cinematography — Claude Code skill: what it does, how to install
Builds production-grade visual prompts with specific camera movements, lenses, and lighting for the genmedia CLI. Ideal for directing AI video and image models.
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a claude-codeWhat cinematography does
Instead of adding vague buzzwords to prompts, this skill treats generative media like a real film set. It arranges descriptions following the SCLCAM sequence: subject, scene context, focal length and shot size, camera path, atmosphere, lighting grade, and file specifications. The agent collects only details that directly impact framing or mood.
Execution relies on the genmedia command-line tool. The agent inspects schemas for target endpoints, uploads reference stills, and submits direct image jobs or asynchronous video tasks. It maps realistic stills to openai/gpt-image-2, fast drafts to fal-ai/flux-2/klein/9b, and high-end camera moves to models like bytedance/seedance-2.0 or xai/grok-imagine-video.
Without the genmedia binary available in your shell, you can generate prompt copy but cannot trigger API jobs directly. Every video prompt focuses on a single continuous take unless the model explicitly handles multi-shot sequences.
What it helps with
- build structured prompts with realistic focal lengths, lighting, and camera paths
- run image and video generation through the genmedia CLI
- route tasks to fitting models across OpenAI, fal-ai, ByteDance, and xAI
- verify physical camera plausibility and single-shot constraints before rendering
Example prompts for the agent
- Draft a cinematic video prompt for a rainy alleyway tracking shot
- Generate a realistic portrait with openai/gpt-image-2 using genmedia
- Create an image-to-video prompt from ./frame.png with a slow push-in
How to install cinematography
1Skills CLI (Vercel)
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a claude-code2Manually: put the files in place
~/.claude/skills/cinematography/SKILL.mdCopy the whole skill folder; for one project use .claude/skills/cinematography/
1Skills CLI (Vercel)
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a codex2Manually: put the files in place
.agents/skills/cinematography/SKILL.mdFor all projects use ~/.agents/skills/
1Skills CLI (Vercel)
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a cursor2Manually: put the files in place
.cursor/skills/cinematography/SKILL.mdCursor also reads .agents/skills/ and .claude/skills/
1GitHub CLI
gh skill install fal-ai-community/skills cinematography2Manually: put the files in place
.github/skills/cinematography/SKILL.md1Skills CLI (Vercel)
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a gemini-cli2Platform CLI
gemini skills install https://github.com/fal-ai-community/skills --path skills/cinematographyManually: put the files in place
.devin/skills/cinematography/SKILL.mdThe legacy .windsurf/skills/ path still works
Skills CLI (Vercel)
npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a opencodeClaude.ai
Zip the folder and upload it in Settings → Capabilities → Skills
Step by step, with commands for each platform: How to install skills in Claude Code: five ways
Questions about cinematography
How do I install cinematography in Claude Code?
Run npx skills add fal-ai-community/skills --skill cinematography -a claude-code. You can also place the skill file manually at ~/.claude/skills/cinematography/SKILL.md.
What does cinematography do?
It helps agents write production-level visual prompts with camera angles, lenses, and lighting, and executes generation via the genmedia command line.
What prompt structure does cinematography follow?
It uses the SCLCAM order: subject, context, lens and framing, camera movement, atmosphere, mood and color, followed by technical output settings.
