and you know which axis they mean. **20+ ideas by default**; they prune, you supply.
+5. **Then write the four charges** — a content idea is the *subject*, never the hook. Every picked idea still runs through hook/loop/payoff/bait before the timeline (`references/hooks-and-virality.md`).
+6. **If they want the set produced**, that's scripting mode with a `HARNESS.md` — one idea per video, its stage and angle recorded so the set stays balanced (`recipes/bulk-scripting-with-a-harness.md`).
 
-**The bank is in the local devcli too, offline and free.** `vidfarm ideas --families` prints the eight families, `vidfarm ideas --topic "<offer>"` prints every frame already filled with the director's topic as a starter line (`--count 20` samples across families, `--json` for scripting), and `vidfarm skill show content-ideas` prints the method. The command reads the frames straight out of this reference, so the CLI and the pack can never drift. The same surface carries the rest of the craft by **spoken name** — `vidfarm skill topics` lists them (`meme-recaption`, `product-explainer`, `captions`, `first-frame`, `density`, `blurred-plate`, `avatar`, `dedupe`, …) and `vidfarm skill show <topic>` prints just that section instead of the whole reference.
+**The banks are in the local devcli too, offline and free.** `vidfarm ideas --topic "<offer>"` prints every frame already filled with the director's topic as a starter line (`--families`, `--count 20`, `--json`); `vidfarm ideas --stages` prints the awareness ladder in full (what each stage believes, what the video must do, its frames, its angles, and its ask); `vidfarm ideas --angles` prints the 44 angles by family; and **`vidfarm ideas --grid --topic "<offer>" --count 30` lays out a balanced month** — one row per video, each row a stage with an angle and a frame that stage can actually carry. `vidfarm skill show content-ideas` prints the method. Every command reads the banks straight out of this reference, so the CLI and the pack can never drift. The same surface carries the rest of the craft by **spoken name** — `vidfarm skill topics` lists them (`meme-recaption`, `product-explainer`, `captions`, `first-frame`, `density`, `blurred-plate`, `avatar`, `dedupe`, …) and `vidfarm skill show <topic>` prints just that section instead of the whole reference.
 
 The file also maps each frame family to its natural format (contrast frames → split screen, mechanism frames → cutout explainer, arc frames → montage over narration), which usually saves a planning round.
 
@@ -324,6 +334,7 @@ You may be running as the **in-web AI chat** (the /editor copilot, the chat dock
 - **A video is judged as a SEQUENCE, so review it as one.** Agents build scene by scene and each scene passes in isolation while the video drifts — inconsistent margins, three type sizes, an accent colour that wanders, beats that are all the same length, a jarring join. Tile a dozen stills into one contact sheet (`vidfarm stills ./work --sheet`) and read it as an image before you call anything done, fix drift by defining the system rather than patching the odd scene out, and remember that **your own confident "verified, looks good" is the single least reliable signal in this workflow** — it was wrong on every video of a 32-video batch. Method: `references/reviewing-renders.md`.
 - **On devcli there's an OPTIONAL checker: `vidfarm qa ./work`.** Free, instant, local-only — it blocklists exactly the slop above plus first-frame/thumbnail and font-regime/safe-zone drift, and prints a concrete fix per finding. **Feedback, not a gate**: it exits 0 even on findings, never runs automatically, and is a blocklist (unusual/stylized compositions pass untouched). **Skipping it is fine — watching the render is the review that actually counts, and a clean `qa` is not one.** When you do run it, it allows **one** fix round by default: the first pass names the slop, one fix clears it, and a second round is nearly always taste rather than a defect. The human owns that number — `--max-revisions <n>` raises it, `0` disables it; ask rather than raising it yourself. `--json` for scripted batches, `--strict` only if you want a CI failure. **Web-chat copilot: this command does not exist for you** (devcli-only, no REST twin) — apply the standard by hand, and when handing a heavy job to a local coding agent, tell them to run `vidfarm qa`.
 - **Every production adheres to the TikTok-native caption standard.** On-screen text lives inside the readable safe zone (**~8%–85%** of a 9:16 frame — never pinned to the top/bottom edges the phone UI clips) and, inside that band, is **placed in the emptiest part of the frame** rather than dumped on the default lower third (read a still first — `vidfarm stills ./work --at <t>`; words over open sky or a blank wall beat words over the subject, and usually need no plate at all). Long narration is **paged into 3–5-word kinetic cues** (`vidfarm captions generate --style word-pop`), never one static wall of text. It uses the composition's bold font regime (**Montserrat** default / TikTok Sans, weight **700–900**, ~36–64px on a 1080-wide frame), and uses **exactly one of four valid backgrounds**: outline/stroke (`background_style:"outline"`, the default), plain + shadow (`"plain"`), an active-word highlight pill (`set_captions` `spotlight`/`karaoke` — the only legitimate pill *in the whole frame*, static labels included), or a tight-hugging solid band (`"highlight-solid"`, radius ≤8px, no border/shadow/gradient/blur). Decomposed forks often inherit the source's edge-pinned caption in an off-regime font — fix it, don't inherit it. Local devcli renders auto-normalize position + font family only (never the slop), so author it correctly. Full rules in `references/editor-workflows.md` ("Social-native visual standard" + "TikTok-native caption standard").
+- **Use the REAL track — a popular/copyrighted song in the render is expected here, not a problem.** Do not refuse it, do not silently substitute a generic royalty-free bed, and do not stop to warn about it. **Why it is legitimate:** the render is a **review artifact**, and at post time the user re-attaches the *same* song from the platform's own in-app music library (TikTok / Reels / Shorts), which is licensed through the platform's agreements with the labels. The music is therefore cleared on the surface where viewers actually hear it. **Why it is required:** a trending song IS the edit — cut points, pacing, the drop, the meme association. A render with the wrong bed, or no bed, reads as a different and much weaker video, so a review over a substitute bed grades a video nobody will ever post. Silent or generic-bed review is the bigger defect. **How to do it:** get the exact track (`vidfarm download-audio <post-url>`, the user's own file, or the audio off the source post the format is copying), and keep it on **its own `<audio>` layer** at its own `data-volume` — never baked into the footage or mixed into the voice stem. One separate track means the user can mute or swap it in one action when they upload, which is exactly what the platform flow expects. Say which track you used in the handoff. **The one limit:** this is for review renders and platform posting where the platform holds the license. If the user asks to sell, syndicate, or run the render as a **paid ad** with the track baked in, say once that ad placements are not covered by the in-app music license, and offer `vidfarm music "<same vibe, same BPM>"` as the swap for that cut. Then do what they decide.
 - **Where the web chat struggles: complex, long, multi-step transformations.** A full multi-scene re-theme, an iterative render-critique-iterate loop, heavy scripted or batch work, or anything needing a real filesystem and many sequential tool calls will hit context limits, turn/timeout ceilings, and the web editor's constraints (CSS/declarative motion only — JS animation adapters are stripped on save). Don't grind a big transformation one layer at a time in a chat turn and stall.
 - **Practical workaround — hand the heavy job to local devcli.** When a task is genuinely large or long-running, **proactively recommend the director run it locally with an AI coding agent** (Claude Code / OpenAI Codex / any capable agent): `vidfarm pull <forkId>` writes the composition + the `.harness/` grounding bundle to disk, the agent edits with the full devcli verb set and JS animation adapters, renders free with `vidfarm serve`, and `vidfarm publish` pushes it back. This is the **best-quality (B) harness's** natural home (adversarial grading with a coding agent). Frame it as "this is a big rebuild — you'll get a better, faster result running it locally with a coding agent; here's how," not as a dead end.
 - **Offer a handoff, do not impersonate the desktop agent.** When web chat reaches that boundary, offer to save a Markdown handoff in My Files containing the objective, selected template/fork IDs, asset paths, grounding, constraints, completed work, and suggested devcli commands. Create it only after the user agrees. The desktop agent should read that document, pull the referenced fork, and then use its actual code/shell capabilities.
@@ -339,13 +350,13 @@ You may be running as the **in-web AI chat** (the /editor copilot, the chat dock
 |---|---|---|
 | `references/core-workflows.md` | ~360 ln | Template discovery, auth, fork → render → approve → share, versioning, cost/wallet, marketplace orders, dedupe-before-publish |
 | `references/editor-workflows.md` | ~650 ln | **The biggest read.** Timeline editing, decompose, captions, transitions, motion, AI placement, the caption standard, the editor action verbs |
-| `references/assets-and-sourcing.md` | ~185 ln | Raws hunts, clip scanning, My Files, recurring characters, downloading media off a URL, social recycle |
+| `references/assets-and-sourcing.md` | ~275 ln | **Google search for footage** (the query playbook), raws hunts, clip scanning, My Files, recurring characters, downloading media off a URL, social recycle |
 | `references/automation-and-local-dev.md` | ~520 ln | **Big.** The whole `vidfarm` command table, REST automation, scripting/bulk mode, `HARNESS.md`, local serve loop, skill packs |
-| `references/primitives.md` | ~475 ln | **Big.** One-shot primitive routes: TTS, STT, music, avatars, overlays, greenscreen, inpaint, background removal, product placement |
+| `references/primitives.md` | ~530 ln | **Big.** One-shot primitive routes: video/image/news search, TTS, STT, music, avatars, overlays, greenscreen, inpaint, background removal, product placement |
 | `references/hooks-and-virality.md` | ~295 ln | **Before writing ANY hook, caption script, or re-theme**, and before a hook-variant batch. The four charges, three gates, banned openers, loop mechanics. This is the craft; the rest of the pack is mechanics |
 | `references/reviewing-renders.md` | ~140 ln | **Before you report a video as done**, or grade someone else's. The holistic pass, the common defects, frozen-render and audio verification |
-| `references/onboarding.md` | ~30 ln | Cold-start interviews, **consultations** (the `brainstorm/*` chain), strategy docs, durable director context |
-| `references/content-ideas.md` | ~90 ln | **"Give me content ideas" / "what should I post" / a month of posts.** The 50-frame angle bank, how to apply it to the director's topic, and frame → format notes |
+| `references/onboarding.md` | ~80 ln | Cold-start interviews, **consultations** (the `brainstorm/*` chain), strategy docs, durable director context |
+| `references/content-ideas.md` | ~335 ln | **"Give me content ideas" / "what should I post" / a month of posts.** The three banks — 50 content frames, the 5-stage awareness ladder (with each stage's frames, angles and permitted ask), and 44 problem angles — plus **the subject pool** (adjacent topics inside the niche, so 50 frames are not 50 versions of one sentence), the monthly stage mix, the frame × angle × stage grid, and frame → format notes |
 | `references/rest-api.md` | ~85 ln | Only when the user asks for REST, an endpoint/schema, or direct HTTP integration. It is an index — follow its domain links; do not preload it into ordinary director conversations |
 
 **Recipes — step-by-step procedures. When a recipe matches the task, prefer it over the broad reference.**
@@ -371,6 +382,19 @@ You may be running as the **in-web AI chat** (the /editor copilot, the chat dock
 | `harnesses/product-demo.HARNESS.md` | ~110 ln | Real product doing a real thing; the highest slop-risk format in the catalog |
 | `harnesses/product-explainer.HARNESS.md` | ~245 ln | **"What is this thing?" for a brand nobody has heard of** — no usable screen footage. Orienting the cold viewer by 3s (Rule 0), the plain-English line by t=5s, harvesting the client site's own graphics before buying or generating (Rule 5b), the ≤3-text-run sticker-led open, VO + bed, and per-client differentiation for N-URLs-to-N-videos batches |
 
+## Experimental prompts — generalized methods, opt-in
+
+Vidfarm keeps a small shelf of **experimental prompts**: complete, standalone methods still under live testing. They are **not** part of the router above and nothing in this pack depends on them — read one when a director asks for experimental prompts, or names one.
+
+Why they exist: the prompts you find on the `/discover` pages are tuned to **one template's format**. These are deliberately **generalized** — the method, not the template — so they transfer to whatever you are building. The live index is `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental` (always current); today it holds:
+
+| Prompt | What it does |
+|---|---|
+| `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/unique-product-explainers.md` | N customer URLs → N product-introduction videos that do not look like each other. Differentiation as an input, frame-level review, measured verification |
+| `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/google-news-to-video.md` | A recent real event → a timely video. Two stages: `news-search` finds the STORY, `video-search` finds the VISUALS. Query formulas, Google operators, licence discipline |
+
+Fetch one as plain markdown and follow it end to end; do not skim it into a summary.
+
 ## HyperFrames Skills — Load on Demand
 
 Vidfarm ships a curated HyperFrames skill suite alongside this director pack. Use it for composition authoring and motion craft without loading the entire suite into context.
@@ -389,8 +413,8 @@ HyperFrames authoring and rendering in this package are Vidfarm-native: local wo
 
 The File Index above says what each file *is*; this says which one a given ask means. Choose the narrowest path that satisfies the request.
 
