comic-director — the Audited Spiral + Release (Phase 2/3)

The middle + right of Figure 1: take an authored comic.json (produced by the comic-author skill, Phase 1) and turn it into baked frames + a clickable viewer, through the audited spiral. Per frame: render a deterministic content-SVG blueprint → bake a pixel-art frame (agent mcp__codex__codex sidecar) → a 3-reviewer cross-model panel_gate → keep / retry → page assembly → projection. The movie twin of method-figure's render half. (Image-based today; video-based is next.)

Input contract — comic.json (authored upstream)

The contract boundary is comic.json + the assets it references (content-SVG blueprints, identity refs, ART_BIBLE.md) — authored by comic-author. This skill is render + verify:

• It never invents a number or a cast — faithfulness is a deterministic token-diff over reviewers who never see the expected values; identity is judged against the ref the author supplied (cast-aware).
• It writes back only image_path / active_attempt_id / wiki_node_id (+ the wiki trace) on KEEP.
• The generator family (Codex image_gen) can NOT self-acquit. A KEEP needs the token-diff clean and the cross-model visual panel (Gemini + Codex) to pass. The calling agent (Claude) gives the final structural sign-off.

Full IR spec: ../../docs/comic-json.md / ../../schemas/comic.schema.json.

Run it (scripts/run_comic.py — agent-driven bake, CLI gates)

A pure-stdlib faithful port of packages/core/spiral_engine.js's movie branch. The cross-model gates (Gemini + Codex vision) still shell the gemini / codex CLIs directly. The BAKE is performed by the skill agent via the mcp__codex__codex MCP tool through --bake-mode=agent (the default): the core emits a deterministic bake-request sidecar (prompt + absolute ref paths + exact out_path), the agent calls mcp__codex__codex (sandbox: workspace-write, model: gpt-5.5, config: {model_reasoning_effort: xhigh, include_image_gen_tool: true}, cwd: <project>), and the core verifies the explicit out_path. (codex exec is RETIRED for real bakes — it forced a hand-drawn SVG/struct+zlib fallback; --bake-mode=exec RAISES if it ever reaches a real bake. See docs/spiral-runtime.md.)

python3 skills/comic-director/scripts/run_comic.py \
    --project examples/comic_m3_audit --page P02_b08 --panels S12,S13,S14,S15 \
    [--bake-lang zh] [--finalize] [--dry-run] [--skip-assembly] \
    [--gemini-cmd "python3 cli/gemini_agy_shim.py"] [--gemini-family google]

• --dry-run validates + prints each frame's concrete bake prompt (no image_gen) — run this first; it's also how comic-author confirms Phase 1 is correct.
• --finalize rebuilds the single-file viewer (packages/viewer/build_comic.py) only if the run is shippable (nothing escalated/throttled/flagged-for-human; assembly accepted).
• --gemini-cmd (default: the legacy gemini CLI) — the argv prefix shelled for the google-family reviewer slot (the --model auto-gemini-3 -p <prompt> tail is appended). With the legacy CLI deprecated upstream (IneligibleTierError, 2026-07), pass --gemini-cmd "python3 cli/gemini_agy_shim.py" — the shipped shim translates the old interface to Antigravity's agy and pins a Gemini model (Antigravity also serves Claude/GPT-OSS; the slot must stay google-family for cross-model quorum honesty).
• --gemini-family (default google) — the provenance family recorded in the wiki for whatever --gemini-cmd actually routes to. It must stay non-openai (the visual quorum needs a second family); record honestly, never re-label.
• Needs the codex CLI + a google-family reviewer (legacy gemini CLI, or Antigravity via --gemini-cmd + the shim) on PATH + headless Chrome (to rasterize the content-SVG blueprint). Reuses skills/method-figure/scripts/pickup_image.py.

It prints a JSON run-report (kept, flagged_for_human, needs_human, shippable, throttled, escalated, assembly, attempts_per_panel). Engine semantics it ports (caps 4/panel + 6/run, the deterministic verdict, anatomy single-vote veto, throttle → fresh-run): ../../docs/spiral-runtime.md.

Bake seam contract (agent ↔ core) — --bake-mode=agent

The bake is a synchronous sidecar handshake (contract-v2 §1–§4). The core never returns/exits early on a bake; only the bake primitive moved off codex exec onto mcp__codex__codex:

