Resolve Delivery

Resolve Delivery / Deliverable QC

Bridges delivery craft to this repo's tools.

• Craft / specs — the global deliverables-knowledge, post-supervisor, and quality-control / qc-domain skills (distributor specs, mastering, QC discipline). Use for what the spec should be, not tool mechanics.
• Live tool mechanics — docs/kernels/render-deliver-kernel.md (the render planning/validation boundary + Quick Export).
• Offline deliverable QC — resolve-advanced/README.md → deliverable, media, provenance.

Two servers

Delivery targets (the short path)

Named render intents. list_delivery_targets → prepare_delivery_job(target, target_dir). Ask for prores422hq_master, dnxhr_hqx_master, h264_1080p_web, or an alias (youtube, tiktok, avid, stems). One definition emits BOTH the Resolve render settings and the deliverable_qc spec, so the returned qc_spec is what you QC the finished file against — do not hand-write a second spec.

• Format/codec resolve against the live matrix. A target this machine or license cannot render fails with the available lists; it never silently substitutes. Use check_availability: true to see what this install supports.

• Image-sequence targets return qc_spec: null — deliverable_qc probes one file, a sequence is many. That is expected, not a gap.

• Bitrate is deliberately unset (Resolve has no bitrate key). Pin quality yourself via settings if a spec demands it.

• Programme loudness is a separate projection. A target names a standard via overrides: {loudness_standard: "ebu_r128"}; resolve_delivery_target then returns a loudness_target alongside qc_spec. Hand loudness_target.target to advanced loudness_qc. render(action='list_loudness_standards') lists the five named contracts (web, podcast, ebu_r128, atsc_a85, ott_dialogue_gated) — cite one, never invent the numbers.

• No shipped target names a loudness standard by default: a ProRes master has no inherent programme loudness and a broadcast handoff depends on territory. A loudness_note tells you when none is pinned.

• Dialogue-gated standards emit no gradeable integrated. loudness_qc measures full-programme; grading a dialogue-gated figure against that means nothing. The number rides in meta for a properly gated meter and only true peak is asserted. This is deliberate, not a missing field.

Use the lower-level path below when you need something no target covers.

Live render essentials

• Discover then validate then apply: probe_render_matrix (formats/codecs/res) → validate_render_settings → safe_set_render_settings (dry-run capable) → prepare_render_job (adds a job, does not start it).
• Format AND codec accept display names or ids; both normalize against the live maps. A rejected pair is a hard error with the available codecs — it never queues a job in the previously set codec.
• Render lifecycle helpers require temp output dirs by default; real delivery paths need explicit lower-level actions.
• GetRenderSettings readback is version/page dependent — the kernel validates and applies through SetRenderSettings regardless.
• safe_quick_export forces EnableUpload=False and needs allow_render=True before it actually renders.
• Pin the base render state with prepare_render_job(from_preset=...). SetRenderSettings applies your keys on top of whatever the Deliver page is holding rather than replacing it, and a loaded preset carries more state than the keys you pass. An Audio Only preset plus an explicit ExportVideo: true has been measured to queue a job that reads back IsExportVideo: true and renders an mp4 with no video stream (issue #123). There is no way to detect this: the API documents neither GetRenderSettings nor GetCurrentRenderPresetName, so the inherited state cannot be read — only pinned. Verify the OUTPUT, not the job: ffprobe for a codec_type=video stream. A long timeline that "renders" in seconds is the tell.
• Three render keys are 21.0.4+: UseFullExtents, AddFrameHandles, DataBurnIn (issue #131). SetRenderSettings ignores unknown keys silently, so on an older build these are dropped with no signal rather than refused — which is exactly the failure mode that produces a deliverable missing handles nobody notices until the conform. Check resolve_control check_version_support before offering them, and note AddFrameHandles is also ignored when full extents is enabled, so it can do nothing for two different reasons.

Offline deliverable QC (deliverable actions)

Report-only, gate: review — never auto-pass-clear. Run these on the finished file, not the timeline:

• deliverable_qc — ffprobe a render vs its spec → pass/fail per field.
• loudness_qc — ebur128 LUFS / true-peak / LRA.
• reframe_blanking_check — pillar/letterbox/blanking vs expected framing.
• conform_completeness — every intended shot present in the delivered cut.
• re_delivery_diff — what changed between two delivery versions.
• render_manifest — build / reconcile the manifest of what was delivered.
• expand_deliverable — derive texted / textless / stems / slate / leader entities from a master.
• spec_from_authored — turn the authored deliverable vocabulary (codec display names, "1920x1080", "-16 LUFS", <SHOW>_<EP>_<YYYYMMDD>.mov naming) into a deliverable_qc spec plus a loudness_qc target. Anything it cannot map is listed in unmapped[] rather than dropped, so an unrecognized codec surfaces instead of quietly producing a spec with no codec check in it.

Two things that bite when hand-writing specs, both handled by the projections:

• container is "mov" for both .mov and .mp4 — ffprobe reports format_name=mov,mp4,m4a,... for each and only the first token is kept. Use video.codec to tell them apart; a spec asserting container: "mp4" always fails.
• Loudness is not a deliverable_qc field. It comes back as a separate loudnessTarget for loudness_qc.

Media front-end + provenance

• media (front-end / AE): ingest_verify (hash seal / verify / dupes), media_inventory (fps/codec/colorspace/TC + card gaps), sync (picture↔sound TC + drift/MOS), relink_manifest, rename_plan (refuses camera originals) / reel_normalize, turnover_package, project_hygiene.
• provenance (audit): grade_provenance ("why is this graded this way"), gallery_lineage, cdl_export / cdl_diff (round-trip asserted), revision_tracking, episode_report.

Gotchas

• QC tools refuse rather than fabricate — a "refused" result means missing file, wrong spec, or a metric it cannot honestly compute; read it, don't retry blind. deliverable/media QC needs ffmpeg + ffprobe on PATH (GPL, not bundled) — call the advanced capabilities tool for live status + install hints.
• Deliverable gates never auto-clear; surface the per-field verdict to a human.

Source-media safety (AGENTS.md)

Render probes may render derivatives of synthetic fixtures, never user source media. media.rename_plan refuses camera originals by design — do not override without explicit approval. Preserve the camera-original-to-delivery chain.