hermes-agent/skills/creative/baoyu-comic/references/workflow.md

Complete Workflow

Full workflow for generating knowledge comics.

Progress Checklist

Copy and track progress:

Comic Progress:
- [ ] Step 1: Setup & Analyze
  - [ ] 1.1 Analyze content
  - [ ] 1.2 Check existing ⚠️ REQUIRED
- [ ] Step 2: Confirmation - Style & options ⚠️ REQUIRED
- [ ] Step 3: Generate storyboard + characters
- [ ] Step 4: Review outline (conditional)
- [ ] Step 5: Generate prompts
- [ ] Step 6: Review prompts (conditional)
- [ ] Step 7: Generate images
  - [ ] 7.1 Character sheet (if needed)
  - [ ] 7.2 Generate pages
- [ ] Step 8: Merge to PDF
- [ ] Step 9: Completion report

Flow Diagram

Input → Analyze → [Check Existing?] → [Confirm: Style + Reviews] → Storyboard → [Review Outline?] → Prompts → [Review Prompts?] → Images → PDF → Complete

---

Step 1: Setup & Analyze

1.1 Analyze Content → analysis.md

Read source content, save it if needed, and perform deep analysis.

Actions:

1. Save source content (if not already a file):
   • If user provides a file path: use as-is
   • If user pastes content: save to source.md in target directory using write_file
   • Backup rule: If source.md exists, rename to source-backup-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.md
2. Read source content
3. Deep analysis following analysis-framework.md:
   • Target audience identification
   • Value proposition for readers
   • Core themes and narrative potential
   • Key figures and their story arcs
4. Detect source language
5. Determine language:
   • If user specified a language → use it
   • Else → use detected source language or user's conversation language
6. Determine recommended page count:
   • Short story: 5-8 pages
   • Medium complexity: 9-15 pages
   • Full biography: 16-25 pages
7. Analyze content signals for art/tone/layout recommendations
8. Save to analysis.md using write_file

analysis.md Format: YAML front matter (title, topic, time_span, source_language, user_language, aspect_ratio, recommended_page_count, recommended_art, recommended_tone) + sections for Target Audience, Value Proposition, Core Themes, Key Figures & Story Arcs, Content Signals, Recommended Approaches. See analysis-framework.md for full template.

1.2 Check Existing Content ⚠️ REQUIRED

MUST execute before proceeding to Step 2.

Check if the output directory exists (e.g., via test -d "comic/{topic-slug}").

If directory exists, use clarify:

question: "Existing content found at comic/{topic-slug}. How to proceed?"
options:
  - "Regenerate storyboard — Keep images, regenerate storyboard and characters only"
  - "Regenerate images — Keep storyboard, regenerate images only"
  - "Backup and regenerate — Backup to {slug}-backup-{timestamp}, then regenerate all"
  - "Exit — Cancel, keep existing content unchanged"

Save result and handle accordingly:

• Regenerate storyboard: Skip to Step 3, preserve prompts/ and images
• Regenerate images: Skip to Step 7, use existing prompts
• Backup and regenerate: Move directory, start fresh from Step 2
• Exit: End workflow immediately

---

Step 2: Confirmation - Style & Options ⚠️

Purpose: Select visual style + decide whether to review outline before generation. Do NOT skip.

Display summary first:

• Content type + topic identified
• Key figures extracted
• Time span detected
• Recommended page count
• Language (detected or user-specified)
• Recommended style: [art] + [tone] (based on content signals)

Use clarify one question at a time, in priority order:

Question 1: Visual Style

If a preset is recommended (see auto-selection.md), show it first:

question: "Which visual style for this comic?"
options:
  - "[preset name] preset (Recommended) — [preset description] with special rules"
  - "[recommended art] + [recommended tone] (Recommended) — Best match for your content"
  - "ligne-claire + neutral — Classic educational, Logicomix style"
  - "ohmsha preset — Educational manga with visual metaphors, gadgets, NO talking heads"
  - "Custom — Specify your own art + tone or preset"

Preset vs Art+Tone: Presets include special rules beyond art+tone. ohmsha = manga + neutral + visual metaphor rules + character roles + NO talking heads. Plain manga + neutral does NOT include these rules.