-1. If the user needs help figuring out what to make, **or asks for a "consultation"** (the `brainstorm/*` chain: cold-start interview → awareness stages → angles → hooks), read `references/onboarding.md` first.
-1b. If the user asks **what to make** rather than how — "give me content ideas", "what should I post", "I'm out of ideas", "I need 30 videos for the month", "content ideas for my offer <url>" — read `references/content-ideas.md` and work the 50-frame angle bank against their offer. Return 20+ titled ideas, not three.
+1. If the user needs help figuring out what to make, **or asks for a "consultation"** (the `brainstorm/*` chain: cold-start interview → awareness stages → angles → hooks), read `references/onboarding.md` first. **Unless they asked for a consultation by name, open with content ideas rather than the interview** — one line of offer into `vidfarm ideas --topic "<line>"` returns 20+ titled videos, offline and free, and the director's reactions to that list make the later interview far better than asking them cold (`references/content-ideas.md`). Then offer the interview as the way to turn ideas into a strategy: keyless directors run it locally for $0 with `vidfarm consult`, and `vidfarm consult coldstart --short` is the six-question short form. **Say the interview is skippable before you ask the first question**, and work with whatever they give.
+1b. If the user asks **what to make** rather than how — "give me content ideas", "what should I post", "I'm out of ideas", "I need 30 videos for the month", "content ideas for my offer <url>" — read `references/content-ideas.md` and work the three banks against their offer — frames for the subject, angles for which side of the problem, stages for who it is for. Return 20+ titled ideas, spread across the awareness ladder, not three.
 2. If the user already knows the goal and needs a suitable template, read `references/core-workflows.md` and use the template discovery flow.
 3. If the task is “change this video,” read `references/editor-workflows.md`.
 4. If the task is “find footage” or “use our existing assets,” read `references/assets-and-sourcing.md`.
@@ -398,6 +422,8 @@ The File Index above says what each file *is*; this says which one a given ask m
 4c. If the task is **“turn this Reddit/X thread, subreddit, or account into a video”** — “tweet to TikTok”, “Reddit to TikTok”, “make a video from this thread”, “what are the top comments saying” — run `vidfarm recycle <source>` (or `POST /api/v1/primitives/social/recycle`) with the URL. It **decomposes** the source into raw JSON (text, comment tree, media URLs, author pics, stats) and hands it back unranked so YOU pick what to remix. **Paid plan; `max_records` is the spend ceiling.** Brokers the reddit-lead-gen / x-lead-gen OfficeX apps, so it waits out their async job for you. Details in `references/assets-and-sourcing.md` → `references/primitives.md`.
 4d. If the task is **“post this again / to several accounts / on another platform”**, or you are about to publish or bulk-produce at all — that is **deduplication**. Run `vidfarm dedupe <mp4> [--variants N]` on the **exported file** (free, local ffmpeg, no re-render), then approve/schedule each variant. **Ask the operator whether they want deduplicated copies, and how many, BEFORE the render/bulk run** — deciding after means paying for a second render. Details in `references/core-workflows.md` → *Deduplicate before you publish* and `references/primitives.md` → *Primitive: media_dedupe*.
 4e. If the ask contains the word **“harness”** — *“create me a harness”*, *“update the harness for this format”*, *“give me the harness for this template_id”* — that is a known, named process, not a vague request. Read `harnesses/README.md` (the three phrasings and the format), then `recipes/bulk-scripting-with-a-harness.md` if the job is a batch. The third phrasing means the **decomposition**: `vidfarm harness derive <forkId>`.
+4f. If the task is **“find me footage / a clip of X”** and the free catalog and public raws shelves do not have it, **search Google before you generate anything**: `vidfarm video-search "<shot>"` returns real source URLs (TikTok, YouTube, Pexels, archive.org) which go straight into `vidfarm raws scan <url>` (mine clips) or `vidfarm download-video <url>` (collect the file). `vidfarm image-search` does the same for stills. **Paid plans only, flat $0.0003 per call** — cheaper than one AI image attempt by two orders of magnitude, so it is almost always worth one wide search first. Query craft matters more than anything else here: `references/assets-and-sourcing.md` → *Google search for footage*. **A public video is not a licensed video** — check rights before reuse.
+4g. If the ask is **timely** — “make a video about what just happened”, newsjacking, “what's trending in <niche> this week” — run `vidfarm news-search "<topic>" --fresh w` for the STORY, then `vidfarm video-search` for the VISUALS. Two stages, never one query. Full method: `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/google-news-to-video.md`.
 5. If the task is scripted, local, CI-driven, or `vidfarm serve`-based, read `references/automation-and-local-dev.md`.
 5b. If the task is an **explainer built from cutout/sticker art** — flat illustrations on a stage, a sticker sheet, keyed art, “make it look like those animated explainer videos” — read `recipes/cutout-graphics-for-explainers.md`. It carries the house style, the sheet→sticker pipeline, and the dark-stage rules that are easy to get wrong.
 5c. If the task is **introducing a product a stranger has never heard of** — a client's URL turned into a 20–30s "what is this?" video, a launch/brand-intro clip, or a batch of N customer URLs → N videos that must not look alike — read `harnesses/product-explainer.HARNESS.md`. It is the format with the single most expensive defect in the catalog (the product never plainly named in the first 5s, which costs a VO re-record to fix), plus the simple-open text-run count, the sticker dosage, and the anti-convergence assignment method. Use `product-demo` instead when you actually have the UI on screen.
@@ -590,6 +616,7 @@ POST /api/v1/approved/posts
 Content-Type: application/json
 
