Character-Aware Continuity Companion for Video Production

CastThread automatically tracks recurring characters across video scenes, builds relationship graphs, and flags continuity issues — helping editors and creators stay focused on storytelling.

• Backend: Vanilla PHP (no framework)
• Frontend: Bootstrap 5.3, jQuery 3.7, Font Awesome 6
• Database: MySQL 8+ (InnoDB)
• Video AI: Replicate API (Apollo-7B model)
• Graph Visualization: vis-network
• Font: Google Fonts — Outfit

Import the schema into MySQL:

mysql -u root -p < schema.sql

Edit config.php and set:

• DB_HOST, DB_NAME, DB_USER, DB_PASS — your MySQL credentials
• REPLICATE_API_TOKEN — your Replicate API key (get one at https://replicate.com)

Run with PHP's built-in server or Apache/Nginx:

php -S localhost:8000

Then open http://localhost:8000 in your browser.

• PHP 8.0+
• MySQL 8.0+
• cURL extension enabled
• ffmpeg / ffprobe (optional, for video metadata & thumbnails)

castthread/
├── config.php              # DB connection, API keys, helpers
├── header.php              # Shared HTML header & navbar
├── footer.php              # Shared HTML footer & scripts
├── index.php               # Dashboard
├── project_list.php        # All projects
├── project_create.php      # Create/edit project
├── project_view.php        # Project detail (tabs: videos, characters, graph, alerts)
├── video_upload.php        # Video upload with drag & drop
├── video_process.php       # Video analysis (start, poll, simulate)
├── video_api.php           # Replicate API integration
├── character_list.php      # All characters (with inline rename)
├── character_timeline.php  # Character detail & appearance timeline
├── continuity_list.php     # All continuity alerts (with filters)
├── continuity_detail.php   # Alert detail with scene context
├── scene_list.php          # Scene list for a video
├── graph_view.php          # Standalone relationship graph
├── style.css               # Custom styles
├── app.js                  # jQuery interactions & AJAX
├── schema.sql              # MySQL database schema
├── .htaccess               # Apache config (upload limits, security)
└── uploads/                # Video files, thumbnails, frames (auto-created)

• Project Management — Organize videos by production/episode
• Video Upload — Drag & drop with progress bar, auto-metadata extraction
• AI Analysis — Send videos to Apollo-7B for character detection, scene segmentation, and continuity checking
• Demo Mode — Generate simulated analysis data for testing without API key
• Character Tracking — View all detected characters, rename them, see appearance timelines
• Relationship Graph — Interactive vis-network graph of character co-occurrences
• Continuity Alerts — Flagged issues (wardrobe changes, missing characters, prop inconsistencies) with severity levels and resolution workflow
• Scene Timeline — Visual timeline bar and per-scene character roster
• Mobile-First UI — Bottom navigation bar, responsive cards, native app feel