Getting started (new team member)

Video Terminal is a text-based video editor with a producer agent built in. You edit by deleting words in a transcript, briefing the agent in plain English, and polishing on a normal timeline. This page gets your machine running; the Editor guide teaches the tool in editor language.

1 · Machine setup (~20 min, once)

Your admin will either run this with you on a screen share or send you the script. Open Terminal (⌘-space, type "terminal") and paste the one command they give you. It installs the runtime (node, ffmpeg, Claude Code), pulls the app and your client repos, and puts a Video Terminal launcher on your Desktop.

You'll be asked to log in to Claude in the browser — use the account your admin tells you to (company seat or your reimbursed plan).

2 · First open

  1. Double-click Video Terminal on the Desktop.
  2. Open the practice project your admin points you at.
  3. Look at the bottom-right drawer: within a few seconds you should see ✦ <client> · ready — that's your producer agent, started automatically. You never have to set it up or open a terminal for it.

3 · The first hour

Do these six things in the practice project — they're 90% of the daily loop:

  1. Press play.
  2. Hit ✎ on any graphic card in the Library → change the text → Enter.
  3. ★ Looks tab → drag a look onto the timeline → fill in the little form.
  4. Select a boring sentence in the transcript → delete it → play again.
  5. Type one change to the agent in the drawer: "make the intro title 20% smaller."
  6. ⚗ Bake → watch your export.

4 · Safety net

Before the agent acts, the app snapshots the project automatically. If a result is bad: checkpoints (top right) → roll back. You cannot permanently wreck a project, so experiment freely — that's what the practice project is for.

5 · Keys & access