Use when the user asks for build a brand or a task matching the examples below. Build a practical brand identity from any input — an idea, an existing website, a list of reference brands, product photos, or "I want to rebrand X". Default to a fast quick-brand path for founder-kit users, and offer th

Build a Brand Tools below are Pika MCP tools, named bare — call each under whatever prefix your session exposes for the Pika MCP. Take any input — an idea, a website, a list of reference brands, product photos, or an existing brand to refresh — and produce a usable brand identity. This is a standalone brand building workflow focused on strategy, identity, design, and copy. The default output is a quick brand deliverable that can be finished in minutes. The full 14 16 page brand guidelines PDF is still available, but only when the user explicitly asks for full depth or chooses to go deeper after the quick pass. Reference files Load these only when the relevant phase starts: references/brand directions.md — strategy angle structure and differentiated positioning boards. references/brand identity.md — logo pipeline, symbol rules, concept lanes, and board copy budgets. references/brand guidelines.md — full guidelines layout, render contract, page structure, and QA rules. references/brand md template.md — required machine readable brand.md structure. Execution Model — Local First, Cloud Only Where Needed This skill is local first. Keep deterministic production work on the user's machine: Local: workspace setup, downloaded fonts, generated image files after download, image compression, transparent background cleanup, 16x16 favicon tests, HTML/CSS page builds, PDF rendering, PNG/JPG QA screenshots, logo asset assembly, token/prompt files, and final zip packaging. Cloud: paid generation only ( gpt image 2 for symbols, mood images, photography, illustration, and ambient textures) and URL/source research when the brief requires it. Do not use a cloud PDF renderer or upload PDFs by default. Save quick PDFs, board PDFs, guidelines PDFs, and brand kit zips to ~/Desktop on Mac, or the project working directory when Desktop is unavailable. Only upload/share via CDN if the user explicitly asks for a hosted file. PDF asset hygiene: never embed full size gpt image 2 PNGs directly in board or guidelines PDFs. This previously produced huge PDFs and ASSET FETCH TIMEOUT failures when renderers tried to fetch multi MB CDN images. Download every generated image, down raster/downsample it to the slot size, and save a local JPEG target of about 85 180KB before using it in render HTML. Keep transparent PNG only for logo/symbol source assets and favicon/logo export, not for photographic page imagery. Never put a CSS filter: / backdrop filter: (warm grade, sepia, saturate, brightness, blur) on a photo or background image in the render HTML — it forces Chromium to rasterize that element to a full resolution lossless bitmap in the PDF, which cancels out the JPEG step above and re bloats the file (a warm graded mood board page alone took a deck to 70 MB). Bake any color grade into the JPEG itself (in the gpt image 2 prompt or when you img.save(..., 'JPEG', ...) ); drop shadow() on a transparent logo PNG is the only filter that's safe. Cost transparency gate Before any paid MCP call, call identity balance({verbose: true}) once. Surface the current balance, recent burn rate, and remaining runway, then gate the selected depth with this exact message: Estimated cost: about 100 300 credits (~$1 $3) for quick brand, or about 900 1,500 credits (~$9 $15) for full brand book. These ranges cover gpt image 2 symbol / mood / touchpoint generation plus one targeted regeneration for failed image QA. Quick brand is usually below $5; full brand book exceeds $5, so Reply proceed to continue or cancel to stop. Do not call any paid MCP tool until the user replies proceed . If the user replies cancel , stop without generating. For non interactive quick , full , or config callers, require cost ack=proceed in the config or invocation metadata; if it is absent, stop with the estimate instead of spending credits. Depth Modes Choose the depth before any long running generation or render work: 1. Quick brand (default) — use for first time founder kit runs, quick , creator tutorial flows, batch/subagent calls, or any user who asks for a brand without explicitly asking for a full brand book. Target: 8 12 minutes after usable input, excluding user reply time; no more than 4 generated images unless QA fails; one quick PDF render plus one QA rerender when needed. 2. Full brand book (opt in) — use only when the user asks for "full", "brand book", "brand guidelines", "14 16 page", "15 page", full , or when they approve the quick path's "go deeper" upgrade. Target: 25 45 minutes after choices are locked, excluding user reply time. The quick brand is not a partial or failed full guidelines deck. It is a deliberately smaller deliverable with its own completion criteria. If the selected mode is full, all full guidelines completion gates still apply. Mode Selection Stage 0 — Intake (empty args menu) If invoked with no input (no idea, no URL, no photos, no reference brands, and no relevant prior context in the conversation), print this menu verbatim as your full response and stop. Do not call any tool. Wait for the user's next message. What are we branding? Paste any of: An idea / description — e.g. "a streetwear label for cat people" A website URL — e.g. "rebrand my existing site at example.com" Product photos — drop them in the chat Reference brands — e.g. "I want something that feels like Aesop + Patagonia" An existing brand to refresh — name + what's working / what isn't I'll start with a quick brand by default. Say full brand book if you want the deeper 14 16 page guidelines path. If the user already dropped one of the above, skip the menu and proceed to the selected mode: Quick Step 1 for the default quick brand path, or Step 1 below when full brand book mode is selected. Stage 