Geisha pearl RX-7 night reel: Blender blockout → Seedance 2.5 → 4K

A 15 s gyaru × pearl RX-7 reel cut to 170 BPM: a clay Blender blockout sets 19 shots, the pop-up headlights flip up on the drop, After Effects takes it to 4K.

mira_mybots ·

Made with: seedance-2-5, gpt-image-2.5-sunburst, Mira for Blender, Mira MCP, Blender, Mira for Adobe, After Effects, Claude

The finished take: Seedance 2.5, 1080p, a Blender blockout with 19 shots on a 170 BPM track. The posted version is re-cut on the beat, graded and taken to 4K in After Effects.
The finished take: Seedance 2.5, 1080p, a Blender blockout with 19 shots on a 170 BPM track. The posted version is re-cut on the beat, graded and taken to 4K in After Effects.

This reel started from three videos: one for the music, one for the editing style (a gyaru teaser full of fisheye close-ups and fast cuts), and the vibe of my earlier Pearl Samurai R34 reel. The car was new: a pearl Mazda RX-7 FD3S with a geisha livery, and the brief asked for one thing above all: the pop-up headlights. I directed; Claude did the hands-on work in Blender, in Mira and in After Effects through the Mira MCP.

1. Measure the track and save the drop for the hero

The 15 s excerpt runs at 170 BPM (one beat = 0.3535 s). It builds for ten seconds, drops out between 10.25 and 11.5 s and hits the drop at 11.52 s. The whole reel is planned around that one moment.

  1. Cut every two beats

    Most shots are 0.71 s: fast like the editing reference, but each shot still reads.

  2. Hold still in the break

    The longest shot (1.4 s) sits in the break: a slow push toward the nose under a gas-station canopy, the headlights still shut.

  3. The drop belongs to the headlights

    On 11.52 s both pop-ups flip up and blaze on, then flash high beam, then the car launches.

  4. One table, three uses

    19 shots with time, place, camera and action. The same table becomes the Blender markers and the Shot lines of the prompt.

2. Design the car as stills, including the hero state

A video model copies a car far better from clean studio references. The master was a front three-quarter with the headlights closed; three more views were made from it as edits so the paint and the livery stay identical. The key one is the same car with both pop-ups raised and on: the model needs to see what the hero moment looks like.

Four views on a grey backdrop: closed, pop-ups up and on, the geisha side, the rear with four round lamps. Pearl paint with a pink-gold flake, bronze six-spoke wheels.Four views on a grey backdrop: closed, pop-ups up and on, the geisha side, the rear with four round lamps. Pearl paint with a pink-gold flake, bronze six-spoke wheels.Four views on a grey backdrop: closed, pop-ups up and on, the geisha side, the rear with four round lamps. Pearl paint with a pink-gold flake, bronze six-spoke wheels.Four views on a grey backdrop: closed, pop-ups up and on, the geisha side, the rear with four round lamps. Pearl paint with a pink-gold flake, bronze six-spoke wheels.
Four views on a grey backdrop: closed, pop-ups up and on, the geisha side, the rear with four round lamps. Pearl paint with a pink-gold flake, bronze six-spoke wheels.

3. The heroine: the same girl as in Pearl Samurai

The heroine comes from the Pearl Samurai reel: an original face, not a real person, with the styling of a gyaru teaser: two high pigtails with pink braids, see-through bangs, a baby-blue halter top, baggy jeans, a calla-lily pendant. Her two full-length references plus one face close-up from that reel went in as @Image5–7, so she is recognisably the same person across both videos.

4. Block it out in Blender, in clay

Claude built the scene in my Blender through the Mira MCP: only what sets the camera, the scale and the motion. The car at real FD3S size (4.29 × 1.76 × 1.23 m), stand-in figures, the floors, walls and barriers the camera sees. No people, no pumps signage, no props.

  1. A silhouette that reads as an FD

    The generic car box looks like a sedan, so the RX-7 got its own lofted body: a low round nose, a double-bubble cabin, a short tail.

  2. Four sets, 300 m apart

    A rooftop car park, an elevated expressway, an all-night gas station under a canopy, a crane-game arcade aisle. Cameras see 180 m, so no set shows on another's horizon.

  3. A camera per shot, cut by markers

    20 cameras, each bound to a timeline marker on the beat grid, so one playblast carries every cut. Chase, wheel, drone and cabin cameras are parented to the moving car.

  4. Cabin shots need an open cabin

    The highway car has a roof slab, pillars and a dash but no glass, so the fisheye from the passenger seat sees her, not the inside of a box.

  5. Teleport stand-ins on cuts

    One figure jumps between sets with constant keys exactly on the cut frames, so it never slides across the frame during a shot.

