text-to-lottie

SKILL.md

Text To Lottie

Author production-ready Lottie JSON for the official local Skia Skottie player.
The deliverable is a renderable scene in the player, not isolated JSON.

Operating Model

Use the official player project and verify in Skia Skottie. Do not hand-roll a
custom viewer or switch renderers for verification.

Keep the skill portable across Agent Skills clients. Avoid host-specific
commands, command modes, or orchestration conventions in skill instructions.

Prefer fewer questions and stronger defaults. Ask only when a decision changes
the output materially, such as transparent vs full-frame background, brand
constraints, target format, or supplied source assets.

Prioritize clean, intentional, professional motion over merely satisfying the
literal prompt.

Reference Loading
This SKILL.md is the thin control plane. Load only one-level references that
match the task. Do not open the whole reference library.

Always read references/player-contract.md before creating, editing, fixing, or
verifying a scene. If a routed reference is unavailable, continue using the
inline rules in this file.

User intent
References to read when present

Any new/edit/fix Lottie scene
references/player-contract.md

JSON structure, keyframes, slots, shapes, assets
references/lottie-spec-map.md

Logo animation
references/recipe-logo.md, references/motion-taste.md, references/design-taste.md

Typography, title, quote, text reveal
references/recipe-typography.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Lower third, name tag, caption bar, overlay
references/recipe-lower-thirds.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Loader, icon, spinner, badge animation
references/recipe-loaders-icons.md, references/motion-taste.md

Success, error, warning, completion, empty state
references/recipe-loaders-icons.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

UI microinteraction
references/recipe-ui-microinteractions.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Generic "animate this SVG" or SVG-to-Lottie
references/recipe-svg-animation.md, references/svg-compatibility.md, references/motion-taste.md

Camera follow, pan, zoom, parallax, scene motion
references/recipe-camera-scene-motion.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Diagram, technical line animation, callout, flow trace
references/recipe-diagram-technical.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Data, stats, KPIs, charts, metrics, dashboard figures
references/recipe-data-stats.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Product launch, feature announcement, social promo
references/recipe-product-promo.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Long text, multiple ideas, list/features/steps, timeline, before/after, problem/solution, quote+proof, recap/story, product walkthrough, multi-language variations, chapters, multi-beat sequence, episode, jump/hard cuts, transition grammar
references/chapterization-transition-grammar.md, references/motion-taste.md

Glow, glass, metal, gradient, fill, bubble/burst effects
references/recipe-visual-effects.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

SVG input inside logo/icon/UI/lower-third work
The task recipe plus references/svg-compatibility.md

Starter brief or reusable project direction
references/recipe-starter-projects.md, references/design-taste.md, references/motion-taste.md

Any "premium", "clean", "minimal", "modern", "sleek", or "polished" qualifier
references/design-taste.md (restraint defaults), plus the routed recipe

For mixed prompts, choose one primary recipe from the main deliverable, then add
secondary references for source format or visual treatment. Examples: SVG logo
with glow uses logo as primary plus SVG compatibility and visual effects;
product launch with pan/zoom uses product promo plus camera scene motion;
technical SVG diagram tracing uses diagram/technical plus SVG compatibility;
kinetic title with glass sweep uses typography plus visual effects.

Workflow

Route the task using the table above. Read only the relevant references that
exist.

Locate the official player project and resolve the target scene using the
target precedence below. Before editing, verify the resolved path is
public/projects/<project>/<scene-N>/lottie.json; re-read that current file
immediately before overwriting because the UI can write slot edits back to
source.

Decide the background policy before authoring.

Write or update public/projects/<project>/<scene-N>/lottie.json and, when
useful, controls.json.

Validate JSON, run or reuse the dev server, inspect exact frames with
?frame=N, and fix render/design/motion issues before finishing.

Inline Rules

Design Defaults (always apply)

These few defaults are non-negotiable and apply to every designed scene. Load
references/design-taste.md for the full reasoning, especially for any
"premium", "clean", "minimal", "modern", or "card" prompt.

Premium means subtract, not add. When a prompt says premium, clean, minimal,
modern, sleek, or sophisticated, default to restraint: remove chrome before
adding it. Premium is carried by scale, weight, brightness, spacing, and
timing, never by cards, borders, dividers, shadows, glow, or stacked tints.

Chrome/container budget is 0 by default. Do not add a framing card,
container, border, or divider unless it does a job that whitespace and
alignment cannot. Separate grids and columns with negative space and alignment
first, a single hairline second, and a filled or bordered card last and only
when explicitly warranted.

One surface tone. Use one background tone. Do not stack two near-black or two
near-white tints to fake a "surface"; it reads muddy. If a card surface must
differ from the background, make it one deliberate step with a clear purpose.

One divider treatment, one color. If dividers are truly needed, use one weight
and one color for all of them, title rule and column rules included. Never use
slightly different colors or weights per divider.

Scene Rules

Scene files live at public/projects/<project>/<scene-N>/lottie.json.

Resolve target scenes by authority: an explicit file path wins; a browser URL
route like /<project>/<scene> wins next; an already-known project/scene for
the task wins next; otherwise create a new safe scene. Use /__context only
for discovery, verification, or playback state unless the task explicitly says
to edit what is currently on screen and no more specific target exists. Do not
let /__context.live override a known file path, URL, or project/scene.
Overwrite main-project/scene-1 only if it is still the untouched placeholder;
otherwise create a new scene.

Full-frame standalone compositions should include a visible background layer
with a bgColor slot and controls.json entry.

Transparent-by-default outputs include logos, icons, loaders, overlays, lower
thirds, and SVG-derived assets unless the user asks for a background.

Include top-level v, fr, ip, op, w, h, nm, assets, and
layers. Treat op as exclusive.

Use purposeful easing and staging. Avoid defaulting to linear motion. Derive
easing from the behavior-based anchors in motion-taste.md (chosen by motion
behavior, focal element strongest); do not fall back to one uniform ease for
every layer.

Use slots for important editable values and add controls.json labels/ranges
when they improve the properties panel.

For SVG input, preserve the viewBox, normalize styling, watch fill rules and
intersections, and verify the result in Skottie.

Native Lottie text/text slots (ty:5) render in this player when the scene
ships its font: drop a .ttf/.otf/.ttc next to lottie.json, declare it in
fonts.list with fFamily matching the font's embedded family name, and
reference it from text documents. The loader passes every scene font to Skottie.
Prefer native text; reach for vector/shape text only for deliberate path effects
(stroke-on, glyph morphs, handwriting). See the player-contract "Native Text"
reference.

Verification

Before finishing:

Confirm the intended target file path is
public/projects/<project>/<scene-N>/lottie.json.

Validate JSON:

node -e "JSON.parse(require('fs').readFileSync('public/projects/<project>/<scene-N>/lottie.json','utf8'))"

Confirm the official player is running and the scene appears in
GET /__context.

Inspect pinned frames in the browser. For new scenes, check frame 0,
midpoint, and op - 1.

Confirm the background policy matches the use case.

Check for blank canvas, missing assets, unstyled shapes, wrong layer order,
bad easing, awkward timing, cropped content, text overflow, and visible SVG
artifacts.

Finish only when the animation renders cleanly and feels intentional.

Maintenance Evals

Do not read eval files during normal animation work. Use them only when testing
or changing this skill:

evals/trigger-prompts.json

evals/routing-prompts.json

evals/reference-loading-prompts.json

evals/output-rubric.md