Content Machine Self-Demo Short

Status: workflow

Use this workflow to make a short that explains Content Machine with its own runtime. It is intentionally proof-led: the edit should show inspectable artifacts, not claim that the repo magically produces publish-ready videos without review.

Shape

• problem: most topic-to-video agents are opaque
• solution: Content Machine exposes skills, flows, and JSON-stdio harnesses
• proof: script, audio, timestamps, visuals, captions, render metadata, and publish-prep files appear on disk
• close: clone the repo, run diagnostics, then run generate-short

Tracked Preview Variants

These previews are useful for quickly explaining the repo to low attention-span viewers. They are deterministic no-key preview assets, not golden benchmarks.

• demo-18 uses Reddit/gameplay packaging to explain the repo.
• demo-19 uses motion cards to explain the repo.
• Current demo-video review passes demo-18 and flags only an informational caption-band-sparse note for demo-19; see experiments/video-quality-review-demo.
• Both still need publish-prep sidecars before being described as flagship examples.

Run

Set at least OPENAI_API_KEY and one visual provider key such as PEXELS_API_KEY, then run:

cat skills/generate-short/examples/content-machine-self-demo.request.json | \
  node --import tsx scripts/harness/generate-short.ts

The request writes to runs/cm-self-demo-product/.

Or run the flow wrapper when you want the self-demo treated as a named showcase workflow:

cat <<'JSON' | node --import tsx scripts/harness/run-flow.ts
{
  "flow": "showcase-content-machine",
  "runId": "cm-showcase-3d-reddit-gameplay",
  "input": {
    "topic": "Product-demo short for Content Machine. Show skills, flows, JSON-stdio harnesses, generated artifacts, captions, render metadata, and publish-prep review as inspectable proof.",
    "archetype": "product-demo",
    "laneId": "reddit-post-over-gameplay",
    "targetDuration": 35,
    "publishPrep": {
      "enabled": true,
      "platform": "tiktok",
      "requirePass": true
    }
  }
}
JSON

Flow details: flows/showcase-content-machine.md.

No-Key Smoke Test

Use this when you want to prove the artifact chain without spending API credits or waiting on provider limits. This produces mock audio, mock visuals, caption sidecars, render metadata, and a placeholder MP4. It is not a publishable demo.

Expect visual-quality.json and caption quality fields to report failure in this mode because the smoke test deliberately uses fallback placeholders instead of real footage and real narration.

cat <<'JSON' | node --import tsx scripts/harness/script-to-audio.ts
{
  "scriptPath": "fixtures/examples/content-machine-self-demo/script.json",
  "outputDir": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio",
  "mock": true
}
JSON

cat <<'JSON' | node --import tsx scripts/harness/timestamps-to-visuals.ts
{
  "timestampsPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio/timestamps.json",
  "outputPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/visuals/visuals.json",
  "visualQualityPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/visuals/visual-quality.json",
  "provider": "mock",
  "mock": true,
  "orientation": "portrait",
  "topic": "content machine agent workflow"
}
JSON

cat <<'JSON' | node --import tsx scripts/harness/video-render.ts
{
  "visualsPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/visuals/visuals.json",
  "timestampsPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio/timestamps.json",
  "audioPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio/audio.wav",
  "outputPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/video.mp4",
  "outputMetadataPath": "runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/render.json",
  "mock": true,
  "downloadAssets": false,
  "captionPreset": "capcut",
  "captionMode": "chunk"
}
JSON

Inspect

• runs/cm-self-demo-product/script/script.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/audio/audio.wav
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/audio/timestamps.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/visuals/visuals.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/render/video.mp4
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/render/render.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/quality-summary.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-product/publish-prep/validate.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio/audio.wav
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/audio/timestamps.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/visuals/visuals.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/visuals/visual-quality.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/video.mp4
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/render.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/captions.remotion.json
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/captions.srt
• runs/cm-self-demo-smoke/render/captions.ass

Promotion Rules

• Do not promote the MP4 unless publish-prep explains what passed and what failed.
• Replace generic stock footage with caption-clean terminal or artifact recordings before making it a flagship demo.
• Avoid claims about guaranteed virality, automatic upload, or perfect quality without human or agent review.
• Run npm run review:demo-videos before moving a finished MP4 into docs/demo/.