Effects
What the pipeline does to a recording.
Nine stages, applied in order: a lecture is repaired before it is branded, branded before it is composited, composited before anything is cut away from. A course picks the effects it wants; the order is not negotiable, because each one depends on the state the last left behind.
Every effect below has its own page with each element it creates, how it is made, every rule and setting, and a finished sample from a real lecture — see all effects in detail →
Clips run at the length they run in a lecture. Where a stage has no sample yet the panel says so rather than standing in something from elsewhere.
Template styles
Twenty-six looks, on their own page.
Every effect above is drawn in a course’s template style — its typefaces, palette, ground, shapes and motion. All twenty-six, each with a moving sample from the same lecture, have a page of their own.
Screen elements
Every shape the lecture can draw.
This is the vocabulary that decides what a lecture can say on screen. Each element is cued to a phrase in the transcript, so a point appears on the word that introduces it rather than on a timer. All twenty-nine follow the template style the course is built in — the clips below are in Scholar.
Screen elements
13 typesDrawn into the lecture itself, over the chapter's ground. Every one is cued to a phrase in the transcript, so what appears, appears on the word that introduces it.
hero
Opens a chapter
A kicker and one big title, centred. The title arrives a beat after the kicker so the eye lands on the small line first.
header
Names the chapter, and stays
Top-left kicker, headline and a rule that draws out from the left. Everything else on the screen sits under it.
bullets
A list that arrives as it is spoken
One line per point, numbered or dotted. The line being spoken is lit; earlier ones stay, dimmed. A settle beat brings them all to full once the last has landed.
cards
A thing and what it cost
Two to four panels in a row, each a title with a consequence under it. Empty ones are dashed outlines first, so the count is visible before the content is.
chips
Slots that fill as they are named
Boxes that stand as dashed ghosts the moment a sentence promises three of something, and fill one by one as each is given.
define
A definition, filling in as it is read
The term in the accent colour, then the definition word by word — unspoken words held faintly in place so nothing reflows, and the load-bearing phrase lit as it lands.
columns
Two or three ideas held against each other
Each column's heading sits dim until the argument reaches it, so the shape of the comparison is visible before it is filled.
quote
A sentence worth stopping on
Set against a rule, larger than the surrounding text, with nothing else on screen. For a definition somebody else wrote, or a line the lecture wants to hang on.
slam
One line, full width
The strongest register in the set: a whole sentence across the frame, with one phrase turning accent on the word that carries it.
chain
A sequence, with the arrows drawn
Linked panels with a connector that draws itself just before the next panel lands. For anything that happens in an order.
rail
A numbered agenda with a moving marker
A vertical list where the current item is banded and badged, items still to come are dashed, and passed ones fade back. For a roadmap the lecture returns to.
counter
A number that counts up
For a figure the lecture wants felt rather than read — it rolls to its value, overshoots a little and settles, with a rule drawing out under it.
titleslide
The card the lecture opens and closes on
Programme, course and module down the left under the topic, the presenter cut out of their own recording on the right, and their name arriving last.
Diagrams
12 typesThe same cueing, but carrying a structure rather than a list — an order, a share, a trend, an overlap, a branch. Each is built in front of the class rather than revealed finished.
timeline
An order, with dates on it
A spine that draws only as far as the lecture has reached, with markers that ring as they land and labels alternating above and below so long ones never collide.
matrix
Every pair of two lists at once
Grid rules first, then the headers, then the cells — each tinted by its verdict. Two lists side by side give a comparison; a grid gives the whole cross-product.
bars
How much, side by side
Bars grow out of the baseline and the figure rolls up with them, so the number reads as an amount rather than as a caption. Empty ones sit as dashed footprints.
proportion
Shares of one whole
A single bar that divides. Different from bars on purpose: bars compare separate quantities, this splits one thing, and the reading is “of what is there, this much is X”.
line
A trend
The path draws rather than appearing, because the drawing is the argument — the eye follows it in the direction the sentence is going. Two series can run against each other.
venn
What two or three ideas share
Circles scale in from their own centres and the overlap is named as its own beat. For a distinction the lecture wants to soften rather than sharpen.
flow
A concept with branches
Nodes are placed by the composer, because a flow's shape is part of what it means. Diamonds are decisions, edges draw with a travelling head, and the branch labels arrive with them.