• (A) core writes <out>.bakereq.json = {prompt_text, content_png, identity_ref, out_path, model:"gpt-5.5", config:{model_reasoning_effort:"xhigh", include_image_gen_tool:true}, sandbox:"workspace-write", cwd, created_at, min_bytes:500000, aspect, request_id:"<uuid4 hex>"} (prompt_text ALREADY contains the absolute ref + out paths — the schema has no -i; config carries both model_reasoning_effort:"xhigh" AND include_image_gen_tool:true — without the latter codex won't fire its native image tool; request_id is a per-bake uuid4-hex nonce the core mints — see (D)+(E)), pre-deleting any stale out_path + status.
• (B) the agent calls mcp__codex__codex with EXACTLY those params.
• (C) codex writes a native PNG to out_path.
• (D) the agent writes <out>.bakestatus.json = {status:"ok"|"fail", failure_kind:"throttle"|"other", mcp_output:"<bounded raw codex tool output>", mcp_error, request_id:"<verbatim from bakereq>"}. mcp_output is MANDATORY on BOTH ok and fail — the core feeds this status file to pickup --transcript, and the HARD-VETO scans it for import struct/zlib.compress/<svg>/matplotlib/… markers. An ok status with no raw output makes the HARD-VETO inert (a hand-drawn struct+zlib/SVG that still emits a ≥500KB sig-valid PNG would slip through) — so always embed the bounded raw tool result. request_id is EQUALLY MANDATORY on BOTH ok and fail — copy it VERBATIM from <out>.bakereq.json into the bakestatus; pickup_image.py --out-existing --request-id fail-closes the bake if the status request_id is missing or ≠ the bakereq nonce (a stale/foreign status at the same path can't be silently honored).
• (E) the core verifies via pickup_image.py --out-existing on the EXPLICIT out_path (PNG sig + IHDR dims
  • size > 500000 + aspect band + mtime >= created_at), HARD-VETOES the markers in the transcript (= the status file's mcp_output), and (via --request-id) fail-closes if the status file's request_id is absent or ≠ the bakereq nonce — but all ONLY after it has read status:"ok". Empty/timeout/any-non-ok = fail-closed (no pickup). NO fallback to codex exec/PIL/SVG; effort is ALWAYS xhigh; sandbox ALWAYS workspace-write.

Who runs --bake-mode=agent (the agent-wrapper SOP) — REQUIRED for the default mode to function

The comic-director skill agent is the bake fulfiller. Concretely:

1. Launch the orchestrator in the BACKGROUND: python3 skills/comic-director/scripts/run_comic.py --project … --page … --panels … --bake-mode agent (it blocks on each bake by polling <out>.bakestatus.json).
2. Loop until the orchestrator prints its final run-report JSON / exits:
   • watch the project's panels/ dir for a new *.bakereq.json;
   • read it; call mcp__codex__codex with exactly its {prompt: <prompt_text>, model:"gpt-5.5", config:{include_image_gen_tool:true, model_reasoning_effort:"xhigh"}, sandbox:"workspace-write", cwd:<cwd>} (codex writes the native PNG to the sidecar's out_path). The config MUST carry both include_image_gen_tool:true AND model_reasoning_effort:"xhigh": without include_image_gen_tool Codex will not fire its native image tool (it falls back to descriptive text / an SVG renderer), and xhigh is the required reasoning tier;
   • then read request_id from <out>.bakereq.json and write <out>.bakestatus.json carrying the status, a bounded raw mcp_output, AND that request_id VERBATIM — mcp_output so the core's HARD-VETO can scan it, and request_id because pickup_image.py --out-existing --request-id fail-closes the bake if the status request_id is missing or mismatched (it must be written on BOTH ok and fail). Live-verified pitfall: if the mcp__codex__codex reply TEXT is EMPTY (an image-only reply), serialize the RAW response object into mcp_output — never write an empty string (pickup fail-closes a blank mcp_output on the empty-transcript guard): {"status":"ok","mcp_output":"<raw>","request_id":"<verbatim from bakereq>"} on success, or {"status":"fail","failure_kind":"throttle","mcp_output":"<raw>","request_id":"<verbatim from bakereq>"} on a 429 / MODEL_CAPACITY_EXHAUSTED / overloaded error (otherwise {"status":"fail","failure_kind":"other","mcp_output":"<raw>","mcp_error":"<raw>","request_id":"<verbatim from bakereq>"}).
3. Stop when the orchestrator exits. (Without this wrapper, every bake polls to --bake-timeout and returns generation_failed with failure_kind="other" — fail-closed, not a hang, and never a false throttle.)

--bake-mode=exec is the legacy/CI non-image path and RAISES if it ever reaches a real bake — never use it to produce a panel.

Hard do / don't

• Do author comic.json first with comic-author; copy examples/comic_m3_audit/comic.json as the shape.
• Do --dry-run first; confirm every baked figure-panel carries ascii-tokenizable expected_literals (else the fail-closed gate refuses to run).
• Don't run two bakes at once. The default --bake-mode=agent writes each native PNG to its explicit per-panel out_path and has no /tmp/aris_imagegen.lock (that code lock is GONE in agent mode — the agent wrapper itself serializes the mcp__codex__codex calls). The real race surface: concurrent runs on the same project/page collide on the per-panel .bakereq.json/.bakestatus.json sidecars + the shared out_path — so keep ONE runner per project/page. (The global generated-images dir that could cross-pollinate concurrent bakes is a hazard of the LEGACY --bake-mode=exec path ONLY, retired for real bakes.)
• Don't resume after an image_gen throttle — launch a FRESH run for the remaining panels.
• Don't treat a needs_human/flagged panel as shippable.

Protocols (governance contracts this skill honors)

• reviewer-independence — reviewers get file paths only; the executor (Codex image_gen) ≠ the visual judges (Gemini + Codex vision).
• acceptance-gate — the loop can DRIVE but can't ACQUIT: a KEEP needs the deterministic token-diff clean and Gemini+Codex visual pass; the generator family never self-acquits; Claude gives the final structural sign-off.
• artifact-integrity — the model that bakes a frame does not judge its own faithfulness; numbers are verified, never originated.
• review-tracing — every reviewer's prompt+response is saved (trace.jsonl) so each verdict is auditable.
• reviewer-routing — Codex gpt-5.5 xhigh; Gemini auto-gemini-3; never downgrade the reviewer tier.