Premiere Dialogue Cut
Build an evidence-backed cut plan before touching the timeline. Favor natural pacing over maximum compression.
Required server profile
Start or restart the MCP server with MCP_TOOL_PROFILE=dialogue. The default standard profile also contains this workflow, but dialogue is the smaller dedicated surface.
Workflow
- Call
premiere_ping,premiere_get_project, andpremiere_get_timeline. Stop if the host, project, or target sequence is unavailable. - Resolve the active sequence index with
premiere_get_sequence_list. Before duplication, capture the source settings and a canonical timeline inventory: track counts, clip order, source-media paths, source in/out ranges, timeline start/end ranges, speed, and duration. Callpremiere_duplicate_sequence, re-read the list to identify exactly one new copy, and activate it withpremiere_set_active_sequence. Re-read the same canonical fields and require them to match while ignoring the clone name and sequence/clip identities. Do not compare sequence hashes across distinct sequences: the hash intentionally includes sequence and clip identity, so a valid clone has a different hash. Leave the source sequence untouched as the recovery boundary.premiere_snapshot_timelineandpremiere_save_sequence_versionmay record before/after audit data, but they cannot restore a whole sequence. - List the dialogue clips with
premiere_get_clips_on_track, then callpremiere_get_clip_infoto resolve each source-media path, source in/out range, speed, and timeline range. - Call
premiere_analyze_waveformonce per unique source path. Use its decoded-audiosilence_regions; the legacypremiere_detect_silencehost command only returns clip metadata and is not silence evidence. Stop if waveform analysis is unavailable or empty for a clip that should contain audio. - Intersect source silence with each used source range and map it to timeline time. Stop on reversed, retimed, or variable-frame-rate media unless that mapping can be verified. Keep 80–150 ms before speech, 120–250 ms after speech, and preserve longer rhetorical pauses unless the user asks for an aggressive cut.
- Show a proposed plan with edit count, removed duration, shortest retained pause, affected tracks, and protected markers before applying changes.
- Apply approved edits in reverse timeline order with
premiere_razor_clip,premiere_remove_clip_from_track, andpremiere_ripple_delete_gap, or usepremiere_ripple_trimwhen it expresses the same edit safely. - Re-read the timeline and sequence hash. Verify duration change, A/V sync, clip ordering, and that no edit overlaps protected markers.
Guardrails
- Preserve linked audio/video and room tone unless explicitly told otherwise.
- Do not treat
premiere_detect_silenceas analysis, and do not callpremiere_smart_cut,premiere_smart_trim, orpremiere_generate_rough_cutwhen the server reports them as unsupported. - Stop on the first failed edit; report the last verified time range and the untouched recovery-sequence name.
- Add short audio crossfades only after cuts are verified, using the readback-verified
premiere_add_audio_transitionroute.