Question 2: Narrative Focus

question: "What should the comic emphasize? (Pick the primary focus; mention others in a follow-up if needed)"
options:
  - "Biography/life story — Follow a person's journey through key life events"
  - "Concept explanation — Break down complex ideas visually"
  - "Historical event — Dramatize important historical moments"
  - "Tutorial/how-to — Step-by-step educational guide"

Question 3: Target Audience

question: "Who is the primary reader?"
options:
  - "General readers — Broad appeal, accessible content"
  - "Students/learners — Educational focus, clear explanations"
  - "Industry professionals — Technical depth, domain knowledge"
  - "Children/young readers — Simplified language, engaging visuals"

Question 4: Outline Review

question: "Do you want to review the outline before image generation?"
options:
  - "Yes, let me review (Recommended) — Review storyboard and characters before generating images"
  - "No, generate directly — Skip outline review, start generating immediately"

Question 5: Prompt Review

question: "Review prompts before generating images?"
options:
  - "Yes, review prompts (Recommended) — Review image generation prompts before generating"
  - "No, skip prompt review — Proceed directly to image generation"

After responses:

1. Update analysis.md with user preferences
2. Store skip_outline_review flag based on Question 4 response
3. Store skip_prompt_review flag based on Question 5 response
4. → Step 3

---

Step 3: Generate Storyboard + Characters

Create storyboard and character definitions using the confirmed style from Step 2.

Loading Style References:

• Art style: art-styles/{art}.md
• Tone: tones/{tone}.md
• If preset (ohmsha/wuxia/shoujo/concept-story/four-panel): also load presets/{preset}.md

Generate:

1. Storyboard (storyboard.md):

   • YAML front matter with art_style, tone, layout, aspect_ratio
   • Cover design
   • Each page: layout, panel breakdown, visual prompts
   • Written in user's preferred language (from Step 1)
   • Reference: storyboard-template.md
   • If using preset: Load and apply preset rules from presets/

2. Character definitions (characters/characters.md):

   • Visual specs matching the art style (in user's preferred language)
   • Include Reference Sheet Prompt for later image generation
   • Reference: character-template.md
   • If using ohmsha preset: Use default Doraemon characters (see below)

Ohmsha Default Characters (use these unless user specifies custom characters):

Role	Character	Visual Description
Student	大雄 (Nobita)	Japanese boy, 10yo, round glasses, black hair parted in middle, yellow shirt, navy shorts
Mentor	哆啦 A 梦 (Doraemon)	Round blue robot cat, big white eyes, red nose, whiskers, white belly with 4D pocket, golden bell, no ears
Challenge	胖虎 (Gian)	Stocky boy, rough features, small eyes, orange shirt
Support	静香 (Shizuka)	Cute girl, black short hair, pink dress, gentle expression

These are the canonical ohmsha-style characters. Do NOT create custom characters for ohmsha unless explicitly requested.

After generation:

• If skip_outline_review is true → Skip Step 4, go directly to Step 5
• If skip_outline_review is false → Continue to Step 4

---

Step 4: Review Outline (Conditional)

Skip this step if user selected "No, generate directly" in Step 2.

Purpose: User reviews and confirms storyboard + characters before generation.

Display:

• Page count and structure
• Art style + Tone combination
• Page-by-page summary (Cover → P1 → P2...)
• Character list with brief descriptions

Use clarify:

question: "Ready to generate images with this outline?"
options:
  - "Yes, proceed (Recommended) — Generate character sheet and comic pages"
  - "Edit storyboard first — I'll modify storyboard.md before continuing"
  - "Edit characters first — I'll modify characters/characters.md before continuing"
  - "Edit both — I'll modify both files before continuing"

After response:

1. If user wants to edit → Wait for user to finish editing, then ask again
2. If user confirms → Continue to Step 5

---

Step 5: Generate Prompts

Create image generation prompts for all pages.

Style Reference Loading:

• Read art-styles/{art}.md for rendering guidelines
• Read tones/{tone}.md for mood/color adjustments
• If preset: Read presets/{preset}.md for special rules

For each page (cover + pages):

1. Create prompt following art style + tone guidelines
2. Include character visual descriptions for consistency
3. Save to prompts/NN-{cover|page}-[slug].md using write_file
   • Backup rule: If prompt file exists, rename to prompts/NN-{cover|page}-[slug]-backup-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.md

Prompt File Format:

# Page NN: [Title]

## Visual Style
Art: [art style] | Tone: [tone] | Layout: [layout type]

## Character Reference
[Character descriptions from characters/characters.md]

## Panel Breakdown
[From storyboard.md - panel descriptions, actions, dialogue]

## Generation Prompt
[Combined prompt passed to image_generate]

After generation:

• If skip_prompt_review is true → Skip Step 6, go directly to Step 7
• If skip_prompt_review is false → Continue to Step 6

---

Step 6: Review Prompts (Conditional)

Skip this step if user selected "No, skip prompt review" in Step 2.

Purpose: User reviews and confirms prompts before image generation.

Display prompt summary table:

Page	Title	Key Elements
Cover	[title]	[main visual]
P1	[title]	[key elements]
...	...	...

