Cork Board

Cork Board — Story Structure Planning Wall

When to Use

• User wants to plan/outline story structure: index cards, acts, arcs, episodes, beat sheets.
• User references Cork Board, a cork wall, story cards, or the AVA demo.
• User wants a production preset (Save the Cat, Three Acts, One-Hour Pilot, trailers, shorts) applied to a project.
• Working with the Cork Board app or its MCP server, or setting CORK_BOARD_PROJECT.
• User wants exports: Markdown outline, CSV scene list, Fountain scaffold, JSON, Share Wall.

Part of the Wasserman Filmmaker Suite (by Sam Wasserman). A local-first planning app that emulates a wall of index cards on cork: pin scenes, drag between acts, tag characters/locations, track arcs beat by beat, export the whole wall as outline, scene list, Fountain scaffold, or JSON. Works for short films, music videos, commercials, features, and multi-episode series.

Installed State (this machine)

• App: /Applications/Cork Board.app (universal build, v1.2.0 — runs on this Intel Mac; quarantine cleared)
• Source repo: ~/Projects/cork-board (MCP server at mcp/cork-board-mcp.mjs)
• MCP: registered in the creative profile config as cork-board (node, 25/25 tools enabled) — profile-local only, root config untouched
• One-line reinstall: curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wassermanproductions/cork-board/main/install.sh | bash

What it does

• Board: index cards on cork/paper/midnight surfaces; drag within/across columns; drag a card onto another board tab to move between episodes
• Cards know filmmaking: title, synopsis, INT/EXT, time of day, location, characters, colored labels, status (Idea → Outlined → Drafted → Revised → Locked → Cut), page count, due date, checklist, notes, seven card colors; pushpin color follows status
• Three views: Board (cork wall), Outline (numbered beat sheet with statuses/page counts), Arcs (character-by-scene grid — every cell is an arc beat written in place)
• Cast & world drawer: characters with color/role/want/need/arc; locations with INT/EXT + scout notes; labels for subplots/threads; live Insights (cards, pages, est. runtime, day/night split, character load, location load)
• Presets: 25 production structures — AVA demo feature, Three Acts, Save the Cat, Eight Sequences, One-Hour Pilot, Half-Hour Comedy, Season Arc Wall, Multi-Board Series, Short Film, Music Video, Commercial, Documentary, blank wall, plus timecoded 1–10 min shorts and :30/:60 trailer walls (every beat pinned to a runtime window)
• Reference images on cards (S/M/L sizes) and AI prompts on cards (one-click copy) — the bridge between the wall and image/video generators
• Safety nets: autosave, undo (60 levels), named checkpoints, full JSON export/import
• Exports: Markdown outline, CSV scene list (schedule-friendly), Fountain scaffold with scene headings, complete project JSON, printable Share Wall (HTML — open in browser, print, and any Cork Board user can import it)

Workflow (GUI app)

1. Launch Cork Board — opens with the AVA demo feature (36 cards, six characters, ten locations). Start your own with New or Presets.
2. Build your wall: cards → acts → arcs. Tag characters by dragging them onto cards.
3. Attach reference images and generation prompts to cards as you go.
4. Export when ready: Fountain for a screenwriter, CSV for scheduling, Share Wall for printing, JSON for the agent (below).

Hermes + Cork Board via MCP (headless)

The MCP server lives in the repo at mcp/cork-board-mcp.mjs (zero-dependency, Node ≥ 18). It reads/edits a Cork Board project JSON headlessly: walls, acts, cards, cast, places, labels, arc beats, presets, and the app's own exports — no desktop app required.

Round-trip: Export → JSON in the app → agent works on the file → Export → Import back.

# generic MCP config (Hermes/Codex):
#   command: node
#   args: ["/absolute/path/to/cork-board/mcp/cork-board-mcp.mjs"]
#   env: { CORK_BOARD_PROJECT: "/absolute/path/to/project.json" }  # optional; defaults to app-data location

Tools: get_board, add_card / update_card / move_card / tag_card / set_arc_beat, add_act / rename_act / reorder_acts, add_entity (cast / places / labels), list_presets / apply_preset, export_outline / export_scene_list / export_fountain / export_json / export_share_html.

Pitfalls

• Gatekeeper "damaged" error: unsigned builds aren't notarized — run xattr -cr "/Applications/Cork Board.app" once after installing from a DMG (or right-click → Open → Open).
• AVA demo persists: the demo stays in the project menu until you delete it — don't mistake it for a user project.
• MCP default path: without CORK_BOARD_PROJECT the server points at the app-data location — pass the env or projectPath per call for explicit files.

Verification

• App launches: open "/Applications/Cork Board.app"
• MCP responds: with CORK_BOARD_PROJECT set, call get_board — expect acts/cards matching the project.