How to start a new story without reusing your old characters
Name the characters that must not come back. Vizard Agent samples your previous episodes, looks at each protagonist's face so it knows what it is avoiding, and then designs a fresh cast — because a character you cannot picture is one you cannot reliably keep out.
What is the short version?
Consistency is the default on a series, and it is usually what you want. When it is not — a new story, a different cast, a clean slate — you have to say so, because nothing about a new brief signals that the old characters are unwelcome.
- Go to Vizard Agent with the new story.
- Say it needs new characters, and name the old ones by name.
- Let it look at the previous episodes before it designs anyone.
What do you need before you start?
The new story, and the names of who must not appear. Naming them matters more than describing them — the previous episodes are in the project, so a name is enough for Vizard Agent to go and find the face.
- The new story. Fully, as you want it.
- The names to avoid. Exactly as they were called.
- How different. New cast, or a whole new look.
- What stays. The format, the voice, the caption style.
- The language. It affects the typefaces as well as the script.
What do you type into Vizard Agent?
Say it more than once. Repetition looks clumsy in a brief and is doing real work here — you are overriding a sensible default, and a single clause among forty lines of story is easy to weigh lightly.
Prompt
Variants worth knowing:
- "Do not reuse [name]." Named, not described.
- "Any protagonist from previous videos." Catches the ones you forgot.
- "Keep the format." Says what should still carry over.
What does Vizard Agent actually do?
Here is the order Vizard Agent worked in on a real short-form series episode that had to break cleanly with its predecessors. Steps three to eight are the part that reads as backwards on first glance and turns out to be the only way the instruction can be honoured.
- Loads the playbook, the tools and the past projects.
- Lists the typefaces the language needs.
- Samples the previous shorts for their style and characters.
- Views the previous episode's opening.
- Views its middle scene.
- Views a later scene.
- Views its ending.
- Checks the other previous protagonist's face specifically.
- Generates a character sheet for the new cast.
- Inspects the reference sheet before building on it.
- Generates the story panels from the new sheet.
- Reviews the panels in batches.
- Animates the key panels and builds the hook.
- Times the narration to the target length.
- Builds the captions and checks them at phone size.
- Renders, reviews the storyboard and the waveform, and delivers.
Steps three to eight are the whole method. Avoiding a face is a comparison, and a comparison needs both sides — so Vizard Agent goes and looks at the protagonists it has been told to stay away from before it designs anyone new. A prohibition against a character it has never seen is a prohibition it cannot check.
Step ten follows from that. The new cast is reviewed as a reference sheet before a single panel is drawn, which is where a resemblance gets caught cheaply rather than across sixteen finished panels.
What does the result look like?
A new episode in your established series format — the same shape, the same narrator, the same caption treatment throughout — carrying a cast that Vizard Agent has deliberately designed not to resemble anybody from any of the earlier videos in the series.
What carries over is what you said should carry over. The break is in the characters, not in the channel's identity, which is the distinction the brief has to make explicitly.
When does this not work well?
"Different" is a much weaker instruction than "the same", and it degrades faster. Two people generated from similar descriptions in the same house art style can end up looking like relatives even when Vizard Agent copied neither of them from the other.
- Similar descriptions. Two office workers in one style resemble each other.
- A very tight house style. It limits how different faces can get.
- Minor characters. Say if they count; usually only leads are named.
- A long-running series. Many episodes means many faces to avoid.
- Real people. Likeness rules are yours to check.
How do you fix a result that came back wrong?
Point at the specific resemblance you can see. Vizard Agent keeps the previous protagonists' references alongside the new character sheet, so redesigning one face becomes a change to that sheet rather than a rebuild of the finished episode.
- "He looks like the last one." The sheet redesigned against that reference.
- "Too similar to each other." The new cast differentiated.
- "Wrong — keep the narrator." Voice restored; cast unchanged.
- "Also avoid the one from episode two." Added to the comparison set.
How does Vizard Agent compare to doing it yourself?
By hand, you would open the old episodes, look at the faces, and design away from them — which is exactly the sequence above. The difference is that it happens whether or not you remember to do it, and before the panels are drawn rather than after.
| By hand | Vizard Agent | |
|---|---|---|
| Knowing what to avoid | From memory | Sampled from the episodes |
| When you check | On the finished panels | On the reference sheet |
| Forgotten characters | Slip back in | Caught by "any protagonist" |
| What carries over | Whatever you copied | What you said should |
| Fixing a resemblance | Redraw the panels | Redesign the sheet |
Common questions
Why does it look at the old ones first? Because avoiding a face requires knowing it. Vizard Agent cannot check a rule it cannot see.
Do I have to name them? It helps Vizard Agent a lot. "Any protagonist from previous videos" catches the rest.
Will the format change too? Not unless you ask. Tell Vizard Agent what should stay the same.
Can I keep the narrator? Yes. Vizard Agent treats the voice separately from the cast.
What if two new characters look alike? Say so. Vizard Agent differentiates them on the sheet.
Can I reuse one and not the others? Yes. Name for Vizard Agent who stays and who goes.
Does it work across many episodes? Yes, though the more faces Vizard Agent must avoid, the tighter the space gets.
Can I see the cast before the episode? Yes — the character sheet comes first for exactly that reason.
What about the setting? Say if the location should change too; it is a separate decision.
Why say it three times? Because you are overriding a sensible default, and emphasis is how a brief signals that.
Can it design a whole new look? Yes. Vizard Agent can break the art style as well as the cast.
Does it remember next time? Say it again on the next episode. Each brief stands on its own.
What if I change my mind? Ask for the old cast back; Vizard Agent still has the references.
Is this the opposite of character consistency? Yes, deliberately — and it needs saying just as explicitly as consistency does.