athana creator program

SCENE CONTEXT
A 25-second promo: one continuous walk through five eras and into the present. A third-person follow camera, like a video game, stays behind one walker; on every hidden cut the walker and the whole world change era, while the framing, the pace and the walker's place in frame never change. The walk ends inside a dark film soundstage where five of the walkers sit waiting around an empty director's chair, and the last walker takes it.

LOCATION MAP
Cuts 1-6: each era is a long straight street or avenue running away from camera into depth, buildings or set pieces on both sides, the vanishing point just right of centre, the walker on the left third. Each location is written in its cut.
Cut 7: a large dark film soundstage, walls and ceiling lost in black. One tall tungsten work light on a stand off frame right, aimed down, throws a single warm pool of light about 5 m wide onto the grey concrete floor in the midground. In the pool, five metal folding chairs in a shallow arc facing camera, and in the middle of the arc one taller empty director's chair of plain black canvas. Behind the arc, in the background upper left, the huge stage door stands open: a tall rectangle of blue dusk light. Everything outside the pool falls to near black.

FIRST FRAME / BLOCKING
16:9. Already in motion at 0.0: @nefer seen from behind and slightly to the side, mid-stride, on the left third, framed from the knees up, walking away from camera down an avenue of stone sphinxes; her head is already turned left, profile to camera, following a two-horse chariot that is crossing ahead from right to left.

FORMAT MODE
Seven cuts. Cuts 1-6 are one continuous follow move broken by hidden cuts: each cut lands on a footstep, on the frame where a dark foreground object slides across the lens from right to left and fills the frame for a few frames; the next cut opens as its own foreground object clears the lens to the left. Cuts 2-6 return to EXACTLY the framing cut 1 holds: same camera height, same distance, same lens, walker on the left third, same pace. No dissolves, no morphing, no glitch, no particles, no flash.

CUT 1 (0.0-2.0 s), follow shot from behind, 28mm, Ancient Egypt, 1300 BC:
@nefer walks down a wide avenue of pale stone ram-headed sphinxes toward huge temple pylons, two pyramids hazy in the heat beyond. Hard white noon sun from high front left, short black shadows, sand blowing low across the paving. The chariot clears frame left at 0.8 s and @nefer turns her head forward again. Workers in linen carry baskets at the edges of frame. At 1.9 s the base of a sandstone obelisk passes close to the lens and fills the frame.

CUT 2 (2.0-4.5 s), same follow framing, a castle, 1400:
Opens as a stone gate pillar clears the lens to the left. @knighteyes walks across a muddy castle courtyard at blue hour toward a dark keep, cold fog low over the ground, torches burning on the walls, wet banners hanging still. A groom leads a grey horse past on the right; at 3.4 s one soldier by a brazier turns his head as the knight passes. Steel plates shift with each step, mud splashes at the feet. At 4.4 s a hanging banner sweeps across the lens.

CUT 3 (4.5-7.0 s), same follow framing, Edo Japan, 1820, night:
Opens as a wooden lantern post clears the lens. @hana1 walks down a narrow street of dark wooden two-storey houses in steady rain, red paper lanterns glowing over the doorways and doubled in the wet stones. Two passers-by under oiled paper umbrellas step aside for her, one after the other. At 5.7 s she glances right at a lantern, her face lit red in profile, then looks ahead. At 6.9 s a paper umbrella passes close to the lens and fills the frame.

CUT 4 (7.0-9.5 s), same follow framing, a frontier town, 1880, sunset:
Opens as a wooden porch post clears the lens. @cole walks down the dusty main street of a wooden frontier town straight toward a low orange sun, his long shadow stretching back toward camera, dust lifting at every step. Horses tied at rails on the left, a saloon porch on the right; at 8.3 s a woman on a balcony turns to watch him pass. At 9.4 s the side of a stagecoach rolls across the lens.

CUT 5 (9.5-12.0 s), same follow framing, New York, 1986, night:
Opens as a lamp post clears the lens. @roxy walks down a rain-soaked city street at night, neon tubes in pink, cyan and yellow bent into abstract shapes (arrows, rings, stripes, no letters) reflected in the wet asphalt, steam rising from a manhole ahead, a yellow cab hissing past on the right. Two teenagers lean on a wall. At 11.9 s the side of a city bus passes close to the lens and fills the frame.

CUT 6 (12.0-15.5 s), same follow framing, a film studio backlot, today, dusk:
Opens as the corner of a parked trailer clears the lens. @sam walks down a quiet backlot between two huge windowless soundstages, deep blue dusk sky, sodium lamps just coming on, an electric cart parked on the right. Ahead the tall stage door stands open on darkness, a red bulb glowing above it. @sam slows for half a step, then walks straight through the doorway; at 15.3 s the darkness inside fills the frame.

