Avatar first-frame preview checklist: seven checks before final render

A first-frame preview is the cheap place to catch mistakes: it generates stills, not the talking video, and you only start the full render when you approve. Check seven things on the stills, in this order, and call regenerate or create a new preview depending on what you find.

The seven checks

• Right avatar: the person in the still is the handle you meant. Handles from another workspace return 404, so a wrong face usually means a wrong handle in your own table.
• Framing: head and shoulders are not cropped awkwardly for the aspect ratio you chose. Aspect ratio is 1:1, 3:4, 9:16, 4:3 or 16:9, default 9:16.
• Background: matches your scene prompt or scene photo, and nothing in it contradicts the script (a kitchen for a legal explainer).
• Product: if you sent a product_image, it is visible and not hidden behind a hand.
• Scene continuity: for multi-scene video_inputs, later stills are pose-anchored continuations of the first frame; check each one in scene_previews[].
• Safe areas: the lower third of a 9:16 frame is where captions land, so nothing important should sit there.
• Captions intent: stored at preview create but never burned into the stills, so do not expect to see them.

What each fix costs

The docs separate what a preview can absorb from what it cannot. regenerate reuses the stored request and refreshes only the first-frame stills, returning the same avatar_video_preview_id with a new preview-only job. Changes to structural fields (script, video_inputs, avatar_handle, scene, aspect ratio) need a new preview.

Then generate

When the stills are right, call generate-video on the preview id. An empty body keeps the quality chosen at create; an explicit quality overrides it for the final render only. Sume reuses the approved first frame, and the captions you stored at create apply at this step. Poll resource_status for readiness and job_status for the job, as the status post explains.

The preview must still fit the 4 to 60 second window, since it uses the same estimate as the final video. Check your script length before you create it, and split anything longer.

Make it a team habit

Have the person who owns the brand look at the stills, not only the person who wrote the script. A reviewer who sees the first frame spots a wrong background in seconds, and a regenerate is far less costly than a rendered clip that has to be thrown away.

Why stills are not the whole story

A first frame cannot show motion, lip sync or voice. It shows composition. Pair the preview with a short, cheap standard-tier test render when the script is new or the voice matters, and keep max for the final. Because preview stills do not depend on the tier, you can approve a still and then pick any tier at generate-video.