Documentation
Everything the studio does.
UNSTILL is a direction deck for Visko Orbis. You lock a place, roll a live session, and change the world while it runs. This page covers every control.
Quickstart
- Open the studio. The Corner is selected.
- Press Roll. A session connects and the street appears at dusk, usually within thirty seconds.
- Press E for Rain, then 4 for Night. Each change lands at the next chunk boundary.
- Or press Run cue sheet and let the sequence play.
- Press Cut. The take is saved under Takes.
Studio tour
| Area | What it does |
|---|---|
| Slate | Watch, take number, seed and the current chunk. The tally reads Ready, Rolling, Live or Held. |
| Stage | The live picture, the last directive caption and the chunk rail. The amber tick marks the last change. |
| Transport | Roll, Hold, Resume, Cut, sound, Record, seed and output resolution. |
| Deck | Watch picker, the four directive axes, events, cue sheet, free beats, the queue and the prompt inspector. |
| Watch log | Every prompt sent, newest first, stamped with the chunk it landed on. |
| Takes | Saved runs. Replay, export, import and delete. |
Keyboard shortcuts
Shortcuts work whenever focus is not in a text field.
| Axis | Keys |
|---|---|
| Hour | 1 Dawn2 Noon3 Dusk4 Night |
| Weather | Q ClearW OvercastE RainR FogT Snow |
| Occupancy | A EmptyS A fewD Busy |
| Camera | Z LockedX Push inC HandheldV PanB Overhead |
| Events | 5 6 7 8 fire the four events of the current Watch |
Directives
Before you roll, directives shape the opening prompt. While live, each change becomes one follow up prompt. This is what each one sends on The Corner.
| Directive | Prompt sent |
|---|---|
| Hour: Dawn | The light shifts to early dawn. The sky turns pale blue, and low cool sunlight rakes across the asphalt and sidewalk. |
| Hour: Noon | The sun climbs to midday. Hard white light falls from overhead and shadows shorten on the asphalt and sidewalk. |
| Hour: Dusk | The light falls to dusk. The sky warms to amber, shadows stretch long and the shop signs and street lamps begin to glow. |
| Hour: Night | Night falls. The sky deepens to night blue, and the shop signs and street lamps glow brightly, casting warm pools of light on the asphalt and sidewalk. |
| Weather: Clear | The weather clears. The sky opens up and the asphalt and sidewalk dries to a matte finish. |
| Weather: Overcast | Clouds roll in. The sky turns flat grey and the light goes soft and even. |
| Weather: Rain | Rain begins to fall. The asphalt and sidewalk darkens and turns wet, reflecting the shop signs and street lamps. |
| Weather: Fog | A thick low fog rolls in, swallowing the far background and softening every light into a halo. |
| Weather: Snow | Snow starts to fall in large slow flakes and a thin white layer settles on the asphalt and sidewalk. |
| Occupancy: Empty | The pedestrians in coats walk out of frame one by one, leaving the asphalt and sidewalk empty and still. |
| Occupancy: A few | A few pedestrians in coats enter the frame and pass through at a walking pace. |
| Occupancy: Busy | More pedestrians in coats arrive until a crowd fills the frame, moving in both directions. |
| Camera: Locked | The camera comes to rest, locked off on a tripod, perfectly still. |
| Camera: Push in | The camera begins a slow steady push forward toward the bodega doorway. |
| Camera: Handheld | The camera goes handheld at eye level with a gentle natural sway. |
| Camera: Pan | The camera pans slowly from left to right across the scene. |
| Camera: Overhead | The camera cranes up to a high overhead angle, looking straight down at the scene. |
Direct by voice
Press Direct by voice and call the shot like you would on set. The studio listens, shows what it heard on the picture, and turns each phrase into deck actions in the order you said them. Recognition runs in your browser; Chrome and Edge support it.
| Say | What happens |
|---|---|
| “Action” | Roll the current Watch |
| “Rain, then night” | Weather: Rain, then Hour: Night, released on the beat |
| “Clear the street” | Occupancy: Empty |
| “Give me a slow push in” | Camera: Push in |
| “Have the taxi pull up” | The Cab stops event on The Corner |
| “Run the cue sheet” | Plays the Watch cue sheet |
| “Hold the shot” · “Resume” | Pause and continue the world |
| “And cut” · “That’s a wrap” | End the take |
Events and cue sheets
Each Watch has four events. One action per event, so it reads clearly in the picture.
The Corner
- Cab stops. A yellow taxi pulls to the curb and a passenger in a long coat steps out onto the sidewalk.
- Cyclist. A cyclist in a red jacket rides through the crosswalk from left to right.
