Narrative and cinematic film

Story continuity first. A professional finish is coherence and control, not more effects.

Workflow

1. Structure. Preserve scene order and meaning. Hold on action and expression as long as they carry; let holds follow the action, not a fixed interval.
2. Joins. Hard cuts for continuity; a dissolve only for a motivated jump in time or feeling; a fade to black for an act break. A static shot or a hard cut is often the best choice.
3. Look. Correct exposure and balance per shot before one restrained shared look on an adjustment layer (colour-grade). Keep skin natural.
4. Sound. Level dialogue, music under speech (musicBed or autoDuck). No splice falls to digital silence: where a cut leaves an open gap, cover it with a quiet stretch of the same recording (j-l-cuts). No command makes room tone, so never claim it.
5. Format. Keep the requested aspect ratio; a cinematic request does not change it.

Gotchas

• No default teal-orange, grain, widescreen bars or slow zoom unless asked. Inspect what needs improvement rather than prescribing a recipe.
• A J or L cut needs separate audio and picture timing with real source handles; never fake one by moving a linked clip's mediaStart (j-l-cuts).
• Never change duration just because the user asked for a professional look.
• A decorative dissolve between two shots of one continuous moment is a tell.