cycle
A process that comes back round
Arcs sweep between the nodes and close the loop, which a left-to-right chain cannot do. For a life cycle, a review cycle, anything that starts again.
stack
Parts that build a whole, and stay
Layers rise from the bottom and none of them goes away. For a concept assembled out of pieces, where the point is that the earlier pieces are still holding it up.
formula
An expression, term by term
Operators arrive ahead of their terms, so the shape of the expression is on screen before the parts are, and a note ticks in under whichever term is being explained.
annotate
A picture the lecture can point into
A cutaway today is a picture with a caption band. This is a picture with pins: each lands at its own coordinate and draws a leader out to its label.
layout
A place, with parts of it named
Zones wipe in from their own leading edge. For anything where position carries the meaning — a floor, a region, a structure.
Drawn cutaways
4 typesA separate renderer, used where the lecture cuts away from the slide entirely. Drawn in code rather than generated, which is what makes them free — and what lets them carry an idea no camera could be pointed at.
b-row
A row of cards
Two to four panels side by side, each an icon and a label, arriving as they are named. The plainest of the four, and the one that fits anywhere.
b-versus
Two sides, held apart
A split panel with its own icons either side and a verdict that lands across the middle once both are up. For any comparison the lecture settles.
b-focus
One idea, with what follows from it
A single large icon with consequences arriving beneath it. For the moment a lecture wants one thing looked at and nothing else.
b-chain
A sequence with arrows
Panels linked left to right, each arrow drawing just before the panel it points at. For anything with an order — a process, a life cycle, a history.
Beyond the sixteen effects
What else the engine does.
The effects above are what a viewer sees. These are the capabilities around them: new formats, the checks that keep generated footage honest, and the machinery that lets a whole course come out looking like one course.
NewQuick Check quizzesAfter a concept is taught, the film stops for a short check: an opening card, five multiple-choice questions with a countdown, each answer revealed with a one-line why, and a closing card. Usually two per 20-minute lecture, cut into a natural pause so no word is clipped. Styled from the lecture's own template, light by default. Optional.
NewClassroom BoardA whiteboard, blackboard or template board that writes itself as the lecturer speaks: headings, points and simple diagrams arrive on the words that introduce them. The board shares the screen with the presenter or takes a passage on its own, within a cap so it never crowds out the rest of the film.
Early accessSmartboard and classroom footageFor lectures filmed in a real room in front of an interactive panel, with no green screen. The teacher is cut out with an AI matte, every slide is rebuilt clean from the panel with nobody standing in front of it, and the lecture is then edited in the house layouts, captions and cards.
Two pacesAcademic pacing is the default. Fast-paced is for trailers, programme overviews and module openers: shorter holds, a change of picture every four to five seconds and more drawn scenes. Quality rules are the same in both; only the pace changes.
Safer generated footageGenerated pictures are checked before they are used: no invented logos, made-up brands or fake documents passing as real. An optional no-people mode keeps faces and hands out of every generated and stock shot.
Brand cardsWhen a lecture names a real company, the engine does not draw a fake logo. It shows a clean name card over a relevant photograph instead. Over 300 are ready, and new ones are made as lectures need them.
Characters that stay the sameWhen a lecture follows one person through a case study, that person looks the same in every shot they appear in, from the first scene to the last.
Drawn scenes and 3D figuresFree, fast cutaways drawn by the engine itself: a row, a versus, a focus or a chain, built from a set of marks and simple 3D figures. They cannot invent a fact, so they are safe on any line.
A library of 46,000+ shotsEvery shot the engine makes is tagged by subject and kept, alongside more than 2,000 free stock clips, so a new lecture reuses a good existing shot before it pays for a new one. Browse the library →
Checks on every filmEach finished film is transcribed again and compared with the source to catch a dropped or doubled word, lip sync is checked to within one frame, and a job doctor refuses mismatched measurements before anything is rendered.
OptionalNarrated cards and musicThe welcome, objectives and takeaways cards can be read by a narrator whose voice is chosen to suit the lecturer, over a music bed kept well under speech. Silent cards remain the default.
Whole courses at onceA course is queued as one batch and spread across render machines. Every lecture keeps the course's style, logo and pacing, so lecture fourteen looks like lecture one.
Want to see your own lecture in one of these?
Send a recording and we'll run it through the pipeline as a pilot — one free sample per institution.