- Steam. White steam rises slowly from a manhole cover in the middle of the street.
- Shop closes. The bodega owner pulls the metal shutter down over the shop front and the sign goes dark.
The Aisle
- Spotlight. A bright spotlight snaps on above the center plinth and the white sneaker on it glows.
- Try on. A shopper sits on the oak bench and laces up a white sneaker.
- Red drop. Staff replace the white sneakers on the plinths with bright red sneakers.
- Launch line. A line of shoppers forms outside the glass storefront, pressing toward the door.
The Bay
- Fallen box. A cardboard box falls from the racking and lands in the yellow lane ahead of the robot.
- Robot detours. The orange robot slows, turns and steers around the obstacle, then rejoins the yellow lane.
- Forklift. A yellow forklift carrying a pallet crosses the lane in front of the robot.
- Spill. A puddle of water spreads across the concrete floor in the robot's path, reflecting the lamps.
A cue sheet releases its steps automatically, holding about five chunks after each one. Stop it at any time. Directives you press during a cue join the queue.
The queue
Orbis morphs at chunk boundaries, roughly every 1.8 seconds. The studio releases at most one directive every two chunks so changes do not collide. Pressing another option on the same axis replaces the queued one. Use Drop to remove any item.
Takes and replay
Every roll creates a take: the seed, the opening prompt and each beat with its chunk. Takes are kept in your browser. Export saves a JSON file. Import loads one back.
Replay resets to the same seed, sends the same opening, then sends each beat when the stream reaches its chunk. Orbis produces the same video for the same seed and prompt sequence, so the take comes back.
Branching: what if
Every take can fork. Under a take, pick a beat in What if, after and press Branch. The studio replays the same seed and the same beats up to that point, so the world arrives where it was, then hands control back to you. Direct a different future: snow instead of rain, a cyclist instead of a cab. The branch is saved as its own take, labelled with the take it came from.
Your photograph
- Select Photo in the Watch picker and choose an image.
- It is cropped to 16:9 in your browser. Orbis squashes other ratios, so this keeps proportions true.
- Describe what is in it in one line. This is required: the photograph pins the first frame, and these words keep Orbis on that place afterwards. Without them Orbis drifts to a place of its own within a chunk or two. When the deployment has an OpenAI or Anthropic key, the line is written for you as soon as you choose the photo; edit any word you like.
- Roll. The badge on the stage reads Anchored to photo when Orbis confirms the image.
Landscape images close to photoreal give the most faithful openings.
The wall
The wall is a public page of takes people chose to share. A post is the take itself: the world, the seed and every beat with its chunk. No video and no photo is stored.
- Direct a run and press Cut. The take appears under Takes.
- Press Post to the wall, give it a title and, if you like, your name, then Post.
- Anyone can open the card in the studio, replay it on Orbis, or pick a beat under What if, after and branch it.
Takes that open on a photograph stay private. Posts are checked on the server, length capped and rate limited, and posting the same take twice keeps one card.
Credit guard
Orbis bills while a session runs, so the studio only keeps one alive while someone is directing it. Any click, key, voice command, cue sheet or replay counts as direction.
- Two minutes without direction: a warning with a Keep going button, then the run is cut and the GPU released twenty seconds later.
- Every run is capped at ten minutes.
- A GPU left connected after a Cut is released after a minute.
- Closing or leaving the tab ends the session.
The take is always saved first, so nothing you directed is lost.
Recording
Save HD video downloads the session as a full quality 1080p MP4 with the stream's own sound, recorded on Reactor's servers, so your computer does no encoding and the frame rate stays smooth. It is ready a few seconds after you press it. Record captures the picture in your browser instead and downloads a .webm when you stop.
Self hosting
git clone https://github.com/angelraph/unstill cd unstill npm install echo REACTOR_API_KEY=rk_your_key > .env.local npm run dev
On Vercel, add REACTOR_API_KEY under Environment Variables and redeploy. The key stays on the server. /api/token exchanges it for a one hour token scoped to reactor/visko-orbis-stable and a single session.
Troubleshooting
| Message | Fix |
|---|---|
| REACTOR_API_KEY is not set | Add the key to .env.local or to Vercel Environment Variables, then restart or redeploy. |
| Credits depleted (402) | The Reactor account is out of credits. Add credits on reactor.inc, or contact support@visko.ai. |
| Stuck on Rolling | A GPU is being allocated. Give it thirty seconds, then Release GPU and roll again. |
| Text opening instead of Anchored | Orbis started without the image. Re-select the photograph and roll again. |
| No sound | Browsers start muted. Press Sound off to turn it on. |