figure-composer

Figure Composer — narrative → panels → compose → adversarial loop

Compose ONE publication-grade multi-panel figure: turn a one-sentence claim plus data files into an outline, render each panel, tile them into a composite, and harden it through an adversarial self-review loop.

Setup (any agent, no API key)

This is a pure skill — kernel.py is deterministic Python (PIL geometry plus schema/prompt builders) and you (the base model) do all the reasoning: reverse-engineering an outline from a figure, rendering panels, and the adversarial composite review. There is no host runtime and no LLM API. Load the helpers once per session in a Python cell:

exec(open("figure-composer/kernel.py").read())

Nothing auto-loads it outside Claude Science. Then call the helpers (panel_task, compose_figure, compose_crops, composite_review_task, derive_outline_prompt, …) directly; if one raises NameError, you have not exec'd kernel.py. Dependencies: pip install pillow matplotlib.

Step 0. Load figure-style alongside this skill — that is the design rules (and apply_figure_style() + helpers). You need it in context to write the outline, render the panels, and review the composite. Each panel is rendered against those same rules — whether you draw it yourself or hand it to a sub-agent (see §2), the maker loads figure-style first.

Inputs

• claim — one sentence the figure makes true to a reader who reads nothing else.
• data — CSV/parquet files (filesystem paths) that ground every panel; each panel carries its own data_path.
• width_mm — target venue's column width (common: 85–89mm single, 174–183mm double; check the venue guide).

0. Where this sits

figure-composer is the outer tier: make ONE multi-panel figure good. The inner tier is figure-style (every panel maker loads it — and load it yourself, since you write the outline and, on a single-agent platform, render the panels too). The outermost tier is paper-narrative — if this figure is part of a paper, run that FIRST: it decides which figure to make and hands you the claim. For a standalone figure, start at step 1.