| name | civilwar-letterifier |
| description | Rewrite any text as a solemn, slightly absurd 19th-century Civil War field dispatch (Ken Burns documentary voice), then optionally turn it into a multimodal video — period narration via ElevenLabs, the letter in fancy script on aged parchment, a mournful music bed, and a slow Ken Burns pan/zoom of the letter being read. Use when the user types /civilwar, asks to "civil-war-ify" or "Ken Burns" some text, or asks for a documentary-style letter video. |
| license | Complete terms in LICENSE |
Civil War Letterifier
Two layers. Use only what the user asks for.
- Letterify (text → letter). Rewrite the user's text as a mournful field dispatch. This is the default and is just prose — no tools needed.
- Letterify the multimodal extravaganza (letter → documentary clip). Narrated, scored, written in script on parchment, with a Ken Burns drift over the page. Triggered when the user wants audio/video ("make the video", "with the voice and music", "the full Ken Burns thing").
Layer 1 — The /civilwar command
When the user types /civilwar <text> (or asks to civil-war-ify / Ken-Burns something), rewrite that text as a solemn, slightly absurd Civil War-era letter or documentary narration.
Inviolable rules:
- Preserve the original meaning, names, facts, dates, numbers, requests, and logistics exactly. A blocked Jira ticket stays a blocked Jira ticket.
- Do not invent facts. Period-flavored metaphor is welcome; new commitments, dates, or details are not.
- Mournful field-dispatch register: read over banjo, fiddle, and candlelight. Address a recipient ("My dear colleagues"), sign off as an obedient, beleaguered servant.
- Keep professional messages still usable — the manager must learn the actual status.
Modes
| Mode | Trigger | Length & tone |
|---|
| standard | /civilwar <text> | Default. One sepia paragraph or two. Tasteful tragedy. |
| field-note | /civilwar field-note <text> | One or two sentences — short enough for Slack/SMS. |
| full | /civilwar full <text> | Maximum banjo, maximum plague. Open with a stage cue (*faint fiddle over distant thunder*). HR is concerned. |
| executive | /civilwar executive <text> | Grave dispatch from Antietam that still conveys the Jira ticket, the blocker, and the ask. Safe to send to a manager. |
See references/letter-style-guide.md for the full register, devices, and worked examples. Read it before writing if you want the voice exactly right.
Quick example
/civilwar full I can't make the meeting today because my stomach is wrecked and I need to lie down.
faint fiddle over the low murmur of distant thunder
My dear colleagues,
I regret to report that I shall be unable to attend our appointed council this day. A most grievous rebellion has commenced within my own constitution, and I have been compelled to retire from the field and take refuge upon the nearest horizontal surface.
Pray proceed without me, and know that I remain, though diminished, devoted to the cause.
Your obedient and intestinally besieged servant,
J.
Layer 2 — The multimodal extravaganza
Goal: a documentary clip where the letter, in elegant script on candlelit parchment, drifts slowly under the camera (Ken Burns) while a weathered period voice reads it over a mournful fiddle-and-banjo bed.
Pipeline (all local; renders on the user's machine):
user text
│ Layer 1 — YOU write the period prose (the only creative/agentic step)
▼
the note ──► scripts/build.mjs ──► out/letter.mp4
│ 1. ElevenLabs narration (hardcoded voice) → remotion/public/narration.mp3
│ 2. music bed (drop-in or auto-generated, optional)
│ 2b. ambient bed (assets/sfx, always-on atmosphere)
│ 3. props.json (date auto-generated; signature/title fixed)
└─ 4. Remotion render (parchment + script + Ken Burns + audio)
Three audio layers stack in the render: the narration (voice), the optional
music bed, and an always-on ambient bed (field atmosphere) underneath
both.
The only thing you produce is the note text. Everything else — narrator
voice, date line, signature, title, music, ambient, render — is deterministic
and handled by build.mjs. Don't write a date or signature; the script supplies
them (today's date as "From the Encampment, this Nth day of <Month>", plus a
fixed signature and title).
Step 1 — Write the note
Letterify the text (Layer 1). That period prose is the note — a salutation, a
body, and a closing line (no signature; the script appends one). Pass it straight
to the build as text, or save it to a .txt file. \n\n separates paragraphs;
keep it to a slow read (roughly ≤ 200 words for a tight clip).
Step 2 — Render
export ELEVENLABS_API_KEY=sk_...
node scripts/build.mjs --text "My dear colleagues, ...the period prose... Pray proceed without me." --out out/letter.mp4
node scripts/build.mjs --file note.txt --out out/letter.mp4
node scripts/build.mjs --file note.txt --auto-music
node scripts/build.mjs --file note.txt --music assets/music/your-track.mp3
node scripts/build.mjs --file note.txt --font dispatch
First run installs the Remotion deps under remotion/ automatically. The clip auto-lengths to the narration plus a title card and a fade-out. (--spec letter.json is still accepted for back-compat, but only its letterText is read.)
Voice
The narrator is hardcoded — the custom "Civil War Veteran" voice
(HvjKMFO0rjuPaM2f997g), set as VOICE_ID in scripts/narrate.mjs. There is no
--voice flag and no env override: one note, one narrator. To change narrators,
design a new voice (see references/voice-and-music.md) and replace that single
constant.
Music
Pick one; defaults to voice-only if you skip it:
--music <file> — a track you supply (recommended for the real thing). Drop files in assets/music/.--auto-music — synthesize an original mournful fiddle/banjo bed via ElevenLabs (no licensing worries, looped under the voice).
Licensing matters: the actual Ken Burns theme ("Ashokan Farewell") is copyrighted — do not bundle it. references/voice-and-music.md lists public-domain period tunes and royalty-free sources.
Ambient bed
A separate, always-on atmosphere layer (crickets, wind, a distant camp) that
plays beneath the voice and music for the entire film — it is not an alternative
to the music bed; both stack. Drop an audio file in assets/sfx/ (a file named
ambient.* is preferred; otherwise the first/random track is used) and it is
picked up automatically. Overrides:
--ambient <file> — use a specific ambient track.--ambient-volume <0..1> — peak level of the bed (default 0.16; it sits
below the music's 0.22 so it never competes with the narration).
If assets/sfx/ is empty and no --ambient is given, the layer is simply
skipped.
Tuning the look
The composition lives in remotion/src/CivilWarLetter.tsx. Preview and tweak live with:
cd remotion && npm install && npm run studio
references/composition-guide.md documents every knob (parchment, sepia grade, candle flicker, pan distance, fonts, pads).
Defaults this skill was built with
- Music: drop-in track if present, else auto-generated bed (so the pipeline always finishes).
- Ambient: always-on bed from
assets/sfx/ (skipped only if that folder is empty), layered under voice + music at 0.16.
- Voice: hardcoded custom "Civil War Veteran" (
HvjKMFO0rjuPaM2f997g in narrate.mjs); not parameterized.
- Date line / signature / title: deterministic (date from today; signature + title fixed). The note text is the only creative input.
- Output: 1920×1080, 30fps, h264 MP4.
