Story Video

Story-to-Video Skill

Convert bedtime stories, narrations, or any spoken content into engaging YouTube Shorts videos with:

• Synced subtitles - Words highlighted in real-time as spoken
• Dynamic backgrounds - Images searched and selected based on story content/section
• YouTube Shorts format - 9:16 portrait video optimized for mobile
• Professional styling - Centered, animated subtitle effects

Quick Start

Input Requirements

1. Audio file - MP3/WAV with narration (e.g., from ElevenLabs TTS)
2. Full text transcript - Complete story/narration text
3. Story sections (optional) - If available, define sections for targeted background images

Basic Workflow

# 1. Transcribe audio to get word timing (automatic)
story-video transcribe --audio story.mp3 --output story.json

# 2. Generate video with auto-searched backgrounds
story-video generate \
  --audio story.mp3 \
  --text "Once upon a time..." \
  --title "Bedtime Story" \
  --output story.mp4

Output: story.mp4 (9:16 portrait, YouTube Shorts ready)

Advanced: Custom Sections & Backgrounds

# Create a config with sections and suggested image searches
story-video generate \
  --audio story.mp3 \
  --text full_text.txt \
  --config story-config.json \
  --output story.mp4

story-config.json:

{
  "title": "The Snail Designer",
  "sections": [
    {
      "start_time": 0,
      "end_time": 15,
      "text": "Once upon a time, in the beautiful city of El Paso...",
      "search_query": "El Paso desert sunset"
    },
    {
      "start_time": 15,
      "end_time": 35,
      "text": "...a gentle snail named Snail was a designer.",
      "search_query": "3D design workshop creative tools"
    }
  ]
}

How It Works

1. Audio Transcription + Timing

• Uses Groq Whisper (or local speech-to-text) to get word-level timing
• Outputs JSON with {word, start_ms, end_ms} for each word
• Enables precise subtitle sync

2. Section Detection

• Divides audio into chunks (10-30s sections)
• Generates targeted image search queries from text content
• Searches Unsplash/Pexels for relevant high-quality images

3. Video Composition

• Creates 9:16 canvas (1080x1920 pixels)
• Layers background image (center-cropped, subtle zoom)
• Renders subtitles centered, synchronized to audio
• Applies subtitle effects:
  • Fade in/out as words appear/disappear
  • Color highlight - Current word in bright color, context in white
  • Scale animation - Current word slightly larger
  • Drop shadow - Professional readability on any background

4. Video Export

• Combines audio + video layers
• H.264 codec, optimized bitrate for YouTube
• Metadata tags for YouTube Shorts (aspect ratio, duration)

Configuration Options

Subtitle Styling

{
  "subtitles": {
    "font": "Inter",
    "size": 48,
    "color_current": "#FFD700",
    "color_context": "#FFFFFF",
    "shadow": true,
    "shadow_blur": 8,
    "shadow_color": "#000000",
    "shadow_offset_y": 3,
    "animation_type": "fade_scale",
    "animation_duration_ms": 200
  }
}

Background Options

{
  "background": {
    "source": "unsplash",
    "fallback_color": "#1a1a1a",
    "zoom_effect": "subtle",
    "zoom_speed": 0.3,
    "fade_between_sections": true,
    "fade_duration_ms": 500
  }
}

Commands

story-video transcribe

Generate word-level timing from audio.

story-video transcribe --audio input.mp3 --output timing.json

Options:

• --audio (required) - Audio file path
• --output (required) - JSON output with timings
• --engine (optional) - groq, google, or local (default: groq)

Output format:

{
  "duration_ms": 45000,
  "words": [
    {"word": "Once", "start_ms": 0, "end_ms": 250},
    {"word": "upon", "start_ms": 250, "end_ms": 450},
    ...
  ]
}

story-video generate

Create video from audio + text.

story-video generate \
  --audio input.mp3 \
  --text "Story text..." \
  --output output.mp4

Options:

• --audio (required) - MP3/WAV file
• --text (required) - Full transcript text
• --output (required) - MP4 output path
• --config (optional) - JSON config file (sections, styling, etc.)
• --title (optional) - Video title (for metadata)
• --subtitle-style (optional) - Preset: minimal, bold, elegant (default: bold)
• --background-source (optional) - unsplash, pexels, local_dir (default: unsplash)

story-video style-preset

List available subtitle style presets.

story-video style-preset list
story-video style-preset preview bold

Presets:

• minimal - Small, centered, subtle animation
• bold - Large, bright highlight, dynamic animation
• elegant - Serif font, refined colors, smooth fade
• neon - Bright colors, glow effect, fast animation

Image Search Strategy

The skill auto-generates search queries based on story content:

1. Noun extraction - Identifies key nouns (snail, designer, El Paso, daughters)
2. Context keywords - Adds context (sunset, desert, workshop, family)
3. Search execution - Finds relevant images from Unsplash
4. Quality filter - Prefers high-res, professional photos
5. Caching - Saves images locally to avoid repeated searches

Example:

Text: "snail named Snail who was a three-dimensional designer"
→ Search: "3D design workshop creative snail"
→ Results: [image1, image2, image3]
→ Select: Best match for this section

Requirements

System Dependencies

• ffmpeg - Video composition (brew install ffmpeg)
• python3 - Image processing (PIL/Pillow)

API Keys

• Groq API - Audio transcription (set GROQ_API_KEY)
• Unsplash API (optional) - Image search (set UNSPLASH_API_KEY for more requests)
• ElevenLabs API (optional) - If generating TTS from text first

Python Libraries

ffmpeg-python
pydub
pillow
requests

Workflow Examples

Example 1: Bedtime Story from TTS

# 1. Generate audio (your voice) via ElevenLabs
tts "Once upon a time..." --voice hjX6Urz6dBwVkFdr87DB --output story.mp3

# 2. Convert to video
story-video generate \
  --audio story.mp3 \
  --text "Once upon a time..." \
  --subtitle-style bold \
  --background-source unsplash \
  --output story-video.mp4

# 3. Upload to YouTube Shorts
# (9:16 format is ready!)

Example 2: Existing Audio with Custom Sections

# Create config with specific sections and background queries
cat > config.json << EOF
{
  "title": "The Snail",
  "sections": [
    {
      "start_time": 0,
      "end_time": 20,
      "search_query": "El Paso desert landscape"
    },
    {
      "start_time": 20,
      "end_time": 45,
      "search_query": "3D design studio workspace"
    }
  ]
}
EOF

# Generate video with custom sections
story-video generate \
  --audio narration.mp3 \
  --text transcript.txt \
  --config config.json \
  --output output.mp4

Example 3: Multiple Stories as Shorts Series

# Generate videos for each story
for story in stories/*.txt; do
  audio="${story%.txt}.mp3"
  output="videos/$(basename $story .txt).mp4"
  
  story-video generate \
    --audio "$audio" \
    --text "$story" \
    --subtitle-style elegant \
    --output "$output"
done

# All ready for YouTube Shorts series
ls -lh videos/*.mp4

Troubleshooting

Video is too fast/slow

Adjust audio speed before generating (use ffmpeg -filter:a "atempo=0.9" to slow down).

Background images not matching content

Customize search queries in config.json sections[].search_query field.

Subtitle readability on bright backgrounds

Switch to --subtitle-style elegant (adds stronger shadow) or use the shadow config option.

ffmpeg not found

Install: brew install ffmpeg

API rate limits

• Groq: Free tier has rate limits; use local Whisper if needed
• Unsplash: Free tier is 50 requests/hour; cache images locally

Bundled Resources

• scripts/generate_video.py - Main video composition logic
• scripts/transcribe_audio.py - Word-level timing extraction
• scripts/search_images.py - Unsplash/Pexels image search
• scripts/subtitle_renderer.py - Animated subtitle rendering
• references/ffmpeg_settings.md - FFmpeg optimization for YouTube Shorts
• references/subtitle_effects.md - Available animation effects and customization
• assets/fonts/ - Default fonts (Inter, Serif fallback)