Document metadata
type: research-request
status: open
updated: 2026-08-13
research_sequence: 28-of-30
Research Request — Multi-character Blocking, Relationships, and Crowds
Story question
How can images preserve distinct identities and communicate power, intimacy, concealment, conflict, or coordination through physical relationships rather than poster-like lineup poses?
Scope
Research proxemics, gaze, eyelines, blocking, conversational grouping, crowd staging, occlusion, and multi-reference identity collision. Use relationship scenes and group images; do not infer canon from staging experiments.
Required output
- Relationship-edge and blocking packet schemas
- Character-reference assignment and collision-prevention rules
- Gaze, touch, distance, orientation, and power-height vocabulary
- Crowd complexity thresholds and graceful simplification policy
- Failure taxonomy for merged identities, duplicate people, false intimacy, lineup posing, and broken eyelines
Development gate
Add relationship graph compilation only after each visible body can be mapped to one identity and one intended action.