Blockout → final: she walks toward the lens on the rooftop. The camera and her path come from the blockout; the skyline, the night and her outfit come from words.Blockout → final: she walks toward the lens on the rooftop. The camera and her path come from the blockout; the skyline, the night and her outfit come from words.
Blockout → final: she walks toward the lens on the rooftop. The camera and her path come from the blockout; the skyline, the night and her outfit come from words.
Head-on at the gas station, right after the drop. The blockout only gives the canopy and the camera; the pumps, the lamps and the raised headlights come from the prompt and the references.Head-on at the gas station, right after the drop. The blockout only gives the canopy and the camera; the pumps, the lamps and the raised headlights come from the prompt and the references.
Head-on at the gas station, right after the drop. The blockout only gives the canopy and the camera; the pumps, the lamps and the raised headlights come from the prompt and the references.
The open cabin pays off: a 12 mm fisheye from the passenger seat, her stand-in on the right-hand seat, and the model keeps the wheel on the right.The open cabin pays off: a 12 mm fisheye from the passenger seat, her stand-in on the right-hand seat, and the model keeps the wheel on the right.
The open cabin pays off: a 12 mm fisheye from the passenger seat, her stand-in on the right-hand seat, and the model keeps the wheel on the right.

5. Write the prompt

Seedance 2.5 on Mira takes the playblast as @Video1, the four car views as @Image1–4 and the heroine as @Image5–7. The full prompt is attached to the video at the top; this is its structure:

  1. Bind the blockout first

    @Video1 is a clay 3D blockout: follow its camera path, framing and 19 hard cuts exactly, with every cut time listed.

  2. Give every image a role

    Which image is the closed car, which is the pop-ups up, which is her face, which her outfit, and not their studio backdrop.

  3. Write the state change with a time

    The two pop-up headlights stay CLOSED and flush with the bonnet until 11.54 s; from 11.54 s they are UP and on.

  4. Name the places

    Rooftop with Tokyo Tower, a wet expressway, a white-lit gas station, a pink-and-cyan arcade: materials and light only.

  5. One Shot line per cut

    Shot 16 (11.54-12.25s): low front three-quarter close - BOTH POP-UP HEADLIGHTS FLIP UP from the bonnet and blaze on.

6. Drafts, a beat-sync re-cut, then finalize

Two 480p drafts at 54 credits each. The first had the best take but its cuts drifted about 0.75 s late, so the pop-ups rose after the drop. Re-cutting fixed it for free: one shot was removed and the walk trimmed by three frames, which pulled the headlights exactly onto 11.5 s. Then finalize rendered the same take in 1080p for 300 credits, and the same cut was applied to it.

7. Upscale, optics, grade and a clipping check in After Effects

Mira finishes at 1080p; the 4K master was made in After Effects on my own machine, through the Mira for Adobe panel.

  1. Upscale once

    Detail-preserving Upscale ×2 (detail 35, noise reduction 15), pre-rendered to ProRes in three chunks so the grade stays fast.

  2. Real lens chromatic aberration

    Three copies of the plate split into R, G and B, added back together with the red at 100.12% and the blue at 99.88%: fringes grow toward the corners like a real lens.

  3. Grade cool, not warm

    Color Balance with blue-teal shadows and mids and a pink-violet lift in the highlights, Vibrance +15, a little more contrast.

  4. Halation only on the lights

    A red Glow from 225 of 255 up, so only the lamps and the headlights bloom, not the pearl paint.

  5. Measure the clipping

    Before: up to 2.4% of a frame clipped at the canopy lamps and the headlights. A highlight ceiling at 0.96 and a final one at 0.97 bring it to 0%, peak 242 of 255.

  6. Finish

    Vignette and fine grain, render in chunks, then check every frame: cuts, duplicate or glitched frames and brightness jumps.

Before and after the grade: cooler shadows, deeper blacks, the canopy lamps no longer clipped, the pearl flake still visible on the bonnet.Before and after the grade: cooler shadows, deeper blacks, the canopy lamps no longer clipped, the pearl flake still visible on the bonnet.
Before and after the grade: cooler shadows, deeper blacks, the canopy lamps no longer clipped, the pearl flake still visible on the bonnet.

The whole recipe

  1. Beat grid → shot table, the drop saved for the hero moment.
  2. Car stills on a grey backdrop, including the transformed state.
  3. A clay blockout with a camera per shot and a silhouette that reads.
  4. One prompt: blockout binding, image roles, the state change with a time, places, Shot lines.
  5. 480p drafts → re-cut on the beat → finalize to 1080p.
  6. Upscale, lens, grade and a clipping check in After Effects.

Mira AI — Seedance 2.5 drafts and finalize, the Mira MCP for Claude, Mira for Blender and Mira for Adobe.

Pearl Samurai R34 night reel — The earlier reel with the same heroine, the same track and the same editing reference.