AI-Drawn Video from Your Terminal

The northnoir CLI is the free, local way to make North Noir AI-drawn videos: your own AI coding agent — Claude Code, OpenCode, Codex or Gemini CLI — acts as the model, and your machine does the rendering. No API keys, no account, no cloud tokens.

Install

pipx install northnoir, then northnoir doctor --install. Published on PyPI as northnoir (uv tool install northnoir works too); there is no npm package. It is free and local: your AI coding agent acts as the model and your machine does the rendering. No API keys, no account needed. Your agent usage/subscription and local CPU/disk are yours; NorthNoir provides no model inference through the CLI.

The agent loop

Author

The agent writes scene.html — one self-contained page whose JavaScript paints every frame of a 1920×1080 canvas. Frame 0 already shows the finished scene.

Still check

northnoir check --still renders frame 0. The agent views the PNG, fixes composition, scale and contrast, and only then animates.

Motion check

northnoir check renders sampled frames with a contact sheet and quality flags. The agent reviews, fixes and re-checks — up to three improvement rounds.

Render

northnoir render produces the final MP4 with procedural audio, a poster and a contact sheet, verified locally.

Commands

• northnoir doctor [--install] [--json] — Verify Chromium, ffmpeg and the pinned scene libraries (SHA256). --install runs the guided setup first.
• northnoir init <dir> [--title "..."] [--duration 5] [--fps 24] [--style <id>] — Scaffold a starter scene.html with a working window.SCENE contract.
• northnoir check <scene.html> --still — Gate 1: render frame 0 only, with the full quality report — look at the still before animating.
• northnoir check <scene.html> [--frames 0,12,24,...] — Gate 2: sampled frames, contact sheet, readability/collision/composition flags and audio health.
• northnoir render <scene.html> [-o out.mp4] [--no-audio] — Render every frame at 1920×1080 and mux an H.264 MP4 with procedural stereo audio, a poster and a contact sheet.
• northnoir styles [--json] — List the 31 AnidoodleDraw style ids and the RuvilMarks medium helpers.
• northnoir skill install — Teach your agent the loop: installs the northnoir-draw skill into its skill folders.

Questions

How do I install the CLI?

pipx install northnoir (or uv tool install northnoir), then northnoir doctor --install. The CLI is published on PyPI as northnoir; there is no npm package — the Python package is the supported distribution.

Is the CLI really free?

Yes — free forever for local code-drawn video. It runs entirely on your machine with your own AI coding agent, so there are no North Noir tokens to buy and nothing to meter.

Do I need a North Noir account?

No. The CLI needs no account and no API keys. An account is only for the web Studio and cloud rendering, where finished scenes can be assembled on a timeline with voice and music.

Which AI agents work with it?

Claude Code, OpenCode, Codex, Gemini CLI and Cursor — anything that can write files, run shell commands and look at images. northnoir skill install teaches the agent the contract and the loop.

What do I need installed?

Python 3.10+ and ffmpeg. northnoir doctor --install sets up Chromium for you; northnoir doctor verifies the whole environment in one command.