CUT 7 (15.5-25.0 s), reverse angle inside the soundstage, 35mm, locked off, then a slow push-in:
The camera stands inside the stage facing the open door. In the pool of light, left to right: @hana1, @knighteyes holding a white paper coffee cup, the empty director's chair, @nefer, @cole with his boots stretched out, @roxy. They sit loose and bored, like actors on a break between takes. At 15.8 s @sam's silhouette steps into the bright door rectangle behind them and walks forward. At 16.7 s @roxy glances back over her shoulder toward the door, then faces front again; nobody else turns. At 18.0 s @cole, eyes down on his hands, says "You're late." From 18.5 s @sam walks into the light between @knighteyes and @nefer, turns, and sits in the director's chair facing camera. At 21.8 s @knighteyes lifts the paper cup an inch toward @sam. At 23.0 s @sam lifts his eyes to the lens and holds. The camera has pushed in slowly from the wide to a medium-wide of all six; the dark stage above them fills the upper half of frame.

OPTICS
Cuts 1-6: 28mm, deep focus, the walker sharp and the world crisp to the horizon. Cut 7: 35mm at f/2.8, all six sharp, the door softly out of focus.

CAMERA
Cuts 1-6: Steadicam follow at shoulder height, 2.5 m behind the walker, matching the walker's pace exactly, a slight vertical bob in time with the steps, no orbit, no speed change. Cut 7: locked off for the first 3 s, then a slow push-in of about 1 m to the end.

ACTION
One walker per era at an unhurried, confident pace, about two steps per second, the same rhythm in every era so each cut lands on a footstep. Nobody runs. Extras keep to their own business; at most one or two react in a cut, one after the other, never in unison.

PERFORMANCE
Walkers: calm, purposeful, eyes forward, never at the lens. Cut 7: the five are relaxed and a little bored, like actors waiting between takes; @cole's line is dry and flat, almost under his breath; @sam lets out a small breath on sitting, at most a closed-mouth half smile, and the look into the lens at 23.0 s is steady and quiet. No big smiles, no posing.

PHYSICS
Sand, fog, rain, dust and steam move with the wind and with the walker's passage. Hair and cloth move naturally with every step. Mud splashes, puddles ripple, the knight's plates shift, the paper cup is light in a steel hand.

LIGHTING
Each era keeps its own single dominant source: white noon sun (cut 1), cold blue dusk with warm torches (cut 2), red paper lanterns in rain (cut 3), a low orange sun ahead as backlight (cut 4), pink and cyan neon with wet reflections (cut 5), blue dusk with sodium lamps (cut 6), one warm 3200K tungsten work light from high right in a black stage (cut 7).

AUDIO
No music. The footsteps carry the rhythm through every cut, the sound of each step changing with the era; every cut lands on a footstep.
Cut 1: sandals on stone, hot wind, chariot wheels and hooves crossing.
Cut 2: steel plates clanking on every step, boots in mud, torches crackling, a crow.
Cut 3: steady rain on paper umbrellas and wooden eaves, steps on wet stone.
Cut 4: boots on dry dirt, spurs ringing, wind, a horse snorts.
Cut 5: sneakers on wet asphalt, rain, the hiss of a passing cab, a distant car horn.
Cut 6: sneakers on asphalt, a distant generator hum, the steps turning hollow in the doorway.
Cut 7: the hush of a big empty stage, the low hum of the work light, a folding chair creaks; at 18.0 s @cole says "You're late."; the director's chair creaks as @sam sits; then quiet.

STYLE
Photoreal live action on 35mm film, fine grain, natural skin, every era dressed and lit like a period feature film. No AI gloss, no glow, no particles, no fantasy haze.

POSITIVE LOCKS
- @nefer, @knighteyes, @hana1, @cole, @roxy and @sam 100% match their reference sheets. Studio sheet backgrounds and layouts NOT inherited.
- Cuts 1-6: exactly one walker in each cut, the one named; the walker stays on the left third, framed from the knees up, back to camera, at the same distance and pace in every cut.
- Cut 7: exactly six people, the five seated plus @sam; no crew, no cameras, no equipment besides the one work light.
- @knighteyes's visor stays closed in every frame.
- Every weapon stays sheathed or holstered at all times.
- Hard cuts only, hidden by foreground objects; no dissolves, morphs, glitches, flashes or light leaks.
- No phones, no screens. No music. No slow motion.
- No text anywhere: no signs, no shop names, no lettering @hana1 on neon, wagons, trailers, buses or chairs. No logos.