Vertical Series Factory

One prompt in, a living episode-by-episode production system out. Generalizes the proven Infinite Idol pipeline (~/infinite-idol-series/, 240 frames generated + brutally QC'd) into a reusable product: any premise + any style → series bible, season slate, scripts, storyboards, generation manifests, QC'd episodes, publish drafts — with persistent ledgers, signoff gates, and a learning loop.

Core principle: script and QC everything on paper before a single video credit burns. Video generation is the expensive, gated, final step.

Operate

bin/vsf init "<premise or full series_request yaml>"   # new series instance
bin/vsf status [--series <slug>]                        # where everything stands
bin/vsf next   [--series <slug>]                        # next command + what it changes + proof + rollback
bin/vsf validate <slug>                                 # schema + structure + gate checks
bin/vsf gate <slug> <gate> --approve|--check            # record/inspect owner gates
bin/vsf ledger <slug> <event-json>                      # append production event
bin/vsf qc-probe <file.mp4|.png> [--expect 9:16]        # ffprobe/image receipt, sidecar JSON
bin/vsf signoff-check <slug>                            # is the signoff packet complete?
bin/vsf adopt <slug> --root <path>                      # register an existing production

Stage semantics (BIBLE, CAST, SEASON, EPISODE, SIGNOFF, PRODUCE, QC, REVISE, PACKAGE, CONTINUE, LEARN) are LLM work executed by the stage skills in skills/ — COMMANDS.md defines each command's contract; vsf next tells you which one to run. Deterministic state, gates, validation, probes, and ledgers are vsf.

Layout

• product-manifest.json — version, command surface, tool assumptions.
• schemas/ — series-request, episode, qc-report, production-job (JSON Schema).
• templates/ — series bible, episode script, storyboard, signoff packet.
• skills/ — 18 stage skills; they improve every run (LEARN promotes into them).
• adapters/ — seedance2 / higgsfield-cli / higgsfield-mcp / audio surfaces.
• ledgers/ — series-index, production-ledger.jsonl, retake-ledger.jsonl, learning-ledger.md.
• checks/ — mechanical checkers (write the checker BEFORE dispatching a batch).
• series/<slug>/ — one directory per series instance (see COMMANDS.md §layout).

Iron rules

1. No "done" without an on-disk artifact verified by a script or eyes.
2. Anything mechanically checkable gets a checker; model judgment is for taste.
3. Owner gates are cheap; regenerating 240 assets after a missed gate is not.
4. No credit spend before an explicit approved signoff gate (Gate A).
5. Publish is draft-only. Always (Gate C).

Instances

• infinite-idol — adopted flagship (root: ~/infinite-idol-series/), mid-production, blocked on Higgsfield tokens (~2026-07-16). Bridge: series/infinite-idol/bridge.md.
• ghost-whale — launch specimen, cold-start proof INIT→SIGNOFF.