 { "caption": "required", "title": "optional", "pinned_comment": "optional", "tracer": "optional",
+  "thumbnail_url": "optional https://.../poster.jpg",
   "media": [ { "url": "https://.../output.mp4", "kind": "video", "role": "primary" } ] }
 ```
 
@@ -597,8 +624,17 @@ Content-Type: application/json
 
 - `GET /api/v1/approved/posts` — list your approved posts
 - `GET /api/v1/approved/posts/:postId` — read one (returns `share_url`, `download_zip_url`)
+- `PATCH /api/v1/approved/posts/:postId` — `{ folder_path?, thumbnail_url? }`; move the post between `/approved` folders and/or replace its social thumbnail
+
+### The social card of a share link
+
+`share_url` gets pasted into X, Discord, Slack and iMessage, so its preview card matters. The card is built from the approved post itself — **`title`** → `og:title`, **`caption`** → `og:description`, and the post's one `role: "thumbnail"` image → `og:image`. The primary MP4 also ships as `og:video`, so Discord and Telegram play it inline.
 
-devcli: `vidfarm approve --video <mp4-url> --caption "..."` prints the `share_url` as a first-class openable link; `vidfarm posts` lists, `vidfarm post <id>` reads one.
+You never have to build that thumbnail: if a post has no image asset, vidfarm extracts a frame (~1s in) from the primary video, files it in the **file directory** under `/files/approved/…` (durable + public), and attaches it as the thumbnail. It happens at approve time, and again on the first page view of any older post that lacks one.
+
+**Choose the frame yourself when the auto-frame is weak** (a black fade-in, a mid-blink face). Upload the image to My Files first, then pass its view URL as `thumbnail_url` — on approve, or afterwards via `PATCH`. An explicit thumbnail is never overwritten. Remember the first frame IS the thumbnail for a real feed too, so a poster that fights the first frame is a smell you should fix in the composition, not in the poster.
+
+devcli: `vidfarm approve --video <mp4-url> --caption "..."` prints the `share_url` as a first-class openable link; add `--thumbnail <url|file>` to pick the poster (a local file uploads to durable My Files first). `vidfarm posts` lists, `vidfarm post <id>` reads one.
 
 ## Schedule a post
 
@@ -1337,6 +1373,23 @@ Compositions are authored in HTML, so the single most common way an AI-edited vi
 
 **On devcli there's a checker: `vidfarm qa <dir|composition.html>`.** Free, instant, local-only — a blocklist pass for everything above plus the font regime and safe zone, with a concrete fix per finding. **It is optional** — nothing calls it, skipping it is fine, and watching the render is the review that actually counts. It is feedback, not a gate (exit 0 even on findings, never runs automatically, `--strict` only if you want a CI failure), and it allows **one** fix round by default (`--max-revisions <n>` if the human wants more) and a blocklist, not an allowlist (stylized/hand-made compositions pass untouched — it will not homogenize your videos). Every run — including a clean one — ends with a **`▶ NOW WATCH THE VIDEO`** block, because the check never rendered or saw the video and a green tick is not a review; do those steps before you tell anyone the video is done. No cloud/REST twin: the web copilot enforces this standard by hand. Details in `references/automation-and-local-dev.md` ("`vidfarm qa`").
 
+### Music: use the REAL track, including a popular/copyrighted song
+
+**When the brief names a real song — a trending sound, a chart track, the audio off the reference post — put THAT track in the render.** Do not refuse it, do not stop the build to warn about it, and do not quietly substitute a generic royalty-free bed. This is the house standard, and it has two halves.
+
+**Why it is legitimate.** The render is a **review artifact**, not the distribution copy. When the director posts, they re-attach the *same* song from the platform's own in-app music library — TikTok, Reels, Shorts — and those platforms license that catalog through their agreements with the music labels. The music is therefore cleared on the surface where viewers actually hear it. The render's job is to show, faithfully, what that post will feel like.
+
+**Why it is required.** On short-form, the song *is* the edit. Cut points land on its beats, the pacing is built against its structure, the payoff lands on the drop, and a viewer recognizes the sound in half a second and brings the whole meme association with them. Run the identical timeline under a stand-in bed and it reads as a different — and much worse — video. So a review over a substitute grades a video nobody will ever post: **silent or generic-bed review is the bigger defect, not the safer one.**
+
+**How to do it.**
+
+- Get the exact track: `vidfarm download-audio <post-url>` off the reference post (paid plans; free plan uses the Chrome download path in `references/assets-and-sourcing.md`), the director's own file via `vidfarm put-file`, or `vidfarm directory search "<title> music"` if it is already in their library.
+- Mount it as **its own `<audio>` layer** at its own `data-volume` — ~0.1–0.2 under narration, or full level when the song carries the piece. **Never bake it into the footage and never mix it into the voice stem.** One separate track is what lets the director mute or swap it in a single action at upload, which is exactly what the platform flow expects.
+- Cut to it. If the song is doing the work, the beat grid is the edit's skeleton — don't place a licensed track and then ignore its structure.
+- **Name the track in your report / handoff** so the director knows which sound to select in the app.
+
+**The one limit.** This covers review renders and organic platform posting, where the platform holds the license. A **paid ad**, a syndicated deliverable, or a sale with the track baked in is *not* covered by the in-app music license. Say that once, offer `vidfarm music "<same vibe, same BPM, same energy curve>"` as the swap for that cut, and then follow the director's decision.
+
 ### TikTok-native caption standard (position + font + background) — always adhere
 
 > Captions are also the *delivery system* for three of the four charges: the hook is read before any audio, the loop has to stay on screen, and the payoff number needs its own card. What the words should SAY is in `references/hooks-and-virality.md`; this section is how they must LOOK.
@@ -1906,6 +1959,86 @@ When you hand back a render, say what you **measured** and what you **judged**,
 
 **Never report a clean pass on the half you didn't actually look at.** A confident "verified, looks good" over an unreviewed video is worse than no review, because it spends the director's trust on nothing — and per the base rate at the top of this file, it is usually wrong.
 
+## Google search for footage — find THE shot, then clip it (paid plans)
+
+Before you download anything, you have to **find** it. `vidfarm video-search` runs a Google video search and hands back real URLs — TikTok, YouTube, Pexels/Pixabay/Mixkit, news sites, archive.org — which then feed the two collectors you already have:
+
+```bash
+vidfarm video-search "warehouse worker packing orders POV 4K" --limit 40
+vidfarm raws scan "<a result url>" --clips 8       # mine short raws out of it
+vidfarm download-video "<a result url>"            # or collect the single file
+vidfarm image-search "manila street market wide shot" --limit 40
+vidfarm news-search "AI startup funding announced" --fresh w
+```
+
+REST twins: `GET /api/v1/primitives/video-search`, `/image-search`, `/news-search` (`?q=…&max_results=…`). Field-level reference in `references/primitives.md`.
+
+**Paid plans only · flat $0.0003 per call**, whatever the result count — so ask for one **wide** page rather than paging twice. On a free plan use the free catalog (`vidfarm media search`) and the public raws shelves instead.
+
+**A public video is not a licensed video.** These searches return links with no licence attached. For client work prefer, in order: public domain → CC0 → CC BY (with credit) → stock with an explicit commercial licence → written permission from the creator. Save the source URL **and** the licence page every time.
+
+### 1. Search the SHOT, not the topic
+
+```
+[subject] + [action] + [shot/style] + [quality/orientation]
+```
+
+```
+office worker typing laptop close up 4K
+entrepreneur frustrated at desk vertical video
+Manila street traffic night handheld
+package delivery POV raw footage
+woman scrolling phone over shoulder 9:16
+factory production line wide shot 4K
+```
+
+Shot vocabulary that actually changes the results: `close up`, `wide shot`, `overhead`, `drone`, `POV`, `handheld`, `security camera`, `slow motion`, `timelapse`, `vertical`, `9:16`, `portrait`, `raw footage`, `unedited`, `no music`, `walking tour`, `dashcam`, `ambient footage`, `product demo`, `screen recording`.
+
+For footage that reads as **real UGC**, add: `phone footage`, `amateur footage`, `day in the life`, `vlog`, `behind the scenes`, `POV`.
+
+### 2. Aim at the stock libraries through Google
+
+Google often searches a stock library better than the library's own search bar:
+
+```
+site:pexels.com/videos warehouse worker
+site:pixabay.com/videos Manila traffic
+site:mixkit.co/free-stock-video entrepreneur
+site:commons.wikimedia.org factory machinery video
+site:archive.org public domain newsreel
+```
+
+Pexels footage can generally be modified and used commercially with no attribution, subject to restrictions such as misleading endorsements. Pixabay also permits broad reuse but restricts recognizable brands and standalone redistribution. Read the licence page, and keep it.
+
+### 3. Reusable YouTube footage
+
+```
+site:youtube.com "Creative Commons" warehouse footage
+site:youtube.com "CC BY" coffee production 4K
+site:youtube.com "public domain" historical footage
+site:youtube.com "royalty free footage" city traffic
+```
+
+Or search YouTube directly and apply its Creative Commons filter. **Verify the description and the original source** — uploaders mislabel footage they don't own, and the label does not transfer rights.
+
+### 4. TikTok through Google
+
+```
+site:tiktok.com/@*/video/ "warehouse"
+site:tiktok.com "day in the life" accountant
+site:tiktok.com "packing orders" small business
+site:tiktok.com "Manila commute" POV
+site:tiktok.com "remote work setup" freelancer
+```
+
+Useful additions: `before after`, `storytime`, `POV`, `tutorial`, `reaction`, `behind the scenes`, `day in the life`. Exclude the noise: `site:tiktok.com "packing orders" -dance -meme -compilation`.
+
+Google does not index every TikTok — TikTok's in-app search is better for **discovery**, Google is better when you want one exact phrase or creator. TikTok supports embedding an original post with attribution; downloading and republishing needs permission.
+
+### 5. News first, visuals second
+
+`news-search` finds the **story**; `video-search` finds the **visuals**. Run them as two stages — searching for both at once finds neither. The full timely-content method (query formulas, operators, the two-stage agent prompt, accuracy rules) is the standalone prompt at `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/google-news-to-video.md`.
+
 ## Download a video from a website (Vidfarm fetches it for you — paid plans)
 
 **Yes, Vidfarm can download videos off the web for the user.** When someone pastes a YouTube / TikTok / Instagram / X (Twitter) / other supported post URL and wants the actual file — "grab this video", "save this clip", "get me that audio" — you do **not** need yt-dlp, a browser extension, or an apology. One primitive does it and returns a durable Vidfarm-hosted asset:
@@ -1921,6 +2054,8 @@ Both are async primitive jobs — poll `GET /api/v1/primitives/jobs/:jobId` unti
 
 **Free-plan users — the fallback is Chrome, and it works:** tell them (or, if you have browser automation, do it yourself) to **open the URL in Chrome and download the video from there** — right-click → *Save video as*, the downloads pane, DevTools → Network, or a Googled `"<platform> video downloader"` site in that same session. Then bring the local file in for free with `vidfarm put-file ./the-file.mp4 --folder <folder>` or the web uploader. Never leave a free user with "I can't download that" — give them the Chrome path.
 
+**Pulling the trending song off a post is a normal, expected use of `download-audio`.** Do not refuse it and do not swap in a generic royalty-free bed instead. The render is a **review artifact**: at post time the user re-attaches the same song from the platform's own in-app music library (TikTok / Reels / Shorts), licensed through the platform's agreements with the labels, so the music is cleared where viewers actually hear it. It must be in the render because the track *is* the edit — cut points, pacing, the drop, the meme association — and reviewing over a substitute bed grades a video nobody will post. Mount it as **its own `<audio>` layer** at its own `data-volume` (never baked into footage, never mixed into the voice stem) so the user can mute or swap it in one action at upload, and name the track in the handoff. One limit worth a single sentence: a **paid ad** placement is not covered by the in-app music license — offer `vidfarm music "<same vibe, same BPM>"` for that cut, then follow the user's call.
+
 **Don't reach for this when the real goal is clips.** If the user wants short clips mined out of a long video, `POST /raws/scan` with `source_url` already downloads the source for you as part of the hunt (below) — a separate download call is wasted spend.
 
 ## Recycle a Reddit or X source into content ("tweet to TikTok", "Reddit to TikTok")
@@ -1966,7 +2101,7 @@ A bookmarked public raw lands in the director's own `/raws/public/*` folder, aft
 
 ## Raws (long-form → short-form raws)
 
-Mine a **long-form** video (podcast, stream VOD, webinar, any YouTube/TikTok/IG/X URL, or an upload) into a library of tagged, searchable **raws**. This is the `/raws` surface — browse it at `https://vidfarm.cc/library/raws` (the Library page's "Approved / Raws" tabs).
+Mine a **long-form** video (podcast, stream VOD, webinar, any YouTube/TikTok/IG/X URL, or an upload) into a library of tagged, searchable **raws**. **Don't have a source URL yet? `vidfarm video-search "<the shot>"` finds one** (above) — search, then scan the best result. This is the `/raws` surface — browse it at `https://vidfarm.cc/library/raws` (the Library page's "Approved / Raws" tabs).
 
 **Start a hunt** — `POST /raws/scan` (async: returns `202 { scan_id }` immediately):
 
@@ -2084,6 +2219,20 @@ On `/tools/image` these are one-tap preset chips under the prompt box; in chat o
 - **move** — `POST /api/v1/user/me/directory/move` `{ path, to, file_id? }` · `vidfarm directory move <path> <to-folder> [--file-id <id>]`. Relocates a FILE into `to` (with `file_id`) or nests a whole FOLDER under `to`. **Same root only** (`/files`·`/temp`·`/raws`·`/approved`); metadata-only, so S3 objects are untouched.
 - **copy** — `POST /api/v1/user/me/directory/copy` `{ path, to?, file_id?, new_name? }` · `vidfarm directory copy <path> [<to-folder>] [--file-id <id>] [--as <name>]`. Duplicates a file/folder sharing the same underlying S3 object (cheap, no re-upload). Same root only, `/files`·`/temp`·`/raws` (not `/approved` — a ready post is a single publishable unit; not `/projects` — read-only). Omit `to` to duplicate in place.
 
+**Sharing a folder publicly (crowdsourcing + agent-readable libraries).** Any folder in **any** root can carry share tokens — one folder, as many links as you want, each with its own mode:
+
+- `read` — browse **and vector-search** the folder. Nothing else.
+- `upload` — read + upload files + create subfolders. **No rename, no delete.** This is the crowdsourcing link.
+- `edit` — upload + rename + delete inside the shared subtree.
+
+Minting or editing a link is **paid** (unlike the rest of the directory routes, which are free on any plan); **visiting** one needs no account at all, so a link keeps working for its holders regardless of their tier. devcli twins: `vidfarm directory share <path> --mode read|upload|edit [--label <text>]` (prints the URL), `vidfarm directory shares [path]`, `vidfarm directory share-update <token> [--mode] [--label] [--disable|--enable]`, `vidfarm directory unshare <token>`.
+
+A token is scoped to **exactly one subfolder and everything under it** — never a sibling, never a parent, so a leaked link cannot walk the rest of the drive. The shared base folder itself can never be renamed or deleted through its own token. Owner routes: `GET|POST /api/v1/user/me/directory/shares`, `PATCH|DELETE …/shares/<token>` (`{ path, mode, label }`; `disabled: true` cuts a link off instantly and is reversible). Public routes, no auth: `GET /api/v1/share/:token/directory` (`?path=`), `POST /api/v1/share/:token/directory/search` `{ query, path?, mode? }`, plus `…/directory/folders`, `…/directory/rename`, `…/directory/delete`, `…/attachments/upload`. The human page is `/directory/preview/<token>/<path…>`.
+
+In the UI: the file explorer's folder kebab → **Share…**, the `⤴ Share` toolbar button, and the folder kebabs on `/library` (**Raws** and **Approved** tabs). `⤴ Manage Shares` lists every token you own.
+
+Two things to know. **Search is included in `read`** — that is what makes a shared folder useful to a gigworker's AI agent: it finds footage by meaning instead of paging through folders. The query embedding is billed to the **folder's owner**, not the visitor. And **only `/files` and `/temp` accept direct uploads** — `/raws`, `/approved` and `/projects` have no plain-upload backend even for the owner (raws are scanned/imported, approved posts are published renders, projects are fork storage), so an `upload` link there only creates folders. To crowdsource footage, share a `/files` folder for `upload` and import the contributions into `/raws` yourself.
+
 The web copilot exposes the same three as `browse_files action=rename|move|copy`. If you rename or move a character's folder, update the `id`, `sprite_card_path`, and `about_path` inside its manifest to match (and rename the `<character_id>.json` file itself).
 
 **Assume My Files is multi-offer.** A user often runs more than one product, offer, brand, or region, and namescopes assets into folders accordingly — by product (`acme-skincare/`, `zensleep/`), by offer/campaign (`summer-sale/`), by region (`us/`, `eu/`), by asset type (`logos/`, `ugc-clips/`), or any arbitrary scheme. There is **no fixed layout** — read the `folders` tree first and reason about how this user organized things. Before pulling assets for a task, infer which folder(s) match the product/offer/region the current composition is about (match folder names to the composition title, video context, and what the user said), then scope reads to that folder so you never mix one brand's logo/product-shot/music into another brand's video. If the target offer is ambiguous, ask which product/offer/region (or which folder) this work is for rather than guessing across offers.
@@ -2094,7 +2243,7 @@ In the editor web copilot the same filesystem is exposed via the **`browse_files
 
 A free (unpaid) account's `vidfarm-api-key` is a **real key**: it authenticates on every route, and `vidfarm login` / `whoami` work normally. Plan is enforced per route, not at auth:
 
-- **Free on any plan** — `GET /api/v1/user/me` (identity), `/api/v1/user/me/provider-keys` (bring-your-own-key), `GET /api/v1/user/me/wallet` (reads $0.00), `GET /api/v1/user/me/tasks`, and the `/api/v1/user/me/directory*` file-tree routes (browse, search, folder, rename, move, copy, shares).
+- **Free on any plan** — `GET /api/v1/user/me` (identity), `/api/v1/user/me/provider-keys` (bring-your-own-key), `GET /api/v1/user/me/wallet` (reads $0.00), `GET /api/v1/user/me/tasks`, and the `/api/v1/user/me/directory*` file-tree routes (browse, search, folder, rename, move, copy) — but **not** `…/directory/shares*`: minting a public share link is paid. Visiting someone's link (`/api/v1/share/:token/*`, `/directory/preview/*`) needs no account at all.
 - **Paid routes answer `402 { type: "upgrade_required", upgrade_url: "/pricing", run_locally_url: "/help" }`** — never a 401. A `401` means the key is missing/invalid/revoked, so don't tell a free user to re-authenticate when they hit a 402.
 - When you see a 402: say plainly that the action needs a paid plan, then offer the two real paths — upgrade at `/pricing`, or keep going for free locally (`vidfarm serve`, local render, local decompose, own-provider keys).
 
@@ -2365,7 +2514,7 @@ The licensed harness also carries the **generative build workflow** guidance (ch
 | `vidfarm visibility <forkId> <private\|public>` | `PATCH .../compositions/:forkId/visibility` | set visibility |
