describe_look

What it does

• Read-only
• Idempotent
• Account required

Decide what the strip should look like before rendering it. This is the authoritative, complete styling reference at runtime — and deliberately the only complete copy. It returns five named starting-point presets that each bundle a background, device body, caption colour and typeface that agree with each other; the three layout templates and how many headline lines each reserves; a short intake script for asking the user their vibe and their headlines; and every styling field with its default.

You can ask: “Show me the styling options before the first Tidebook render.”

This page describes the call. It deliberately does not retype the field inventory: the response is the catalog, it is generated from the same projection the render schemas are, and a copy here would be a second contract that goes stale.

It takes no arguments

Call it with an empty arguments object. There is nothing to configure, and nothing you pass changes what comes back.

Result

• intakeanyoptional

• presetsarrayrequired

  each item

  any

  The published schema does not constrain this element, on purpose — a malformed entry comes back as a sentence instead of a stacked union error. What the server re-validates against is below.

• layoutsarrayrequired

  each item

  any

  The published schema does not constrain this element, on purpose — a malformed entry comes back as a sentence instead of a stacked union error. What the server re-validates against is below.

• styleanyoptional

• lookanyoptional

• panelPresetsarrayrequired

  each item

  any

  The published schema does not constrain this element, on purpose — a malformed entry comes back as a sentence instead of a stacked union error. What the server re-validates against is below.

• clipanyoptional

• notesarrayrequired

  each item

  string

Example

That request maps to this call:

{
  "name": "describe_look",
  "arguments": {}
}

The preset list, the layout templates, the intake questions, the full field catalog with defaults, and the composition notes — including the caption-band rule that decides whether a set of panels reads as designed.

Access and cost

• Open to everyone. It reads nothing about the account, so it works signed out, on both doors.
• Free. It spends no cloud credits and uses up no preview.

When it refuses

You are about to guess a colour scheme out of raw fields.

Call this instead. Presets and layouts are independent axes and you usually want one of each — a preset never pins placement, a layout never pins colour.

The user already said what they want.

Skip it. Also skip it when the project has a saved look, or when you are iterating on a strip you already rendered.

Where this fits

• Choosing a look before the first render

What the agent is told

The title and description the server publishes on tools/list — this is the copy a model chooses between, reproduced verbatim.