ReelStack — usage

1. Buy your license and run the one-time installer.

    Copynpx @devinilabs/reelstack init

2. Drop your voiceover into public/audio/ (or use a placeholder for now).

    Copycp ~/Downloads/launch-vo.wav public/audio/launch.wav

3. Scaffold the reel from the graphify preset.

    Copy/reelstack-glass --preset=graphify --name=Launch --vo=public/audio/launch.wav

4. Lock motion to the voiceover. Paste the resulting BEATS const at the top of src/Launch.tsx.

    Copy/reelstack-beats public/audio/launch.wav

5. Iterate scenes in Remotion Studio at http://localhost:3000.

    Copynpm run dev

6. Lint until clean. Run /reelstack-critique for a deeper review.

    Copy/reelstack-lint src/Launch.tsx

7. Render the IG variant (1080×1920, 8 Mbps).

    Copy/reelstack-render Launch --platform=ig

8. Output: out/Launch-ig.mp4 — ready to post.

1. Scaffold the opus preset, which composes 5 ScreenshotFade slots.

    Copy/reelstack-paper --preset=opus --name=ThesisReel

2. Capture editorial screenshots from the published essay's URL into public/captures/.

    Copy/reelstack-capture https://yoursite.com/essay --scroll --name=essay

3. Replace the 5 ScreenshotFade `src` props in src/ThesisReel.tsx with the captured frames (frame_0001.png, frame_0480.png, frame_0860.png, frame_1240.png, frame_1620.png).
4. Record a voiceover reading the thesis. Lock motion.

    Copy/reelstack-beats public/audio/thesis.wav

5. Lint, critique, then render Shorts variant for higher bitrate.

    Copy/reelstack-render ThesisReel --platform=shorts

1. Render the IG variant (8 Mbps).

    Copy/reelstack-render MyReel --platform=ig

2. Render the TikTok variant (8 Mbps).

    Copy/reelstack-render MyReel --platform=tiktok

3. Render the Shorts variant (9 Mbps — slightly higher bitrate).

    Copy/reelstack-render MyReel --platform=shorts

4. Outputs: out/MyReel-ig.mp4, out/MyReel-tiktok.mp4, out/MyReel-shorts.mp4. Dimensions identical (1080×1920); only bitrate differs.

1. Scaffold the claudewatch preset (six-color scene palette).

    Copy/reelstack-glass --preset=claudewatch --name=ClaudeWatchHomage

2. Open src/ClaudeWatchHomage.tsx — note the per-scene accent override pattern (claude / film / vector / success / crimson / plasma).
3. Pick the scene-color for each beat from the named set. Don't introduce new accents — the lint flags any hex outside the family allowlist.
4. Lock motion, lint, render.

    Copy/reelstack-beats public/audio/your-vo.wav

1. Place the voiceover wav in public/audio/. ffmpeg + whisper-cpp do the rest.

    Copyls public/audio/

2. Run beats. The CLI resamples to 16 kHz mono, runs whisper-cli, parses the SRT, emits a TypeScript const.

    Copy/reelstack-beats public/audio/your-vo.wav

3. Paste the BEATS const at the top of your reel file. Replace every `from={...}` numeric on `<Sequence>` with `from={BEATS.<key>}`.

    Copy<Sequence from={BEATS.problem} durationInFrames={BEATS.revealName - BEATS.problem}>
     <ProblemScene />
   </Sequence>

4. Lint. The AUDIO_NOT_LOCKED rule should now pass.

    Copy/reelstack-lint src/MyReel.tsx

1. Scaffold the standalone CTA — claudewatchcta (8s) or resourcescta (7s).

    Copy/reelstack-dark --preset=resourcescta --name=Outro

2. Render the main reel and the CTA separately.
3. Concatenate via ffmpeg `-f concat`.

    Copyprintf "file 'out/MyReel-ig.mp4'\nfile 'out/Outro-ig.mp4'\n" > out/list.txt
   ffmpeg -f concat -safe 0 -i out/list.txt -c copy out/MyReel-with-cta.mp4

Check the cached license file at `~/.reelstack/.license` (mode 600). Delete it and re-run init. If the key was emailed but rejected, contact [email protected] with your purchase email.

v1.2+: init's Tier 2 detects this and offers to install for you on macOS+Homebrew. On other platforms it prints the right command for your package manager and exits so you can install + retry. Manual install — macOS: `brew install ffmpeg`. Linux: `apt-get install ffmpeg` (Debian/Ubuntu) · `dnf install ffmpeg` (Fedora) · `pacman -S ffmpeg` (Arch). Windows: `choco install ffmpeg` or `scoop install ffmpeg`. Required by /reelstack-render and /reelstack-beats.

You declined the whisper install during `init`, OR the install ran but didn't put a binary on PATH. Fix: macOS: `brew install whisper-cpp`. Linux: build from source at github.com/ggerganov/whisper.cpp. Windows: build from source, or `scoop install whisper.cpp`. Then re-run `npx @devinilabs/reelstack init` so it can re-flip the state to OK.

Same as above — install via your platform's package manager, then run `npx @devinilabs/reelstack init` so the readiness gate records the dep as available. Required by /reelstack-beats.

macOS / Linux: `bash <(curl -L https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ggerganov/whisper.cpp/master/models/download-ggml-model.sh) base.en` in your project root. Windows (PowerShell): `Invoke-WebRequest -Uri https://huggingface.co/ggerganov/whisper.cpp/resolve/main/ggml-base.en.bin -OutFile $env:TEMP\ggml-base.en.bin`.

The named step tells you which check failed. `scaffold-demo` = your `Root.tsx` doesn't accept the Demo composition (check that registerRoot exists). `remotion-compositions` = Remotion CLI couldn't load the project (likely `npm install` didn't complete or `tsconfig.json` is broken — try `rm -rf node_modules && npm install` and retry). `ffmpeg-version` = ffmpeg is installed but not executable (rare; reinstall). Pass `--skip-smoke` to bypass once you've diagnosed the cause.

Your project's `package.json` has a syntax error. Open it and fix the JSON (most often a trailing comma or missing quote). Or run `init` from a different directory.

Upgrade Node. With nvm: `nvm install 20 && nvm use 20`. With fnm: `fnm install 20 && fnm use 20`. Or fresh install from nodejs.org. Then re-run `init`.

Add `// reelstack-lint-ignore-line` immediately above the offending line. Use sparingly — most flagged hexes are real violations.

Critique scores motion + palette + timing of what's actually in the file; an unused BEATS const isn't penalized. Run `/reelstack-beats <vo.wav>` to populate it before trusting the critique number.

Open `src/Root.tsx` and confirm the new comp is registered as a `<Composition>` entry. The scaffolder should do this automatically; if it didn't, add it manually.

Increase Remotion's timeout: `npx remotion render <id> --timeout 60000`. Common cause: large `<Img />` reads from the filesystem during render.

Some openers genuinely start black — pass `--skip-smoke` to bypass. If a midpoint frame is also all-black, your composition is broken; check `npm run dev` first.

ffmpeg's `-target-bitrate` flag conflicts with `-crf` in some ffmpeg versions. Try `--platform=ig` (uses both flags) versus a raw `npx remotion render` invocation (uses only crf).

`npx` runs the package without globally installing. Either invoke as `npx @devinilabs/reelstack <cmd>` each time, or globally install: `npm install -g @devinilabs/reelstack`.

If you moved `~/.reelstack/`, run `npx @devinilabs/reelstack update` to refresh the symlinks. Reference reels live at `~/.reelstack/reference/<family>/<preset>.tsx`.