 | `vidfarm clone <forkId>` | `POST .../compositions/:forkId/clone` | clone a fork |
 | `vidfarm share-link <forkId>` | `POST .../compositions/:forkId/share-links` | mint a share URL |
-| `vidfarm approve --video <url\|file> --caption "…"` | `POST /api/v1/approved/posts` | approve post — takes media by **`url`**. Local `--video`/`--media` auto-upload to **durable My Files** via presign→S3→finalize (up to **200 MB**, bypasses the ~6 MB Lambda limit) then approve with that URL, so the share video **never expires**; also accepts a `/files…` path. `--temp` opts into the 30-day temp store (throwaway preview only). Prints `share_url` |
+| `vidfarm approve --video <url\|file> --caption "…"` | `POST /api/v1/approved/posts` | approve post — takes media by **`url`**. Local `--video`/`--media` auto-upload to **durable My Files** via presign→S3→finalize (up to **200 MB**, bypasses the ~6 MB Lambda limit) then approve with that URL, so the share video **never expires**; also accepts a `/files…` path. `--temp` opts into the 30-day temp store (throwaway preview only). `--thumbnail <url\|file>` picks the social-card poster; omit it and a frame ~1s into `--video` is extracted into `/files/approved`. Prints `share_url` |
 | `vidfarm posts` / `vidfarm post <id>` | `GET /api/v1/approved/posts[/:id]` | browse approved posts |
 | `vidfarm schedule <postId> --at <iso> --to <dest>` | `POST /api/v1/approved/posts/:postId/schedules` | schedule a post |
 | `vidfarm schedules <postId>` | `GET /api/v1/approved/posts/:postId/schedules` | browse scheduled posts |
@@ -2375,9 +2524,13 @@ The licensed harness also carries the **generative build workflow** guidance (ch
 | `vidfarm mode [interactive\|autonomous]` | local (`~/.vidfarm/interaction-mode.json`) | **The SECOND preference axis — ask it alongside cost mode.** Is the human in the loop? `interactive` = at checkpoints you hand them a copy-paste brief (an image prompt for a FREE web generator; a keyword list for sourcing clips) and they hand files back — usually BETTER output, and in `minimize` the only way to get custom art at all. `autonomous` = you finish solo within the budget. Independent of cost mode: every cost mode runs either way. No arg prints the pair + the explainer to relay; `--clear` forgets; per-run `--interactive`/`--autonomous`. Aliases: `interaction-mode`, `interaction`. |
 | `vidfarm handoff image --theme "<what>" [--items "a,b,c"] [--style …] [--single]` | local (pure text) | **The interactive-mode IMAGE brief.** Prints the exact prompt, the numbered steps, the free tools (meta.ai / ChatGPT / Gemini / HF Spaces) and the follow-up command. Defaults to a **sticker pack**: ONE sheet holding every item on a chroma plate → `vidfarm sticker-pack` splits it for $0. Picks a plate the art won't collide with (green art → magenta plate), spells out what the local keyer actually needs (a crisp silhouette in a different color from the plate, sealed shapes, clear gaps between items — hollow art and plate-colored detail INSIDE a shape are fine now), and carries that `--key-color` into the follow-up. `--single` for one subject. `--zoned` asks instead for a color-block sheet (one panel colour per item) and hands back a `--zones RxC` follow-up — worth it when the pack's own colors fight one plate, but leave it off for a free consumer tool that may not follow a grid. |
 | `vidfarm handoff raws --keywords "a,b" [--platforms tiktok,youtube] [--count N] [--purpose "…"]` | local (pure text) | **The interactive-mode CLIP-SOURCING brief** — the bottom rung of the sourcing ladder (browser control → `clipper`/`raws scan --cloud` → public raws → the human). Prints what to search, how to download (a Google *search* for a downloader, never a link that rots), and the import command for when the folder is ready. |
+| `vidfarm consult [coldstart\|awareness\|angles\|hooks\|placement]` | local (pure text) | **The consultation / brainstorm chain, KEYLESS.** Offer `vidfarm ideas` first — the interview is the deeper step a director opts into after they have seen a list of ideas, not the price of entry. The cloud runs these five steps as `brainstorm/*` primitives that need a provider key or wallet credits; this prints the **identical prompt** (same source module, so they cannot drift) for the agent already in the terminal to answer itself — $0, no key, no network. Bare `consult` = the map of the four chain steps and which artifacts already exist. Auto-reads `OFFER.md` / `OFFER_<NAME>.md` from `--dir` (two offer files → it makes you name one rather than guessing the wrong product); `--offer` takes a path **or** the offer text, and a path that resolves to nothing is an error, never silently treated as the offer. `--count` mirrors the cloud bounds. **`coldstart --short` is the short-form interview**: six fixed questions (offer line, price/checkout, best customer, their complaint verbatim, dream outcome, do they know this product category exists) instead of 12-30 generated ones — instant, identical every run, and still enough for every later step. Interview only, and it takes no `--count`. **Every step reads and appends `CONTEXT.md` in `--dir`** — the durable answer file, so a later session in a new terminal starts warm instead of re-interviewing the director. Tell the director the interview is skippable before you ask anything; mark skipped answers `UNKNOWN` and carry on. `--refs` inlines the full `SELLING_*.md` documents for byte parity — off by default because it is ~34KB of your context, and the brief points at `references/hooks-and-virality.md` instead. Each step names the artifact it writes (`OFFER.md` → `awareness-levels.md` → `persuasive-angles.md` → `ad-hooks.md`) and the next command. Aliases: `consultation`, `brainstorm`. Flow: `references/onboarding.md`. |
 | `vidfarm storyboard [dir] [--init] [--frames "Title\|scene,…"] [--json]` | local (`STORYBOARD.md` / `SCRIPT.md`) | **The plan pass, and a core part of the composition format.** Scaffolds/reads the project's `STORYBOARD.md`: ordered frames with `duration`/`status`/`src`/`scene`/`voiceover`. The Vidfarm editor renders this file in its **Storyboard** view (contact sheet + per-frame comments + `outline → built → animated` progress), so it's the cheapest place to get a director's approval before building. Not to be confused with `vidfarm sequence` (which GENERATES storyboard images for the pure-videogen pipeline). Alias: `plan`. |
 | `vidfarm experiment [dir] [--init] [round …] [log <video> …] [--json]` | local (`EXPERIMENTS_DIARY.md`) | **Ad testing over weeks, not one video.** Owns the campaign ledger and ONLY that: sizes each round (`videos ÷ capacity = epochs`, where capacity is the SUM of per-channel posting rates — `--channels "tiktok_a x2, li_a 3/week, fb_a paused"` — and epoch slots are dealt out in proportion, warning on `channel-overposted`), ranks the north-star metric, flags outliers vs the median, and lints the method — two variables in one structured round, a winner promoted off one post, results read at mixed ages, a structured round handed to gigworkers, unspent capacity. Feedback, not a gate (exits 0). Also carries the FORMAT decision into planning: `--init` prints the copywriting-led menu (b-roll / talking head / process / loop background / satisfying / lifestyle / POV quote) and records the pick in Setup, which every round inherits. Two writes: `round --videos N --variable angle …` and `log <video> --comments N --channel <acct> --source flockposter --age 48h` (ALWAYS pass `--channel`: it keeps a per-account median so each video is ranked against its own account, not the fleet — account health moves numbers by multiples — and a second account's reading counts as the retest that clears `account-health-confound`) (or `log <video> --posted --channel <id>`, which only RECORDS a post). It deliberately does not re-wrap `channels` (capacity), `harness`/`qa` (constants), `handoff` (briefs), `dedupe` (per-channel copies) or `approve`+`schedule` (posting). Method: <https://vidfarm.cc/experiments.md>. Alias: `experiments`. |
 | `vidfarm wallet [--job <id>\|--tracer <t>] [--limit <n>]` | `GET /api/v1/user/me/wallet` | cost log: balance + lifetime spend + recent charges. `--job <renderJobId>` prints **what that one video cost** (sums its charges); `--tracer <t>` sums a tracer. Cloud-only; readable on the free plan too (shows $0.00). Aliases: `spend`, `costs` |
+| `vidfarm video-search "<query>" [--limit n] [--fresh d\|w\|m\|y] [--duration short\|medium\|long] [--resolution high\|standard] [--region r]` | `GET /api/v1/primitives/video-search` | **GOOGLE VIDEO SEARCH — how you SOURCE footage.** Returns real source URLs off the open web (TikTok, YouTube, Pexels/Pixabay/Mixkit, news, archive.org), which go straight into `vidfarm raws scan <url>` (mine clips) or `vidfarm download-video <url>` (collect the file). Search the **shot**, not the topic: `[subject]+[action]+[shot/style]+[quality/orientation]`. Google operators work — `site:pexels.com/videos`, `site:tiktok.com "packing orders" -dance`, `"exact phrase"`. **PAID PLAN · flat $0.0003 per call** whatever the result count, so ask for one WIDE page (`--limit 40`) instead of paging. Returns LINKS with **no licence** — check rights before reuse. Aliases: `videosearch`, `search-video` |
+| `vidfarm image-search "<query>" [--limit n] [--type-image photo\|clipart\|gif\|transparent] [--color c] [--size s] [--layout Square\|Tall\|Wide]` | `GET /api/v1/primitives/image-search` | Google image search — reference stills, textures, logos, product shots. Same operators. **PAID PLAN · flat $0.0003 per call.** For licence-checked, royalty-free assets prefer `vidfarm media search --type image` (free); these are LINKS with no licence. Aliases: `imagesearch`, `search-image` |
+| `vidfarm news-search "<query>" [--fresh d\|w\|m\|y] [--limit n] [--region r]` | `GET /api/v1/primitives/news-search` | Google News — recent real events, so an agent can build **timely** content. News finds the STORY; run `video-search` after for the VISUALS (searching both at once finds neither). **PAID PLAN · flat $0.0003 per call.** Full method: <https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/google-news-to-video.md>. Aliases: `news`, `newssearch`, `search-news` |
 | `vidfarm iconscout "<query>" [--asset icon\|illustration\|3d\|lottie] [--style sticker] [--free\|--premium] [--sort …] [--limit n]` | `GET /api/v1/primitives/iconscout/search` | **The cheap alternative to AI image generation.** Designer-made icons, STICKERS, illustrations, 3D props and Lottie. Reach for this BEFORE `generate image` for any of those: an AI attempt costs cents, needs a prompt loop, and rarely returns a clean transparent vector, while IconScout hands back a finished SVG / transparent PNG on the first try. **Search is FREE and never gates.** Needs **no key** — vidfarm's own IconScout account serves it. Aliases: `icons`, `stickers` |
 | `vidfarm iconscout get <uuid> [--format svg\|png\|…] [--size px] [--out file]` | `POST /api/v1/primitives/iconscout/download` | Download one asset to a durable vidfarm URL you can place. A **free** asset costs $0 (honour the returned `attribution`); a **premium** asset runs on vidfarm's IconScout subscription for a few cents on the wallet — still under one AI attempt. Saving your own `iconscout` key makes downloads free. Idempotent per uuid+format. |
 | `vidfarm provider-keys` / `vidfarm add-provider-key <p> <secret>` | `GET`·`POST /api/v1/user/me/provider-keys` | manage AI keys. `iconscout` is the one provider that packs TWO values into one secret: `<client_id>:<client_secret>` |
@@ -2405,7 +2558,7 @@ The licensed harness also carries the **generative build workflow** guidance (ch
 | `vidfarm doctor` | (local environment triage) | check ffmpeg/node/keys/agent CLI/poisoned env + list local serve/preview processes before debugging anything else; `--kill-orphans` reaps dead servers squatting ports (fixes the "Waiting for preview server…" hang) |
 | `vidfarm skills list\|add <name>\|update` | `GET /skill-pack/index.json` · `/skill-pack/:name/*` | install/refresh skill packs (see "Skill packs — import on demand") |
 | `vidfarm skill ls\|topics\|show <path\|topic>\|search "<term>"\|path` | (local — **offline, no account**) | **Read this pack straight off disk.** A full copy ships inside the devcli tarball and is pinned to the installed version. `search` greps all 23 files at once — the cheapest way to find one paragraph without loading a whole reference. **`topics` is the spoken-name index** (meme-recaption, product-explainer, captions, first-frame, blurred-plate, density, avatar, dedupe, …) and `show <topic>` prints just that SECTION, not the 650-line file it lives in |
-| `vidfarm ideas [topic] [--topic "<offer>"] [--family <name>] [--families] [--count <n>] [--json]` | (local — **offline, free, no AI call**) | **"What should I post?"** — the 50-frame content-idea angle bank, read out of `references/content-ideas.md` so the CLI and the skill never drift. `--topic` fills every frame with the director's offer as a starter line; `--count` samples across families instead of truncating. It hands over frames, not finished titles — sharpen each one, then write hook/loop/payoff/bait |
+| `vidfarm ideas [topic] [--topic "<offer>"] [--family <name>] [--families] [--stages] [--stage <name\|n>] [--angles] [--angle <name>] [--grid] [--count <n>] [--json]` | (local — **offline, free, no AI call**) | **"What should I post?"** — the three content-idea banks, read out of `references/content-ideas.md` so the CLI and the skill never drift. `--topic` fills every frame with the director's offer as a starter line; `--count` samples across families instead of truncating. `--stages` prints the 5-stage awareness ladder (what each stage believes, what the video must do, its frames, its angles, and what it may ask for); `--angles` prints the 44 problem angles by family — hold the frame and change the angle when a topic is "already covered"; **`--grid --topic "<offer>" --count 30` lays out a balanced month**, one row per video, in the default stage mix. It hands over combinations, not finished titles — sharpen each one, then write hook/loop/payoff/bait. **Run this BEFORE `vidfarm consult` on a new director**: one line of offer buys 20+ ideas with no key and no interview, which is the easiest first win, and their reactions to the list make the later interview better |
 | `vidfarm tts "…" --engine local` / `vidfarm stt <file> --engine whisper` | (keyless LOCAL engines: Kokoro-82M TTS, whisper.cpp STT) | narration + word-timestamp transcripts with zero keys and zero accounts |
 | `vidfarm remove-background <video\|image>` | (local ONNX matting — free) | transparent-subject media for occlusion captions/cutouts (arbitrary/messy background; for a FLAT solid background use `remove-background-greenscreen`) |
 | `vidfarm capture <url>` | (local headless-Chrome capture) | website screenshots/assets for website-to-video flows |
@@ -2482,7 +2635,7 @@ The four modes, quoted as **cost per finished video**. The first two are spend p
 
 **All of it bills to the user's own AI provider keys (BYOK)** — the keys saved with `vidfarm add-provider-key <provider> <key>` or at **Settings → Bring your own keys** (<https://vidfarm.cc/settings/developer>). The model providers charge those keys directly; Vidfarm wallet credits only come into play when the user deliberately runs on the platform key instead of their own. So `minimize` isn't "cheap", it's **zero**: nothing reaches a paid key at all.
 
-`vidfarm cost-mode <minimize|hybrid|rich-ai|pure-videogen>` records a single spend preference (in `~/.vidfarm/cost-mode.json`) that every **billed** command honors: `generate`, `music`, `decompose`, `inspiration-decompose`, `create`, `replicate`, `inpaint`, `create-overlay`, `cutout --generate` (only the generation step; a bare `cutout` on an existing graphic is free), and the cloud paths of `render --target cloud`, `tts --cloud`, `stt --cloud`, `remove-greenscreen` (non-`--local`), `dedupe --cloud`. FREE local engines never gate (`render` local default, `tts --engine local`, `stt --engine whisper`, `remove-greenscreen --local`, `dedupe --local`, `cutout` on a file/url, all the file-editing verbs). `vidfarm media search` (the free stock catalog — pixabay/openverse/iconify music, SFX, images, icons, stock video) is also free and never gates. `vidfarm iconscout` **search** is free and never gates either; only `vidfarm iconscout get` on a PREMIUM asset can spend (a few cents on the wallet), and free assets cost $0.
+`vidfarm cost-mode <minimize|hybrid|rich-ai|pure-videogen>` records a single spend preference (in `~/.vidfarm/cost-mode.json`) that every **billed** command honors: `generate`, `music`, `decompose`, `inspiration-decompose`, `create`, `replicate`, `inpaint`, `create-overlay`, `cutout --generate` (only the generation step; a bare `cutout` on an existing graphic is free), and the cloud paths of `render --target cloud`, `tts --cloud`, `stt --cloud`, `remove-greenscreen` (non-`--local`), `dedupe --cloud`. FREE local engines never gate (`render` local default, `tts --engine local`, `stt --engine whisper`, `remove-greenscreen --local`, `dedupe --local`, `cutout` on a file/url, all the file-editing verbs). `vidfarm media search` (the free stock catalog — pixabay/openverse/iconify music, SFX, images, icons, stock video) is also free and never gates. `vidfarm iconscout` **search** is free and never gates either; only `vidfarm iconscout get` on a PREMIUM asset can spend (a few cents on the wallet), and free assets cost $0. `vidfarm video-search` / `image-search` / `news-search` (Google) are **paid-plan** but flat **$0.0003 per call** — two orders of magnitude under one AI image attempt — so they do not gate in any cost mode; in `minimize`, one wide search beats one generation every time.
 
 - **minimize ($0 videos)** — a billed op is **refused** unless you add `--yes`; the error names the free local alternative (which now includes the matching `vidfarm media search` for music/SFX/image/video). Use this to guarantee no surprise AI spend. Before paying to generate music, sound effects, or images, try `vidfarm media search "<meaning>" --type <bgm|sfx|image|vector|icon|video>` first — free royalty-free assets instead of a billed `music`/`generate` call. **Check the keyless sources first — Openverse (CC/CC0 music, SFX, images) and iconify (icons) need no account at all**, so they always work in `minimize`. Photos/vectors/stock-video need a **free Pixabay key** that **may already be saved** — check `vidfarm provider-keys` (or web **Settings → Bring your own keys** / <https://vidfarm.cc/settings/developer>) before assuming a short result means "no key." If absent, save one once: `vidfarm add-provider-key pixabay <key>` (free key from <https://pixabay.com/api/docs/>), the Settings surface, or hand it to the desktop AI agent to run that command. **For icons, STICKERS, illustrations, 3D props and Lottie, use `vidfarm iconscout "<meaning>" --style sticker --free` instead** — it needs no key at all, search is free, and free assets download for $0 (a credit line is the only price). Prefer it over a generated graphic in every mode, not just `minimize`.
 - **minimize still gets CUSTOM images — via a free manual generator.** A refused `generate` is not the end of the road. Offer the user the manual loop (ask once, then make it the session default): **you write the prompt → they run it free in <https://meta.ai>, free-tier ChatGPT, or a free Hugging Face image Space (<https://huggingface.co/spaces>) → they hand the PNG back** via `vidfarm put-file ./sheet.png` or web **My Files**. Ask for **one sheet holding every graphic you need**, gridded on a **flat pure-green plate** (`#00FF00`), no text — one round trip instead of N, which saves the user's time and your tokens. Then split it locally for $0: `vidfarm mask ./sheet.png --crop x,y,w,h --flat "#00FF00" --out prop-a.png`, once per element (drop `--flat` and let local ONNX matting handle it if the tool ignored the green background). Full prompt template + loop: recipe `recipes/cutout-graphics-for-explainers.md` (“Free manual image-gen”).
@@ -2589,7 +2742,10 @@ vidfarm skill show harnesses/README.md  # or an exact path
 vidfarm skill search "greenscreen"      # grep all of it — find the paragraph, then open that file
 vidfarm skill path                      # where the bundled copy lives
 
-vidfarm ideas --families                # the 50-frame idea bank, by family
+vidfarm ideas --families                # the 50 content frames, by family
+vidfarm ideas --stages                  # the 5-stage awareness ladder, in full
+vidfarm ideas --angles                  # the 44 problem angles, by family
+vidfarm ideas --grid --topic "<offer>" --count 30   # a balanced month: stage x angle x frame
 vidfarm ideas --topic "bookkeeping for trades" --count 20
 ```
 
