The first frame playbook
Eleven ways to earn the second second, ranked by how often they worked for us in 2025.
A post has about 1.2 seconds before the thumb decides. Everything we do in production is organised around that number, and this is the list we brief every editor with.
Start on the action, not the setup. The feed does not care why the runner is on the road at 5am. It cares that she is already running. Cut the walk-up.
Put the text on the first frame, not the second. A hook that arrives at 0.4s arrives after the swipe. We burn the line into frame one and let the motion happen behind it.
Break the frame once. A hard cut to a different angle at 0.8s is the cheapest hold-time gain we have measured. Do it once, not three times; the third cut reads as noise.
Never open on the logo. The brand goes last, or not at all in the first three seconds. The only launch we ran that opened on a logo is the one we do not talk about.