0.5 — Quick brand and non interactive fast lane Use quick brand mode when the caller passes quick , omits an explicit full depth request, or states they are running from CI, a subagent, a batch job, a tutorial recording, or any other non interactive harness. Use full brand book mode only when the caller passes full , sets mode: "full" in config, explicitly asks for full guidelines / brand book depth, or approves the post quick "go deeper" upgrade. This section has precedence over the interactive ask/wait instructions below. When quick mode applies, use the quick brand workflow below and do not fall through to the multi turn full workflow intake unless a required input is truly missing. config <path points to a JSON file that pre bakes intake answers: input , photos , reference brands , audience , positioning , assets to keep , references , mode , chosen direction , chosen identity , and export kit . quick means quick brand mode. Use model judgment for all confirmation gates. Ask only if the original input is missing entirely; otherwise infer reasonable defaults, choose the strongest strategy direction and identity option, and continue. full means full brand book mode. Still use model judgment for confirmation gates in non interactive runs, but do not cut the required 14 16 page guidelines. For quick or config , do not stop for confirmation at the deliverable preview, strategy direction choice, identity option choice, or brand kit export gate. Record the assumption inline, then proceed. If a required asset is unavailable and cannot be inferred from the input, stop once with a single compact missing fields list instead of starting a multi turn Q&A loop. In quick mode, deliver the quick brand package defined below; do not describe it as a condensed full guidelines deck. In full mode, do not deliver a condensed or partial brand output just because the caller is non interactive or the run is short on wall clock time. A condensed 6 page deck is not an acceptable substitute for the required 14 16 page guidelines. If the run is out of wall clock budget, save a resumable checkpoint with the pages/assets already completed and stop; do not mark the workflow complete. Autonomous full mode: use this only when an explicit full depth request is present ( full , mode: "full" , or the user asks for a full brand book / full guidelines) and the run already has cost ack=proceed . In that case, the brief is the spec. Do not wait for the user to pick a board and do not wait for explicit user approval before kit export. Produce all three full deliverables in one run: 1. brand boards.pdf — generate all three boards and use model judgment to choose the strongest board or hybrid. 2. brand guidelines.pdf — build the full 14 16 page guidelines from that chosen direction. 3. brand kit.zip — export the complete kit after the guidelines pass QA. Record the assumptions and selected direction in brand.md and the final response. If the brief is ambiguous enough that the board choice would be arbitrary, stop once with the missing decision instead of pretending the run is autonomous. Non interactive clear briefs without explicit full depth stay quick; never promote a batch/tutorial/founder kit run to full solely because the brief is clear. Quick Brand Workflow (Default) Use this workflow for quick brand mode. It is the founder kit fast lane: fewer choices, fewer generated assets, and a complete starter brand that can feed downstream skills without burning a full first run quota. Quick Step 1 — One pass intake If there is usable input, do not start a long questionnaire. State the assumptions you are using and ask at most 3 compact questions only when the answer would materially change the brand: What does this sell or do? Who is it for? Should I preserve any existing name, logo, colors, fonts, photos, or references? For quick , config , CI, subagent, batch, or tutorial recording flows, do not wait for these answers unless the original input is missing entirely. Infer reasonable defaults and record them in the output. Quick Step 2 — Choose one strongest direction Do not present 2 3 directions or 3 identity options in quick mode. Pick one strongest strategy and identity with model judgment. The quick strategy must still include: Brand name or kept name Tagline (8 words max) Audience segments: primary segment, secondary segment(s), and one anchor persona Positioning statement Assets being kept Reference brands / inspirations, if provided Quick Step 3 — Build the starter identity Create one coherent identity system: Logo concept: wordmark + standalone symbol/mark + lockup plan. For a new symbol, use generate image with provider="gpt image 2" and ship the approved symbol as transparent PNG sizes, not SVG. Wordmark and lockup assets may be SVG because the wordmark is converted from real font text to outlined paths. Palette: 4 core colors with roles and hex values. Typography: one characterful display font plus one practical body font, with Google Fonts URLs when available. Voice: 3 tone principles, 3 sample lines, and 5 forbidden words/phrases. Imagery direction: one short photo/illustration rule set plus no text image prompt guardrails. Starter applications: social avatar/app icon, simple web hero direction, and one practical touchpoint appropriate to the brand type. Keep image generation capped: one symbol/mark image plus up to 3 mood or touchpoint images. Retry budget: each generated brand image asset gets at most 2 total generation attempts (initial attempt + one targeted regeneration). If QA fails, regenerate only the failed asset. After either cap is exhausted, stop and ask the user which failed asset or layout issue they want to relax instead of continuing to spend credits. Quick Step 4 — Deliver the quick brand package The quick deliverable must be complete enough for a creator to use immediately: The 3 page quick brand.pdf page structure: 1. Cover + Strategy — brand name, tagline, posit

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