@@ -2650,18 +2806,79 @@ Vidfarm is in active development. Endpoints, response shapes, and the editor UI
 
 Run this flow when the director signals they **don't know where to start** ("getting started", "help me set up", "I don't know where to begin") **or asks for a "consultation"** ("give me a consultation", "consult me on my offer", "I want a strategy consultation"). **"Consultation" is a first-class trigger for the brainstorm chain** — treat it as a request for the full run: the cold-start interview → awareness stages → angles → hooks (steps 1-4 below), driven by the `brainstorm/*` primitives rather than brainstormed in chat from memory. If they already know what they want, skip straight to it — never force onboarding. Directors can also jump to any single step (e.g. "just find me a good template for X" → go straight to template discovery, or "consult me on hooks" → run `brainstorm/hooks` alone).
 
+### Start with content ideas, not the interview
+
+**Unless the director explicitly asked for a consultation, run the content-ideas pass first.** Ask for their offer in **one line** — or a URL you can read — then run `vidfarm ideas --topic "<that line>"`, sharpen the frames into **20+ real titles**, and save `content-ideas.md` in their working folder. It is offline, free, needs no key and no `OFFER.md`, and takes about a minute. Method: `references/content-ideas.md`.
+
+Why this order:
+
+- **The director gets something before they give something.** An interview asks them to work first, on a product they already know, for a payoff they cannot see yet. A list of 20 titled videos is the payoff, up front.
+- **Reacting beats recalling.** "This one, not that one — our customers don't care about pricing, they care about the mess we clean up" is a better interview answer than anything they would have typed cold, and they gave it without being interviewed. Read those reactions straight into `CONTEXT.md`.
+- **It makes the interview optional, and therefore wanted.** After the list, say the interview is what turns ideas into a strategy — who to sell to, which angle, which hook — and offer the six-question short form. A director who says yes there is a director who will answer properly.
+- **It fails softer.** If they lose interest after the ideas, they still have a month of content. If they lose interest during an interview, they have nothing.
+
+Skip straight to the interview only when they asked for a consultation by name, when the ideas pass already ran, or when they say they want the strategy first.
+
+**No AI key and no wallet credits? The consultation still runs — locally, for $0.** The `brainstorm/*` primitives broker a provider on the director's saved key or the wallet, so a keyless director would be stopped at step 1. They should not be: **you** are a frontier model already sitting in their terminal, and Vidfarm does not need to hire a second one. `vidfarm consult <step>` (aliases `consultation`, `brainstorm`) prints the **identical prompt** the cloud primitive would have sent — same file, `services/brainstorm-prompts.ts`, so the two paths cannot drift — and you answer it yourself. No network, no key, no charge.
+
+```
+vidfarm consult                 # the map: four steps, which artifacts already exist
+vidfarm consult coldstart       # → the interview questions; you ask the human → OFFER.md
+vidfarm consult coldstart --short   # the SHORT form: 6 fixed questions, ~2 minutes → OFFER.md
+vidfarm consult awareness       # → awareness-levels.md      (reads OFFER.md automatically)
+vidfarm consult angles          # → persuasive-angles.md     [--problem-awareness/--solution-awareness]
+vidfarm consult hooks           # → ad-hooks.md
+vidfarm consult placement --video <path|url>   # native placement moments in an existing video
+```
+
+**Offer the short form first.** The full interview generates 12-30 questions, which is right for a director who came for a strategy session and far too much for one who wants a video today. `vidfarm consult coldstart --short` asks **six fixed questions** — offer line, price and checkout, best customer, their complaint in their own words, their dream outcome, and whether they know this kind of product exists. That is the minimum every later step reads back, so the chain still runs on it. The questions are fixed rather than generated, so the short run is instant and identical every time. Ask them in two batches of three, as written, and keep the pain and desire answers **word for word** — the hooks step quotes them. A director who wants the deeper session runs the bare `coldstart`. `--short` takes no `--count` and applies to the interview only.
+
+**Say up front that the interview is skippable — every time you start one, short or full.** Tell the director in one line that any question can be skipped, and that they can stop the whole interview whenever it gets tedious. Then work with what they gave: mark the gaps `UNKNOWN`, run the rest of the chain on the partial answers, and only come back to a gap when a later step genuinely needs it and you can say why. Never re-ask, never nag, and never make a finished interview a condition of making a video. A director who abandons a form gives you nothing; a director who answers three of six gives you an offer line and a pain quote, which is enough to start.
+
+**Every step reads and writes `CONTEXT.md` in the working folder.** This is the durable answer file: what the director said, which awareness stage was chosen, what they ruled out. Read it **before** you ask anything — never re-ask a question it already answers — and append to it (under a dated heading, never overwriting an earlier session) when the step finishes. `OFFER.md` is the polished product description; `CONTEXT.md` is the raw carry-over that makes the *next* session, in a new terminal weeks later, start warm instead of re-interviewing someone who already answered. Bare `vidfarm consult` shows whether it exists yet.
+
+**Keep one working folder per director, and run every command from it.** Pass it as `--dir ./acme-skincare` (or `cd` into it) so `OFFER.md`, `CONTEXT.md`, `awareness-levels.md`, `persuasive-angles.md`, `ad-hooks.md`, `content-ideas.md`, the storyboards, the raws and the renders all land together. See "The working folder" below.
+
+It auto-reads `OFFER.md` / `OFFER_<NAME>.md` from `--dir` (several offer files → it makes you name one rather than guessing), and `--offer` takes either a path or the offer text. `--count` mirrors the cloud primitive's bounds so nothing that works locally 400s later. The one deliberate difference: the cloud prompt inlines 34KB of `SELLING_*.md`, and the local brief points you at `references/hooks-and-virality.md` instead to protect your context — pass `--refs` for byte parity. Use the cloud primitives when the director HAS a key and wants the run off their own machine, or from the web chat where there is no terminal; use `consult` whenever they are keyless, cost-averse, or already working locally.
+
 The point of onboarding is to build **durable, reusable context** in My Files, namescoped under the director's product/offer folder, so future chats and agents can read it back. Save each artifact as Markdown with `browse_files` write (web copilot) or `vidfarm put-file` (devcli):
 
