The gates

In steer mode, pod stops at every important moment of the production, shows you its work, and waits for your word. These stops are called gates, and this page walks through every one of them.

A gate is a pause. Pod has just finished a piece of work (a script, a cast, a scene's clips) and it will not move on until you've looked. Nothing renders, nothing is spent, while pod is waiting at a gate. If gates feel new, don't worry: the choices are the same at every single one, so once you've passed two or three, the rest feel familiar.

Your options at any gate

Every gate accepts the same five answers:

The gates, in order

1. Plan preflight

Before anything is made, pod lays out the plan: what will be produced, from what material, and the steps it will take. This is your last cheap chance to say "actually, make it vertical" before the crew starts.

2. Script review

The full episode script plus continuity notes. Approve it, or direct in plain words: "make the ending happier", "add a rain scene". Script changes here cost nothing.

3. Casting

Pod's casting director picks the generation engines that suit this film's style and shows an estimated price. You can recast in plain words: "use omni for the hero shots", "kling for the clips".

4. Characters & locations

The canonical design sheets and reference images, the faces and places the whole film will be held to. Ask for changes freely: "give Meena a red saree", "make the office more cramped". In a series, episode 2 onward opens with a continuity review instead: returning characters keep their exact face from episode 1, reused as-is, nothing regenerated, nothing spent.

5. Coverage interview

Before the shots are divided, pod goes scene by scene and asks: "how do you want this covered?" Your words are binding, as in "open wide, then close-ups on the lead, OTS for the argument". Enter takes the script's own staging; "you decide" hands that scene to the AI. This is the place to speak camera language.

6. Shot plan review

The full shot list: 8–15 second shots, camera, transitions. Per-shot edits are first-class here: "scene 2 shot 2 should be a top shot".

7. The cost gate

The one gate pod always makes, no matter what. Pod shows the exact credit estimate before ANY footage renders:

Cost gate — nothing renders until you say go.
y = go · d = drafts only (cheap 480p pass) · N = stop
❯ d
  (drafts-only: watch a cheap cut first; master later with pod finalize)

y starts the shoot. d renders the whole film as cheap 480p drafts. Watch a low-cost cut first, then pod finalize masters it at full resolution later. N stops for free; the plan is saved and resume continues from here. You can still recast models at this gate. More on pricing at money & credits.

8. Keyframes

The first frame of every shot, as stills. Stills are cheap, a few credits each, so iterate freely: note changes per shot until each frame looks right.

9. Clips, scene by scene

Pod renders one scene's clips, you review them, then it moves to the next scene. Behind you, the continuity supervisor checks the scene and the cut boundaries and files advisories. In steer these are notes for you, not overrides; you make the calls.

10. Final screening

The assembled film, plus a shot map with timecodes so you can name any moment precisely. Two kinds of notes are possible here, and they cost very differently:

• Edits ("cut the first 3 seconds", "pacier") are recuts from existing takes. Free.
• Re-shoots are anything that needs new footage. They're separate, and they always ask first, with a price.

11. The wrap

The final MP4 and a report, with optional graphics dressing (title cards). Everything saves under episodes/<name>/ on your own computer, with the film in 07-final/.

You'll find two files there for each cut. <film>-v1.mp4 is the master: the full-resolution film, the thing you deliver. Beside it, <film>-v1-review.mp4 is a review copy: the same cut at about 540p, with the finished mix carried across untouched. It's a fraction of the size and starts playing almost immediately, which is what you want when you're sending a cut to a client or dropping it in a chat thread for notes. Pod always plays the master when you type open, and every new cut gets its own fresh review copy. (Making it is optional — if the video engine can't produce it, pod says so and you still have your master.)

Looking at the work

When a gate involves images or clips, o opens them, and on plain terminals they auto-open in your normal viewer without you asking. On iTerm2-class terminals, thumbnails appear inline right in the studio window.

If you step away

Gates wait as long as you need. If you've wandered off, pod sends a desktop notification when it's ready for you ("ready for review: scene 2 clips"). If you're mid-typing when something finishes, it stays polite: just a soft chime, no interruption.

The live shoot line

While footage renders, a single live line keeps you oriented: clips done · time in · credits spent · estimate remaining. You always know how far along the shoot is and what it has cost so far.

Stopping is always safe

Ctrl-C (hold the Control key, tap C) cancels a running job but never kicks you out of the studio. Progress is checkpointed. If pod stops mid-film for any reason (Ctrl-C, a crash, a closed laptop), resume continues from the exact checkpoint. Approved work is never redone, and pod remembers paid work: on resume it collects the finished result or resumes waiting, never paying twice for the same take.

What advisories and critics do per mode

The gates above describe full control, the mode every film runs in today. You are the quality control: AI continuity checks still run and file advisories, but no AI judgment overrides you and nothing re-renders unasked.

Two hands-off modes are benched for now, returning once they're ready (full details): assisted steer would let AI critics pre-check every image and clip before it reaches you, and autopilot would let pod self-QC the whole shoot with only the cost gate stopping it. Until they return, typing auto at a gate politely declines.

A different kind of gate, coming later

Every gate on this page sits between you and pod, while the film is being made. There is a second kind for studios that deliver to customers: a publish gate between your studio and your client, which decides whether a finished cut is visible to them at all. It's the same instinct (nothing moves until a person says so) applied to a different boundary. See the publish gate.