Generate a terminal-theme cover image for a blog post — renders an on-brand HTML template to PNG with headless Chrome. Use when the user wants a cover image, thumbnail, or og-image for a post, or when a finished post is missing its cover. Scope is the site's terminal-style covers (dark green, $-prompt, terminal window); photo/YouTube-style thumbnails with Dan's face are the video `thumbnail` skill, NOT this one.
Research, refine, and scope a single video idea Dan already has — validate demand with evidence, find the angle competitors are missing, and define what the video covers, ending in a go / reframe / park verdict. Use whenever Dan brings his own idea rather than asking for new ones — "I want to make a video about X", "is X worth a video?", "help me scope this video", "research this topic for a video", "what should I cover in a video on X", "how should I angle this". Finding ideas from scratch is `video-ideation`; turning a settled, scoped idea into a title/thumbnail/intro is `video-packaging`. This skill is the bridge between them.
Add branded motion graphics and camera moves to a YouTube video — lower thirds, section titles, callouts, punch-in zooms — transcript-driven placement, rendered from the terminal-style template library and composited with ffmpeg. Chains after rough-cut. Use when Dan says "add graphics", "add a lower third", "motion graphics pass", "add zooms", "punch in on that", "put my name on the intro", or wants callouts / titles / animations / transitions on a video. Do NOT use for cutting (rough-cut), thumbnails/titles (video-packaging), or captions.
Produce a rough cut of a raw YouTube recording — trim dead air, remove filler words, and resolve retakes while preserving natural pacing. Handles both talking-head and screen-share footage; the output is a first pass to finish in an editor, not a final render. Use when Dan drops a video file and says "rough cut this", "first pass on this", "trim the silences", "cut the dead air", "remove the ums", "remove the duplicates", "I re-recorded some parts", or "clean up this recording". Do NOT use for titles/thumbnails (video-packaging), extracting short clips, captions, zooms, or b-roll.
Chop a long-form video into 30–60 second 9:16 vertical shorts — find the standalone moments in the transcript, reframe per segment (face crop for talking-head, stacked layout for screen-share), and burn in word-by-word "karaoke pop" captions. Chains after rough-cut. Use when Dan says "make some shorts", "chop this up", "pull some clips out of this", "clip this video", "vertical clips", "9:16", or mentions Shorts / Reels / TikTok for an existing video. Do NOT use for the long-form first pass (rough-cut), graphics on the long-form video (motion-graphics), or titles/thumbnails (video-packaging).
Research-driven YouTube video ideation for Dan Vega's channel (Java, Spring, AI, and developer tools). Use this whenever Dan asks for video ideas, wonders what video to make next, wants to know what's trending in the Java/Spring/AI space, asks what topics are doing well on YouTube, or mentions ideation, content planning, or "what should I cover". Even a vague "I'm stuck on what to make" should trigger this skill. Produces a ranked idea brief where every idea is backed by evidence of real demand.
Scaffold a new YouTube video project on disk from Dan's 2026 template — copy /Users/vega/youtube/2026Template into a new PascalCase project folder and rename the Premiere project file to match. Use when Dan says "new video project", "scaffold a project", "set up a project for <video name>", "create the folders for <video>", or gives a video title and asks to start the project. Do NOT use for deciding what to film (video-ideation), titles/thumbnails (video-packaging), or editing footage (rough-cut).
Render the final thumbnail art for a YouTube video — composes real photo cutouts of Dan with HTML/CSS templates in the channel's design language (dark green, big white type, one green accent) and renders to PNG with headless Chrome; no AI image generation. Use when Dan wants the actual thumbnail image made — "make the thumbnail", "render the thumbnail", "thumbnail for <video>", or when a video-packaging concept is ready to become art. Do NOT use for thumbnail *concepts*/creative direction (video-packaging), blog cover images (blog post-cover), or video ideas (video-ideation).