-1. **Product context** → **`OFFER.md`** (or `OFFER_<NAME>.md` — e.g. `OFFER_ACME_SKINCARE.md` — when the director runs more than one offer). Drive the interview questions with `brainstorm/coldstart` and **recommend the director save their answers into that file**, either locally next to their project or in cloud My Files. This is the durable artifact every later step reads back; `About.md` / `Interview.md` are legacy names — prefer `OFFER*.md` for anything new.
+0. **Content ideas** → **`content-ideas.md`** — **do this one first** (see *Start with content ideas* above). One line of offer in, `vidfarm ideas --topic "<line>"`, 20+ titled ideas out, saved to their folder. No key, no `OFFER.md`, no wallet. It is the fastest visible win in the whole flow, and the director's reactions to the list feed step 1. Deepen it later, once the awareness stage is known.
+1. **Product context** → **`OFFER.md`** (or `OFFER_<NAME>.md` — e.g. `OFFER_ACME_SKINCARE.md` — when the director runs more than one offer). Drive the interview questions with `brainstorm/coldstart` and **recommend the director save their answers into that file**, either locally next to their project or in cloud My Files. This is the durable artifact every later step reads back; `About.md` / `Interview.md` are legacy names — prefer `OFFER*.md` for anything new. Offer the **short form** (`vidfarm consult coldstart --short`, six fixed questions) to anyone who sounds impatient or just wants a video today, and tell them any question is skippable before you ask the first one.
 2. **Awareness level** (Eugene Schwartz — problem-aware, solution-unaware, …) → `awareness-levels.md`. If it's genuinely unknown after thinking it through, note that ads for **every** level should be made and tested. Use `brainstorm/awareness_stages`.
 3. **Persuasive angles** → `persuasive-angles.md`, via `brainstorm/angles`.
 4. **Hooks** → `ad-hooks.md`, via `brainstorm/hooks`. **Grade what comes back against `references/hooks-and-virality.md`** — the three gates, situation-vs-label, and the unguessable test — instead of shipping the raw list. And never rank a generated batch with the same reasoning that wrote it; the rubric catches defects, it doesn't pick winners.
-4b. **Content ideas** → `content-ideas.md` in their offer folder. Once the offer and awareness stage are known, work the 50-frame angle bank in `references/content-ideas.md` against the topic and save 20+ titled ideas. This is what the director actually posts from between chats, and it is the answer to "what should I post?" for the next month.
+4b. **Content ideas, second pass** → update `content-ideas.md`. Step 0 already produced a list from one line of offer; now that the offer document and the awareness stage exist, work all three banks in `references/content-ideas.md` against them again and rewrite the weak picks. Now you can set the awareness stage per idea and spread the set across the ladder, which is exactly what step 0 could not do — a solution-unaware audience wants different frames, different angles and a different ask than a product-aware one. This is what the director actually posts from between chats, and it is the answer to "what should I post?" for the next month.
 5. **Brand assets & demos** — ask if they have logos/mascots/themes (suggest a `/brand-assets/` folder, e.g. `/brand-assets/logo.png`) or product demos / screen recordings (suggest a `/product-demos/` folder). `browse_files list` / `vidfarm files` first to see what they already uploaded; filenames should be descriptive and every asset worth finding later should get **notes** (`annotate-file` / `browse_files annotate`) so `files --search` works months from now. If they have a recurring character/mascot, set up its `/files/characters/<slug>/` trio now — `<character_id>.json` (e.g. `character_zara.json`) + `character_sprite_card.png` + `character_about.md` (see "Recurring characters are first-class").
 6. **Budget** — ask roughly what they want to spend per video, and map it to the Cost spectrum (free reuse+local render → pennies for cloud render → ~$1 for some AI scenes → $10+ for heavy AI gen). This sets which approach you default to and whether AI **video** generation is on the table (ask permission before using it; image gen is cheap and fine). Budget can also be revisited per editor project.
    - **While you're on money, set the graphics default: IconScout, not AI image generation.** Any icon, sticker, illustration, 3D prop, or Lottie should come from `vidfarm iconscout "<meaning>" --style sticker` — a designer's finished transparent asset on the first try, for a fraction of one AI attempt. **It needs no key and no setup**: vidfarm's own IconScout account serves it, search is free, and free assets download for $0 (a credit line is the only price). Say this out loud during onboarding — it's the single biggest per-video saving a new director can adopt on day one, and it holds in **every** cost mode, not just `minimize`. A director who already pays IconScout can save their own key once (`vidfarm add-provider-key iconscout "<client_id>:<client_secret>"`, or **Settings → Developer**) and then downloads cost them nothing here.
 7. **Recommend & adapt a template** — pair what you now know about the offer against the decomposed template catalog (`GET /discover/feed?q=<offer>`, read each result's `promotions`/`keywords`/`summary`), recommend the best 3-6, then fork and **modify** the winner to fit their offer. Prefer already-decomposed templates so the director skips the ~$0.10 decompose cost.
 
+### The working folder — suggest one on the first turn
+
+**Before anything else, ask the director to keep one folder on their machine for all their Vidfarm work, and use it for every command.** Suggest a name after their offer or brand (`./acme-skincare/`), and if they have no preference, propose `~/vidfarm/<brand>/` and create it. Say why in one line: every command that takes `--dir` writes there, so the strategy documents, the storyboards, the footage and the renders stay in one place, and any later session — a new terminal, a different agent, next month — can read the whole history back instead of asking the same questions again.
+
+A typical folder:
+
+```
+acme-skincare/
+  OFFER.md              # the offer, in the director's own words
+  CONTEXT.md            # durable answers, appended every consult step
+  awareness-levels.md   persuasive-angles.md   ad-hooks.md   content-ideas.md
+  brand-assets/         # logo, mascot, fonts, colors
+  product-demos/        # screen recordings, product footage
+  raws/                 # downloaded and mined clips
+  renders/              # exported mp4s
+  STORYBOARD.md         # the current video
+```
+
+Rules that make the folder pay off:
+
+- **Every `vidfarm` command runs from it** — `cd` into it, or pass `--dir`. A command run from the wrong place writes an orphan `OFFER.md` next to the shell, and the next step silently consults on nothing.
+- **One folder per offer.** A director with two products gets two folders, not two `OFFER_*.md` files in one — the artifacts are per-offer, and mixing them bleeds one brand's angles into the other's ads.
+- **Mirror it into cloud My Files** (`vidfarm put-file <file> --folder <brand>`) so the web copilot and any other machine see the same context. Local is the working copy; My Files is the one the web chat can read.
+- **When a director arrives with an existing folder, read `CONTEXT.md` and `OFFER.md` first** and tell them what you already know. Do not re-run the interview on a folder that has answers in it.
+
 **Assume multiple offers.** My Files is multi-offer (see the My Files section) — namescope every onboarding artifact under the right product/offer/region folder (`acme-skincare/OFFER.md`, not a bare `OFFER.md`) so one brand's context never bleeds into another's. When a director keeps several offers in one flat folder, name the files `OFFER_ACME_SKINCARE.md` / `OFFER_ACME_SUPPLEMENTS.md` instead.
 
 ## Default assistance pattern
@@ -2677,21 +2894,72 @@ When a director asks "make me a video", the default sequence is:
 
 Prefer specific templates over primitives when a template exists that already captures the desired production pattern.
 
-## Content ideas — the angle bank
+## Content ideas — frames, awareness stages, and problem angles
 
 Read this when a director says **"give me content ideas"**, "what should I post", "I need 30 videos for the month", "I'm out of ideas", or when a batch run needs N *different* videos instead of N variants of one video.
 
-**What this is.** A fixed bank of **50 content frames**. A frame is a reusable shape for a video's subject — not a hook line, not a script. You take the director's topic (their offer, their niche, their product, their audience's world) and pour it into a frame: `the rise of` + `dropshipping supplements` → *"The rise of the supplement dropship store"*. One topic against 50 frames is 50 distinct videos, and they do not read as repeats, because each frame changes what the video is *about*, not just how it opens.
+**This also runs FIRST for a brand-new director, before the cold-start interview.** It needs one line of offer, not an interview; it is offline, free, and keyless; and it hands the director 20+ titled videos in about a minute. That is the easiest win available on turn one, and their reactions to the list ("this one, not that one") are better raw material than anything an interview gets cold. Run it, save `content-ideas.md`, then offer the interview as the way to turn ideas into a strategy — `references/onboarding.md` → *Start with content ideas*.
+
+**What this is — three banks, not one.** An idea is a point in a small grid, and this reference holds all three axes:
+
+| Axis | Bank | Question it answers |
+|---|---|---|
+| **Subject** | the director's own pool of adjacent topics | *What is this one about, in the niche?* (settling the dinner argument · eating what you actually craved · reading a menu before you commit) |
+| **Frame** | 50 content frames | *What is the video the story of?* (`the rise of`, `then vs now`, `one decision that changed everything`) |
+| **Awareness** | 5 stages | *What does the viewer already know?* (unaware → problem-aware → solution-aware → product-aware → most-aware) |
+| **Angle** | 44 problem angles | *From which side do we talk about the problem?* (the hidden cost, the myth, the confession, the honest downside) |
+
+A **frame** is a reusable shape for a video's subject — not a hook line, not a script. You pour the director's topic into it: `the rise of` + `dropshipping supplements` → *"The rise of the supplement dropship store"*. An **angle** decides which face of the problem that video shows; the same frame at two angles is two genuinely different videos. An **awareness stage** decides who it is allowed to be for — the same idea aimed at a stranger and at a buyer needs different first ten seconds and a different ask.
+
+**The grid is where the volume comes from.** 50 frames × 44 angles × 5 stages, over a pool of adjacent subjects, is not a number to take literally, but it is why "I need 30 videos this month" is an easy ask, not a hard one. Vary **two** axes across a set and it never reads as repeats. Vary only one and it does — and the axis most often left frozen is the subject, because the offer line is right there and it is easy to paste.
 
