# Direct Render

Render the shot's 3D scene as video, no AI in between. The camera move, the animated subjects, the lighting model: captured frame-for-frame as an MP4. Useful when you need to see the blocking move, hand a director a structural cut, or sanity-check a long animated shot before spending credits on AI generation.

![Visualizer panel with Video (From Animation) set as the mode and Direct Render selected as the model; a Capture Animation button sits below](/files/w6Vk0C03vUIlX9IzIM4Z)

## What it does

Direct Render captures the shot's 3D scene as a video. Same camera move, same animation, same viewport lighting, exported as an MP4. Deterministic: run it twice, get the same file.

Distinct from the AI video paths (Seedance Motion Guide, Luma Ray 3.14, Veo, Kling, Runway) which interpret your scene through a diffusion model and produce a stylized result. Direct Render does no interpretation. What's in the viewport is what ships.

Previously labeled "Shot Animation Capture" in the visualizer. The behavior is the same; only the label changed.

## How to use it

1. **Switch to Visualize mode** on a shot whose animation is set up in Compose.
2. **Set the mode dropdown to Video (From Animation).**
3. **Pick Direct Render from the model dropdown.**
4. **Click Capture Animation.** The job runs server-side. No prompt needed.
5. The output lands as the shot's video. Download or use it as the start frame for a later AI pass.

## When to reach for it

* **Blocking review.** Walk a director or producer through the structural cut before committing renders.
* **Pre-render preview.** Confirm the sequence reads as authored before spending credits on Visualize.
* **Reference handoff.** Hand a downstream artist a video of the wireframe they can match against.
* **Tight iteration.** No AI cost. Run it as many times as the shot needs.

When not to reach for it:

* **Final delivery.** The wireframe isn't a finished shot. For finished output, render through one of the AI video models (Veo, Kling, Seedance, Luma, Runway).
* **Stylized or photoreal look.** Direct Render is structural, not visual. For style, use an AI model.

## Direct Render vs Scene to video

Two ways to get a wireframe video out of Intangible, at different scopes:

| Path                                             | Scope           | Where it lives                                |
| ------------------------------------------------ | --------------- | --------------------------------------------- |
| **Direct Render** (this page)                    | One shot        | Visualize mode, model dropdown                |
| [**Scene to video**](/publish/scene-to-video.md) | One whole scene | Compose / Publish mode, Scene Timeline action |

Use Direct Render when you're working on a specific shot in Visualize and want a quick non-AI preview of just that shot. Use Scene to video when you want the whole scene's animatic across all its shots, in their authored order, as a single file.

## Limits and known issues

* **Wireframe / greybox output only.** No materials, no shading, no textures. That's the point: it's structural.
* **No audio.** Capture the audio separately and add it in your editing tool.
* **Per-shot only.** For multi-shot exports, see [Scene to video](/publish/scene-to-video.md) (full scene) or the export menus at scene / sequence level (see [Export video](/publish/export-video.md)).

## Related

* [Video (From Animation)](/visualize/video-from-animation.md) – the parent mode that contains Direct Render.
* [Scene to video](/publish/scene-to-video.md) – the Compose-side export of the full scene animatic.
* [Animate an object](/overview/how-to/animate-an-object.md) – authoring the motion that Direct Render captures.
* [Models](/visualize/ai-models.md) – the AI video models you'd use for a finished render instead.


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