Use clarify:

question: "Ready to generate images with these prompts?"
options:
  - "Yes, proceed (Recommended) — Generate all comic page images"
  - "Edit prompts first — I'll modify prompts/*.md before continuing"
  - "Regenerate prompts — Regenerate all prompts with different approach"

After response:

1. If user wants to edit → Wait for user to finish editing, then ask again
2. If user wants to regenerate → Go back to Step 5
3. If user confirms → Continue to Step 7

---

Step 7: Generate Images

With confirmed prompts from Step 5/6, use the image_generate tool for all image rendering.

Aspect ratio mapping — image_generate supports landscape, portrait, and square:

Storyboard ratio	image_generate format
3:4, 9:16, 2:3	portrait
4:3, 16:9, 3:2	landscape
1:1	square

7.1 Generate Character Reference Sheet (conditional)

Character sheet is recommended for multi-page comics with recurring characters, but NOT required for all presets.

When to generate:

Condition	Action
Multi-page comic with detailed/recurring characters	Generate character sheet (recommended)
Preset with simplified characters (e.g., four-panel minimalist)	Skip — prompt descriptions are sufficient
Single-page comic	Skip unless characters are complex

When generating:

1. Use Reference Sheet Prompt from characters/characters.md
2. Backup rule: If characters/characters.png exists, rename to characters/characters-backup-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.png
3. Call image_generate with landscape format → save to characters/characters.png
4. Compress to reduce payload size when used as a reference:
   • macOS: sips -s format jpeg -s formatOptions 80 characters.png --out characters-compressed.jpg
   • Linux: pngquant --quality=65-80 characters.png -o characters-compressed.png

7.2 Generate Comic Pages

Before generating any page:

1. Confirm each prompt file exists at prompts/NN-{cover|page}-[slug].md
2. Check whether image_generate accepts a reference image in the current runtime
3. Determine if character sheet exists
4. Choose the appropriate strategy below

Page Generation Strategy:

Character Sheet	image_generate reference support	Strategy
Exists	Supported	A: Pass character sheet as reference with every page
Exists	Not supported	B: Embed character descriptions in every prompt
Skipped	—	C: Prompt file contains all descriptions inline

Strategy A: Pass reference image

• For every page, read prompts/NN-{type}-[slug].md as the prompt input
• Save output to NN-{type}-[slug].png
• Use aspect ratio from storyboard (mapped to landscape/portrait/square)
• Pass characters/characters.png (or compressed version) as the reference image

Reference failure recovery: If generation fails when passing the reference:

1. Compress/convert reference image:
   • sips -s format jpeg -s formatOptions 70 characters.png --out characters-compressed.jpg
   • Or reduce resolution: sips -Z 1024 characters.png --out characters-small.png
2. Retry with compressed/converted image
3. If still fails: Fall back to Strategy C — generate WITHOUT reference, with character descriptions embedded in prompt text

Strategy B: Embedding character descriptions in prompt

When reference images are not supported, create combined prompt files:

# prompts/01-page-xxx.md (with embedded character reference)

## Character Reference (maintain consistency)
[Copy relevant sections from characters/characters.md here]
- 大雄：Japanese boy, round glasses, yellow shirt, navy shorts...
- 哆啦 A 梦：Round blue robot cat, white belly, red nose, golden bell...

## Page Content
[Original page prompt here]

Strategy C: Prompt-only (no character sheet)

When character sheet was skipped or the reference failed:

• Prompt file already contains all character descriptions inline
• No reference image needed
• Rely on detailed text descriptions for character consistency

For each page (cover + pages):

1. Read prompt from prompts/NN-{cover|page}-[slug].md
2. Backup rule: If image file exists, rename to NN-{cover|page}-[slug]-backup-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.png
3. Generate image via image_generate using Strategy A, B, or C
4. Save to NN-{cover|page}-[slug].png
5. Report progress after each generation: "Generated X/N: [page title]"

---

Step 8: Merge to PDF

After all images generated:

bun {baseDir}/scripts/merge-to-pdf.ts <comic-dir>

Where {baseDir} is this skill's directory. Creates {topic-slug}.pdf with all pages as full-page images.

---

Step 9: Completion Report

Comic Complete!
Title: [title] | Art: [art] | Tone: [tone] | Pages: [count] | Aspect: [ratio] | Language: [lang]
Location: [path]
✓ analysis.md
✓ characters.png (if generated)
✓ 00-cover-[slug].png ... NN-page-[slug].png
✓ {topic-slug}.pdf

---

Page Modification

Action	Steps
Edit	Update prompt → Regenerate image → Regenerate PDF
Add	Create prompt at position → Generate image → Renumber subsequent (NN+1) → Update storyboard → Regenerate PDF
Delete	Remove files → Renumber subsequent (NN-1) → Update storyboard → Regenerate PDF

File naming: NN-{cover|page}-[slug].png (e.g., 03-page-enigma-machine.png)

• Slugs: kebab-case, unique, derived from content
• Renumbering: Update NN prefix only, slugs unchanged