 **How to use it (the loop).**
 
 1. **Get the topic.** In priority order: read the director's **`OFFER.md`** if one exists (see `onboarding.md`); **if they named a URL** — "content ideas for my offer example.com" — **fetch the site and read it** (home page, plus the pricing and about pages when they exist) and pull the offer, the audience, the promise, the objections, and the product vocabulary straight off the page; otherwise ask for the offer, the niche, and the audience in one question. Never generate ideas against a topic you guessed. When you work from a URL, **state the offer you read back in one line before the list** ("Reading example.com: a $49/mo bookkeeping tool for solo trades") so the director can correct it before you produce 20 ideas off a wrong premise — and offer to save that line plus the ideas as `OFFER.md` + `content-ideas.md` in their folder.
-2. **Pick frames, don't dump the list.** Choose 10–20 frames that actually fit the topic and the audience's awareness stage — a solution-unaware audience wants `what everyone gets wrong` and `how it works`; a product-aware audience wants `then vs now`, `cheap vs expensive`, `one decision that changed everything`. Say the frame name next to each idea so the director can ask for more of that shape.
-3. **Write each idea as a title, not a frame.** Output `"The one pricing mistake that killed our first 400 orders"`, not `"one mistake that changed everything — about pricing"`. A frame that stays abstract is not an idea yet.
-4. **Then run it through the hook harness.** A content idea is the *subject*; it is not the four charges. Every idea a director picks still needs hook / loop / payoff / bait written before the timeline — `references/hooks-and-virality.md`. The frames on this list are deliberately curiosity-shaped, which makes the loop easy to name, but never skip that pass.
-5. **Batch it properly.** If the director wants the whole set produced, that is scripting mode with a `HARNESS.md` — `recipes/bulk-scripting-with-a-harness.md`. One frame per video, one line in the plan file.
+2. **Name the problem in the director's words, once — then write 4–8 adjacent ways to say it.** Every angle is a lens on *a problem*; if you have not written the problem down in one sentence, the angles all collapse into the same vague video. Take it from `OFFER.md`, from the site's own copy, or ask: *"What is the thing that is going wrong for them right now, in their words?"* That sentence is the *first* entry in a **subject pool**, never the only one — see *The subject pool* below. One frozen phrase is what turns 50 frames into 50 versions of one video.
+3. **Spread across awareness stages, not just frames.** Most directors post everything at one stage — usually product-aware, because that is the stage they live in — and then wonder why the account does not grow. Cover the ladder deliberately; the default monthly mix is in *Spreading a month across the ladder* below. Say the stage next to each idea.
+4. **Pick frames and angles, don't dump the lists.** Choose 10–20 combinations that actually fit the topic. Label each idea `frame · angle · stage` so the director can say "more like that one" and you know exactly which axis they mean.
+5. **Write each idea as a title, not a frame.** Output `"The one pricing mistake that killed our first 400 orders"`, not `"one mistake that changed everything — about pricing"`. A frame that stays abstract is not an idea yet.
+6. **Then run it through the hook harness.** A content idea is the *subject*; it is not the four charges. Every idea a director picks still needs hook / loop / payoff / bait written before the timeline — `references/hooks-and-virality.md`. The frames on this list are deliberately curiosity-shaped, which makes the loop easy to name, but never skip that pass.
+7. **Batch it properly.** If the director wants the whole set produced, that is scripting mode with a `HARNESS.md` — `recipes/bulk-scripting-with-a-harness.md`. One idea per video, one line in the plan file, with its stage and angle recorded so the set stays balanced.
+
+**Give lots when asked.** "Give me content ideas" means volume. Return **20+ titled ideas** by default, grouped by frame family or by awareness stage, not three polite suggestions. The director prunes; you supply.
+
+### The subject pool — adjacent, not literal
+
+**The most common defect in a generated list is not a bad frame. It is one frozen phrase.** The offer line goes in verbatim, and every title carries it:
+
+> The history of deciding where to eat tonight
+> The rise of deciding where to eat tonight
+> The future of deciding where to eat tonight
+> The science of deciding where to eat tonight
+
+The frame moved four times. The video did not move once. A director reads that list and correctly says it is one idea with four openings.
+
+**The fix is a pool, not a sentence.** Before you write a single title, write **4–8 adjacent subjects** inside the same niche — different ways the same audience says the same life, from different sides of it:
 
-**Give lots when asked.** "Give me content ideas" means volume. Return **20+ titled ideas** by default, grouped by frame family, not three polite suggestions. The director prunes; you supply.
+| Frozen | Adjacent pool for the same offer |
+|---|---|
+| deciding where to eat tonight | settling the food argument · picking a restaurant before you read a single review · the craving you cannot place · eating what you actually wanted · the group chat that never picks · reading a menu before you commit |
+
+Now the same four frames are four videos:
+
+- *The history of settling the food argument*
+- *The rise of picking dinner by review score*
+- *The future of eating what you actually craved*
+- *The science of the craving you cannot place*
+
+**Adjacent means inside the niche, and true.**
+
+- ✅ **Adjacent:** the same audience, the same day, the same pain seen from another side — the group chat, the diet rule, the menu, the argument, the craving, the five open tabs, the walk to a place that turned out wrong.
+- ❌ **Off topic:** a different business. "The rise of the restaurant industry" is not this offer's video; "the psychology of ordering the same thing every time" is.
+- ❌ **A rebrand of the product line.** Swapping adjectives on the offer sentence — *finding where to eat tonight*, *choosing where to eat tonight* — is the frozen phrase wearing a hat. If the subject has not changed, the video has not changed.
+
+**Where the pool comes from.** The audience's own vocabulary: the objection, the workaround they already tried, the moment before the search, the moment after the wrong choice, the person who is not the buyer but is in the room. `OFFER.md`, the site copy, and real comments are all pools you can read out rather than invent.
+
+**Do it for each lens.** The subject can sit on the *problem*, on the *category*, or on the *product* — and the pool is per lens, because a frame that claims a past cannot take a new product as its subject. Rotate the pool as you go down the list: no two ideas in a row should repeat the same phrase.
+
+**One rule to check the finished list.** Read the titles with the frames covered up. If what is left is the same sentence 20 times, you produced one idea, not 20.
 
 ### The 50 frames
 
@@ -2769,6 +3037,175 @@ Read this when a director says **"give me content ideas"**, "what should I post"
 - the complete breakdown
 - the rabbit hole
 
+### The awareness ladder — 5 stages
+
+Eugene Schwartz's ladder, as a production instrument. The stage decides **what the first ten seconds are allowed to assume** and **what the video is allowed to ask for**. An idea is not finished until it has a stage, because the same subject at the wrong stage is a video that talks past the viewer.
+
+`vidfarm ideas --stages` prints this ladder; `--stage <name|n>` prints one stage.
+
+**Stage 1 · unaware** — they do not have a name for the problem yet, and they are not looking for one.
+
+- **Believes:** nothing is wrong; this is just how it is. They are on the app to be entertained.
+- **Video must:** be interesting on its own merits, then leave one splinter — a situation they recognise from their own week.
+- **Frames that fit:** the rise of · the psychology of · what nobody noticed · the untold story · one event that changed everything · the rabbit hole
+- **Angles that fit:** the daily friction · the two kinds of people · the confession · the screen recording · the industry does this on purpose
+- **Ask:** none. A follow at most. Naming a price here burns the video.
+- **Never:** open with the problem stated as a problem — they do not agree it is one yet.
+
+**Stage 2 · problem-aware** — they feel the pain and can describe it, but they think it is unavoidable or their own fault.
+
+- **Believes:** "this part of my job is just miserable." They blame themselves, their discipline, or bad luck.
+- **Video must:** articulate the pain better than they can, then move the blame off them and onto a cause.
+- **Frames that fit:** why it failed · what everyone gets wrong · the biggest mistakes · expectation vs reality · problem vs solution · the chain reaction
+- **Angles that fit:** the hidden cost · the slow leak · the advice that broke it · the wrong metric · the expensive lesson · the day it broke
+- **Ask:** a comment or a save. "Which one is you?" works; a link does not.
+- **Never:** name the product in the first half. They have not accepted that a solution category exists.
+
+**Stage 3 · solution-aware** — they accept a fix exists somewhere, but not that this *kind* of fix is the one.
+
+- **Believes:** "someone has solved this, but the options I have seen are junk / too expensive / not for me."
+- **Video must:** make the category legible and prove the mechanism. This is the explainer stage.
+- **Frames that fit:** how it works · why it works · myth vs reality · simple vs complicated · cause vs effect · the complete guide
+- **Angles that fit:** the mechanism · the false solution · the myth · the experiment · what pros do differently · the receipts
+- **Ask:** "Want the breakdown?" — a comment keyword, a saved post, a free resource.
+- **Never:** compare to named competitors yet; that is a stage-4 conversation and it reads as defensive here.
+
+**Stage 4 · product-aware** — they know your product exists, and they are weighing it against alternatives and against doing nothing.
+
+- **Believes:** "it might work, but not for my situation / not at that price / not worth the switch."
+- **Video must:** face one specific objection and answer it with evidence, not adjectives.
+- **Frames that fit:** then vs now · cheap vs expensive · beginner vs expert · best vs worst · one decision that changed everything · theory vs evidence
+- **Angles that fit:** the price objection · the "it won't work for me" objection · the honest downside · the before/after · the client story · the risk reversal
+- **Ask:** the direct one. Link, demo, trial, DM keyword.
+- **Never:** re-explain the problem from scratch. They have heard it; repeating it wastes the hook.
+
+**Stage 5 · most-aware** — buyers, users, and the people who already like the director.
+
+- **Believes:** "I'm in. What is new, and what am I missing?"
+- **Video must:** give a reason to act now, or a use they had not thought of.
+- **Frames that fit:** what happened next · the complete breakdown · how it changed · the future of · after it disappeared
+- **Angles that fit:** the window closing · what just changed · the file itself · the process, unedited · the number nobody posts
+- **Ask:** the offer, plainly, with the deadline or the limit that makes now different from next month.
+- **Never:** pad it. This audience wants the update, not the setup.
+
+**Mapping to the `brainstorm/awareness_stages` primitive.** The cloud primitive takes a 2×2 — `problem_awareness` × `solution_awareness` — which collapses this ladder: `problem_unaware + solution_unaware` = stage 1; `problem_aware + solution_unaware` = stage 2; `problem_aware + solution_aware` = stages 3–4; and stage 5 is the customer list, which the primitive does not model. Use the ladder to plan the mix, and the primitive when the director wants generated angles for one specific state (`references/onboarding.md`).
+
+### Spreading a month across the ladder
+
+A month of posts at one stage is the most common failure in a director's calendar, and it looks like "good videos, no growth" (all stage 4) or "big views, no sales" (all stage 1). Default mix for 30 posts, adjusted afterwards for the account's size:
+
+| Stage | Share of a 30-post month | Why |
+|---|---|---|
+| 1 · unaware | 9 (30%) | Reach. This is what brings new people in; it is the only stage that grows the audience. |
+| 2 · problem-aware | 9 (30%) | The conversion engine of organic. Cheap to make, and it recruits from stage 1. |
+| 3 · solution-aware | 6 (20%) | The explainer library. Long-lived; these keep working for months. |
+| 4 · product-aware | 3 (10%) | Objection handling. Also the best paid-ad candidates. |
+| 5 · most-aware | 3 (10%) | Launches, updates, deadlines. More than this reads as constant selling. |
+
+`vidfarm ideas --grid --topic "<offer>" --count 30` lays a month out in exactly this mix, and draws each row's angle and frame from the stage's own lists above.
+
+**Skew it deliberately.** A brand-new account with no audience runs 1 and 2 heavier and can skip 5 entirely. An account with traffic but no sales inverts the top: more 3 and 4. A launch week is allowed to be mostly 4 and 5 for that week only — then go back to the mix.
+
+### The problem angles — 44 lenses
+
+An angle is **which side of the problem the video approaches from**. It is not a hook, not a frame, and not a format. Two videos on the same subject at two angles do not feel like repeats, which is why the angle bank — not the frame bank — is what you reach for when the director says *"I already covered that topic."*
+
+`vidfarm ideas --angles` prints the bank, `--angle <family or name>` filters it, `--grid --topic "<offer>"` pairs angles with frames.
+
+**Pain & consequence — what it is costing them**
+
+- the daily friction — the small annoyance they have stopped noticing, shown in full
+- the hidden cost — what it silently costs per month, counted in their units, not dollars
+- the slow leak — nothing breaks; it just bleeds, and the video shows the bleed rate
+- the worst case — where this ends if nothing changes, played out on one real example
+- the thing they already tried — name their failed workaround before they can bring it up
+
+**Enemy & blame — moving the fault off the viewer**
+
+- the industry does this on purpose — the incentive that keeps the problem alive
+- the advice that broke it — a popular tip, followed correctly, producing the damage
+- the middleman — who takes a cut for work the viewer could do or skip
+- the tool everyone recommends — why the default choice is the wrong one here
+- the rule nobody questions — an unwritten norm that has no reason behind it
+
+**Belief & myth — what they are sure of that is not true**
+
+- the myth — the sentence the niche repeats, taken apart
+- the false solution — the fix that treats the symptom and hides the cause
+- the wrong metric — they are optimising the number that does not pay them
+- the survivor's tale — the success story that is unrepeatable, and why
+- the advice that expired — true five years ago, wrong now, still repeated
+
+**Mechanism & proof — why this actually works**
+
+- the mechanism — the how, drawn out in steps a stranger can follow
+- the receipts — the numbers on screen, unretouched, with the ugly ones left in
+- the experiment — a real A/B, including the version that lost
+- the before/after — same input, two treatments, one frame each
+- third-party proof — someone with no stake saying it
+
+**Identity & status — who they become**
+
+- the two kinds of people — a sorting line the viewer places themselves on
+- the tell — the small signal that gives an amateur away
+- the room you get into — what changes socially, not functionally
+- what pros do differently — the boring habit behind the impressive result
+- the permission slip — telling them the thing they wanted to stop doing is fine to stop
+
+**Confession & story — I lived this**
+
+- the confession — the mistake the director made, named with the number attached
+- the expensive lesson — what it cost to learn, stated first, before the lesson
+- the day it broke — one dated incident, told in order
+- the client story — someone else's arc, with their permission and their words
+- the comment that started it — a real DM or reply as the cold open
+
+**Insider & access — you were not supposed to see this**
+
+- the screen recording — the actual doing, unedited, no narration for the first beat
+- the number nobody posts — the metric the niche hides
+- what gets said off-camera — the version without the marketing voice
+- the file itself — hand over the template, the sheet, the prompt, on screen
+- the process, unedited — full length, real time, mess included
+
+**Objection & risk — why they do not buy**
+
+- the price objection — say the price out loud and defend it with arithmetic
+- the "it won't work for me" objection — the edge case they think they are
+- the "I don't have time" objection — the real time cost, measured
+- the risk reversal — what happens if it fails, and who carries that
+- the honest downside — who this is genuinely wrong for, named plainly
+
+**Urgency & change — why now and not later**
+
+- the window closing — a real deadline, limit, or seasonal edge
+- what just changed — a new rule, price, platform change, or release
+- the cost of waiting — the same decision made now vs in six months, priced
+- the first-mover gap — what the early ones get that the late ones cannot
+
+### Frame × angle × stage — the grid
+
+The grid is the answer to "give me 30 different videos" and to "I already made a video about that."
+
+1. Write the problem in one sentence.
+2. Pick the **stage** first — it constrains the other two, and it decides the ask.
+3. Pick an **angle** that fits that stage (each stage above lists its five).
+4. Pick a **frame** that carries the angle (each stage above lists its six).
+5. Write the title. If the title does not say the angle out loud, the pairing was wrong — go back to step 3, not step 4.
+
+Worked example, one topic (`bookkeeping for solo trades`), one frame family, four angles, four different videos:
+
+| Stage | Angle | Frame | Title |
+|---|---|---|---|
+| 1 | the daily friction | the psychology of | *"Why every tradie has a glovebox full of receipts"* |
+| 2 | the hidden cost | why it failed | *"The £3,400 a year that disappears in your van"* |
+| 3 | the false solution | myth vs reality | *"A shoebox is not a filing system, and HMRC agrees"* |
+| 4 | the price objection | cheap vs expensive | *"£49 a month vs the accountant's £900 catch-up bill"* |
+
+**When a director says "I already covered that."** Hold the frame, change the angle. Same subject, new video, and it is the cheapest idea in the bank to produce because the research is already done.
+
+**When a set feels repetitive.** Check which axis you froze — and check the **subject** first, because it is the one that hides. Thirty ideas that vary only the frame, on one pasted offer sentence, at one stage and one angle, are thirty versions of one video. Vary two axes minimum, and never let the subject be the constant.
+
 ### Frame → format notes
 
