3 high priority Guarded in reviewed patch 29 Aug 2026

Three guards for one live avatar.

One portrait becomes the face register, the speaking loop, and every alternate gesture. A small anatomy error at the start is copied across the whole call, so the fix has to cover all three stages.

1. Portrait anchorIdentity + geometry
2. Primary loopRealtime speaking hub
3. Clip libraryListen, gesture, scene
Priority 01 / source image

Make the portrait avatar-ready

The still image is infrastructure, not only catalog art.

Representative character portrait framed vertically for a live avatar
9:16 call canvas
Risk
A dramatic pose can shrink or block the face, disconnect limbs, or put complex hands where every later model must preserve them.
Guard
Face high and large; chest or waist up; one continuous body; empty hands low and clear of the face; stable, symmetric features.
Coverage
New prompts, style-sample edits, identity restyles, repose, and uploaded-reference redraws all receive the same anatomy floor.
Proof in the patch

PORTRAIT_FRAMING_CONTRACT + PORTRAIT_ANATOMY_CONTRACT are composed before appearance. The new test asserts every portrait entry lane carries the contract.

Priority 02 / speaking hub

Keep the primary loop stable

This is the source video the realtime avatar speaks through.

Representative character portrait with a face-lock and closed-loop timeline overlay
Face lock
Risk
Mid-arc fingers can merge, wrists can detach, or the face can warp. A one-way gesture played backward also reads as visible rewinding.
Guard
First frame equals last frame. Head, gaze, breath, and shoulders carry the life; hands stay low, move on plausible arcs, and settle back to rest.
Coverage
The shared positive hand-and-face guard is appended to Seedance, H3, O1, and the legacy Kling primary paths.
Proof in the patch

AVATAR_HAND_GUARDRAIL names connected wrists, natural digits, aligned joints, and an undistorted face. The Seedance call test asserts it reaches the actual renderer payload.

Priority 03 / alternate motion

Close every clip-library bypass

A clean idle is not enough if one alternate clip can drift.

Representative listen poseListen
Representative intimacy poseIntimacy
Representative special poseSpecial
One shared rule
Risk
Listen, gift, intimacy, special, scene-transition, or manual-regeneration clips can reintroduce bad hands or a warped face after the primary loop passed.
Guard
The exact same positive anatomy rule is appended at the shared Seedance and H3 render seams, with face and hand constraints in the clip scaffolds.
Coverage
Initial generation, backfill, manual regeneration, open-arc specials, and scene transitions now converge on the same constraint.
Proof in the patch

character-clips.ts and clip-models.ts append AVATAR_HAND_GUARDRAIL before provider submission. Generation and regeneration tests pin that payload.

The decision

Ship this as one chain.

Portrait-only leaves motion drift. Primary-only leaves alternate clips as bypasses. Renderer-only inherits a bad starting frame. The reviewed patch addresses the whole multiplication path.