Idea

When the Remotion Studio / webpack dev server handles a request that 404s (or otherwise does not resolve to a served asset), but a file with the same path suffix exists under the project public/ folder, print a developer-facing message (e.g. on the server console) suggesting to reference it with staticFile() instead of a root-relative URL like /video.mp4.

Motivation

Files in public/ are exposed under the hashed static URL (e.g. /static-<hash>/…), not necessarily at the root path (/video.mp4). Using /video.mp4 in <Video src> or similar often results in 404 even though the file exists in public/. A clear nudge at request time would shorten the debugging loop.

Docs: https://www.remotion.dev/docs/staticfile

Example

• Request: GET /video.mp4 → 404 (or SPA fallback).
• On disk: public/video.mp4 exists.
• Expected: log something like:
  The file exists in public/ as "video.mp4". Use staticFile("video.mp4") or the correct static URL instead of "/video.mp4".

Scope / notes

• Likely touches the preview server routing and/or fallthrough handler (e.g. packages/studio-server/src/routes.ts, static serveStatic handling in packages/studio-server/src/preview-server/serve-static.ts).
• Decide when to emit the hint (only on 404? only for GET? debounce noisy paths?).
• Consider matching rules (basename vs full relative path under public/).

Related

• Studio: Missing/invalid video error shows fullscreen overlay… (different symptom, same class of user mistake)