 The frame also suggests how to build it, which saves a planning round:
@@ -2784,10 +3221,14 @@ The frame also suggests how to build it, which saves a planning round:
 
 ### Do not
 
-- **Do not hand back the raw 50-item list as the answer.** The list is your instrument; ideas applied to the director's topic are the deliverable.
-- **Do not stack two frames in one title** ("the untold story of why it failed"). One frame per video, or the video has two subjects and lands neither.
-- **Do not use a frame the topic can't honestly fill.** `the untold story of` a two-week-old product is a lie the audience catches. Pick a frame the facts support.
+- **Do not paste the offer sentence into every frame.** `<frame> + <the one topic string>`, 50 times, is a template filled in, not a set of ideas. Build the subject pool first and rotate it. If two titles in a row share their whole subject phrase, the second one is a duplicate.
+- **Do not read the offer so literally that only the product's own words are allowed.** Adjacent subjects inside the niche are the point — the argument, the workaround, the moment before, the person in the room. Off topic is the failure; adjacent is the job.
+- **Do not hand back a raw bank as the answer.** The three lists are your instrument; ideas applied to the director's topic are the deliverable.
+- **Do not stack two frames in one title** ("the untold story of why it failed"). One frame per video, or the video has two subjects and lands neither. Two *angles* in one video fail the same way.
+- **Do not use a frame or an angle the topic can't honestly fill.** `the untold story of` a two-week-old product is a lie the audience catches, and `the receipts` with no receipts is worse. Pick what the facts support.
 - **Do not treat the frame as the hook.** "The history of X" spoken flat at `start:0` is a banned opener shape — the hook still has to name a situation. `references/hooks-and-virality.md`.
+- **Do not ship a set that sits at one awareness stage.** It is the single most common defect in a month of posts, and neither the frame nor the angle can repair it. Label the stage on every idea so the imbalance is visible before production, not after.
+- **Do not sell at stage 1 or 2.** The ask belongs to the stage. A link in a stage-1 video costs the reach that made the video worth making.
 
 ## Primitive: image_remove_background
 
@@ -2870,6 +3311,57 @@ vidfarm avatar "friendly 30-something founder in a grey hoodie" \
 vidfarm avatar "cheerful barista in an apron" --say "One flat white, coming up." --local
 ```
 
+## Primitives: video-search / image-search / news-search (Google)
+
+Three synchronous searches that hand you real URLs off the open web. They are the **sourcing front door**: the media catalog answers *"give me a clip of X"*, Google answers *"give me THE shot"* — because it indexes TikTok, YouTube, Pexels/Pixabay/Mixkit, archive.org, and every news site at once.
+
+| Route | devcli | What it is for |
+| --- | --- | --- |
+| `GET\|POST /api/v1/primitives/video-search` | `vidfarm video-search "<query>"` | Find **source footage** → feed `raws scan` / `download-video` |
+| `GET\|POST /api/v1/primitives/image-search` | `vidfarm image-search "<query>"` | Reference stills, textures, logos, product shots |
+| `GET\|POST /api/v1/primitives/news-search` | `vidfarm news-search "<query>"` | Recent real events, for **timely** content |
+
+- **Paid plans only.** They sit behind `requireAuth`, so a free-plan key gets `402 upgrade_required`. Free users get the catalog (`media search`, free) and the public raws shelves instead.
+- **Flat $0.0003 per CALL**, whatever the result count. So ask for a **wide page once** (`--limit 40`) instead of paging twice. It is billed to the wallet under the `google_search` cost center.
+- **They return LINKS, never files and never a licence.** A public video is not a licensed video. Check rights before reuse; for licence-checked assets use `media search` (free).
+
+Parameters (query string on GET, JSON body on POST — same names either way):
+
+| Param | Applies to | Notes |
+| --- | --- | --- |
+| `q` (aliases `query`, `text`) | all | **required** |
+| `max_results` (alias `limit`) | all | default 25; max 50 for video, 100 for image/news |
+| `region` | all | `wt-wt` (worldwide, default), `us-en`, `ph-en`, … |
+| `timelimit` | video, news | freshness: `d` \| `w` \| `m` \| `y` |
+| `duration`, `resolution` | video | `short\|medium\|long`, `high\|standard` |
+| `color`, `size`, `type_image`, `layout` | image | `type_image`: `photo\|clipart\|gif\|transparent` |
+| `safesearch` | video, image | `off` (default) \| `moderate` \| `on` |
+
+Responses:
+
+```jsonc
+// video-search
+{ "kind": "video", "query": "...", "count": 40, "charged_usd": 0.0003,
+  "results": [{ "title", "url", "description", "duration", "thumbnail",
+                "publisher", "uploader", "published", "embed_url", "view_count" }] }
+// image-search
+{ "results": [{ "title", "image_url", "thumbnail_url", "source_page", "width", "height", "source" }] }
+// news-search
+{ "results": [{ "title", "url", "body", "date", "source", "image" }] }
+```
+
+`url` on a video result is the **watch page** — exactly what `POST /raws/scan` takes as `source_url` and what `videos/download` takes to collect the file. That is the whole pipeline:
+
+```bash
+vidfarm video-search "warehouse worker packing orders POV 4K" --limit 40
+vidfarm raws scan "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=..." --clips 8   # mine clips out of it
+vidfarm download-video "https://www.tiktok.com/@x/video/123"        # or collect the one file
+```
+
+**How to write the query** — the difference between a useless and a great result is the query, so this is worth the tokens. Full playbook in `references/assets-and-sourcing.md` → *Google search for footage*. In short: search the **shot**, not the topic — `[subject] + [action] + [shot/style] + [quality/orientation]` — and use Google operators (`site:pexels.com/videos`, `site:tiktok.com`, `"exact phrase"`, `-dance`).
+
+**News finds the STORY, video-search finds the VISUALS.** Run them as two stages; searching for both at once finds neither. The full timely-content method is the standalone prompt at `https://vidfarm.cc/experimental/google-news-to-video.md`.
+
 ## Primitive: videos/download — **Vidfarm downloads videos off websites for you**
 
 **Capability statement (say this plainly when a user asks "can you download this video?"): yes — on a paid plan, Vidfarm downloads a video straight off a website URL for you.** Hand it a YouTube / TikTok / Instagram / X (Twitter) / other supported post URL and it returns a durable Vidfarm-hosted file. No local yt-dlp, no browser extension, no "I can't access that URL." The route is intentionally broader than its old name suggests: it returns either a normal MP4 for video posts, or a slideshow payload for photo/carousel posts.
@@ -3788,14 +4280,15 @@ Everything here is **local and free** — crop, matte/key, and trim are all `ffm
 
 Use this only when the director signals they do not know where to start.
 
-1. Read `references/onboarding.md`.
-2. Capture product context and save durable notes into the correct My Files folder.
-3. Determine awareness stages, persuasive angles, and hooks with the brainstorm primitives.
-4. Ask about brand assets, demos, and recurring characters; organize them in My Files.
-5. Ask about budget and map it to the cost spectrum before recommending expensive generation.
+1. Read `references/onboarding.md`. Agree on one **working folder** for all of this director's Vidfarm work, and run every command from it.
+2. **Give them content ideas before you ask them anything.** Take the offer in one line (or a URL you read), run `vidfarm ideas --topic "<line>"`, sharpen the frames into 20+ titled videos, and save `content-ideas.md`. Offline, free, keyless. Their reactions to the list are the first real context you get.
+3. Offer the interview as the next step, not as a gate: `vidfarm consult coldstart --short` (six fixed questions) or the full `coldstart`. Say every question is skippable. Capture product context into `OFFER.md` and the durable answers into `CONTEXT.md`, in the working folder and mirrored to the right My Files folder.
+4. Determine awareness stages, persuasive angles, and hooks with the brainstorm primitives, then revisit `content-ideas.md` now that the awareness stage is known — re-label each idea with its stage and spread the month across the ladder (`vidfarm ideas --stages`, `vidfarm ideas --grid --topic "<offer>" --count 30`).
+5. Ask about brand assets, demos, and recurring characters; organize them in My Files.
+6. Ask about budget and map it to the cost spectrum before recommending expensive generation.
    - Set the graphics default in the same breath: icons, stickers, illustrations, 3D props and Lottie come from `vidfarm iconscout`, never from an image model. No key, no setup, search is free, free assets are $0.
-6. Search for the best matching templates and fork one strong default.
-7. Teach the house phrasing early: coach the director to ask for **"a vidfarm template that …"** rather than "a video," and explain the payoff — it's forkable forever and a teammate can **`vidfarm serve <template_id>`** to pull it onto their own machine (see SKILL.md, "Say 'create a vidfarm template that…'"). Getting this into their vocabulary on day one is the point.
-8. Transition into the ordinary template-editing workflow.
+7. Search for the best matching templates and fork one strong default.
+8. Teach the house phrasing early: coach the director to ask for **"a vidfarm template that …"** rather than "a video," and explain the payoff — it's forkable forever and a teammate can **`vidfarm serve <template_id>`** to pull it onto their own machine (see SKILL.md, "Say 'create a vidfarm template that…'"). Getting this into their vocabulary on day one is the point.
+9. Transition into the ordinary template-editing workflow.
 
 Do not force onboarding on users who already know what they want.