Guide 7 of 8 · Lab · 5 steps

Compare takes and keep one

Takes pile up on the Lab’s rail. Compare them on the stage, star the ones worth a second look, and send one to its shot: the only move that places a take in its shot.

At the end: One take placed in its shot and chosen in the cutting room; every other take still on the rail, with its cost.
Before you start: Takes in the Lab. The sample channel has five: the studio’s recorded style test of its mascot.
A production with a shot list (guide 3).

Step 1

Read the rail

Under the stage runs the rail of takes, newest first. Each take shows its model and what it cost. Filter it with All, by kind, or with Starred.

A take that failed, or whose outcome is uncertain, stays on the rail and says so: Kiju never sends a paid request twice on its own.

The takes rail: All 5, Video 0, Image 5, Voice 0, Starred 0, and five stills of Rivet, each with its model and cost. — The desk, on a fictional sample channel.

Step 2

Compare on the stage

Select a take on the rail. It fills the stage, with its slate under the picture: model, quality, ratio and cost.

Compare by selecting the next take. The stage swaps the picture and the slate follows, so two takes are always judged at the same size, on the same neutral ground.

The Lab’s stage: the cartoon still of Rivet with its slate, GPT Image 2.5 Sunburst · high · 16:9 · $0.07, and the top of its paperwork on the right, with Send to production.

To see where a take came from, read its paperwork on the right. It holds the prompt, the model id, the cost the provider reported, the day it was made and the shot it was made for. Read the full prompt opens the prompt in full.

Show the take’s full paperwork

A take’s paperwork: Image take, GPT Image 2.5 Sunburst, OpenRouter, from the studio engine; Send to production; the prompt; status, quality, ratio, estimate, cost reported, model id, made, for.

Step 3

Star the ones worth a second look

Press the star in the corner of the paperwork to mark a take (Star). Starred on the rail then shows only those. A star is a shortlist, not a decision: nothing moves.

Step 4

Send one to its shot

Press Send to production. The production’s shot list opens under the stage.

Send to production: The last lit window chosen, two sequences, four empty shot slots, and New shot.

Pick the production, then the shot. The take lands in the shot’s slot (the desk calls this the Splice), and the line reads “Placed · The street goes dark · shot 1.1”. Changed your mind? Press Undo.

Placed · The street goes dark · shot 1.1: the cartoon still in slot 1.1, with Undo and Open in the cutting room.

When no shot fits, New shot files the take with the Lab selects. Thumbnail makes the still the production’s picture on the channel’s board. Compare and place one here, with the five recorded takes:

Try it hereIllustration

Compare the five takes, star one, then send it to shot 1.1.

Rivet, the tin toy monster, drawn as a clay figure

GPT Image 2.5 Sunburst · high · 1:1Style test · clay

Takes · newest first

Image take

GPT Image 2.5 Sunburst

Style test · clay

$0.077412 · reported

Made by Tin Kaiju, the studio behind Kiju, with the studio’s engine on 2026-09-26; brought into the sample channel.

Behaves like the desk’s control. This page saves nothing and sends nothing.

Step 5

See it in the cutting room

The take’s paperwork now reads “Placed in”, on a mint line: mint is only ever what a person kept.

Placed in, on a mint line: The last lit window · The street goes dark, and Five ways to draw Rivet · The five looks.

Press Open in the cutting room. There the shot reads “✓ Chosen”. To change your mind later, open the shot’s takes and Select another one. The other takes stay on the rail, with their cost.

The cutting room on The last lit window: no cut yet, Export the chosen take, and the shot list with the cartoon still chosen in shot 1 and three shots planned.