Edit an episode

Run the Edit loop, change the cut with the timeline commands, and render the finished episode as a video file.

The edit turns the picked takes into one cut: the shots in order, the voice lines, the captions and the music. Your agent runs the Edit loop. You watch the cut and say yes.

Start after you approve the Videos loop. See Generate and pick video takes. Every command here needs a signed-in computer. The commands that change or render the cut run in the episode folder, so start with:

cd rain-shop/episodes/ep01

Open the cut

1. Open the episode in the MiniCut app, on the editor tab. The project is rain-shop:

minicut open rain-shop --episode ep01 --tab editor

2. Open the address it prints. The editor shows the cut.
3. If the app does not start, run minicut edit rain-shop --episode ep01. See Editor.

Change the cut

Change the cut in the editor, or with minicut timeline. Never write the cut file index.html by hand. The Edit loop fails a hand-written cut, and in Claude Code and Codex a hook refuses the write.

1. List the cut: every track and clip, with its start and end.

minicut timeline

2. Change the words of a caption, title or card:

minicut timeline set '#cap-c05-l01' --text "I never left."

3. Fix the captions after you change words or timing. This keeps the words, splits them again and times them to the voice:

minicut captions

4. If a take is shorter than its shot, the cut holds the take's last frame still. Cut the shot down to its take. Look at the plan first, then apply it:

minicut timeline fit --plan
minicut timeline fit

5. To undo the fit, run minicut timeline fit --undo. To undo another change, run minicut timeline undo RECEIPT. RECEIPT is the undo receipt that the change printed.
6. To look at the cut without a render, save stills:

minicut snapshot --at 1,3,5 -o snapshots

Run the Edit loop

1. Your agent runs this:

minicut loop run edit

2. The command renders the cut to renders/edit-r1.mp4 in the episode folder. The number is the round. Then it checks the cut and the render.
3. Each failure prints as FAIL with a label and a fix:

The loop also checks the captions and the timeline itself.

4. Your agent applies each fix and runs the command again. After 3 rounds the loop prints CAP REACHED, stop and show the user what is still failing, and you decide.

Render the finished episode

1. Render the final file from the episode folder:

minicut render -o renders/ep01.mp4 --quality delivery

--quality is draft, looks or delivery. 2. Check the finished file from the project folder:

minicut check render episodes/ep01 episodes/ep01/renders/ep01.mp4

It prints each failure with its fix, then RESULT: PASS or RESULT: FAIL, and saves the result beside the video file.

Approve the cut

1. Open the cut with minicut open rain-shop --episode ep01 --tab editor and watch it.
2. If it is right, say yes. Your agent runs:

minicut loop approve edit

Check it worked

Run minicut loop in the project folder. Every loop shows as approved or done. The file episodes/ep01/renders/ep01.mp4 is the finished episode.

Errors

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