Pick three photos of the same person: a clean front-facing shot (facial structure), a daylight selfie (real skin tone) and a casual one (hair, natural expression). One photo drifts; three hold the likeness.
When you attach them, write "identity references ONLY, do not copy their clothes, backgrounds or lighting", or the model paints your holiday background into 1986.
In Nano Banana Pro (gemini-3-pro-image), set the aspect to 4:3 and ask for a real snapshot, not a video: the year, the room, the props, the clothes, and the camera (a 1980s compact with direct flash, faded print colours, film grain, soft focus).
Generate three variations and pick the closest likeness. Fix the face here, where a retry costs a quarter, not in the video where it costs dollars.
Wire the 1986 still plus one identity photo into reference_images on Seedance 2.5 (no start frame: the model refuses references together with one). 4:3, 15 seconds, audio on; 720p is enough because the look is soft on purpose.
Then write the tape prompt as a timed shot list. The ready-made version is in the members pack.
The details that read as a real camcorder:
Models cannot spell on screen, so tell the model no on-screen text and add the camcorder display after: PLAY, SP, the date and a running clock in a pixel font (VT323 is free on Google Fonts), white with a hard black shadow, blinking the date for the first three seconds like a freshly set clock.
Any editor works. An overlay is sharp, says the right year and blinks on cue.
Both models ran inside Claude Code through the ElevenLabs connector (add it with claude mcp add --transport http elevenlabs https://api.elevenlabs.io/v1/mcp), one login, and you can ask for the credit estimate before each run.
For a client this is a campaign, not a filter: the customer as the star of their own tape for a birthday, a reunion, a brand's founding year. Same setup, a new still and a new tape per customer.
This guide is the full process. The ready-made version lives inside AI Creative OS on Skool, next to every other prompt pack I post.
