# Create an experience for the person receiving it

Use this guide with the strategy, experience definitions and exact theme tokens. The brief can be expressed in normal language or the optional machine format below. Read the sections relevant to the assignment.

## 1. Establish the relationship

Identify who is speaking and who receives this particular piece. Describe a person in a recognizable situation, using supplied research, actual words or clearly labeled working assumptions. Understand what they want to change or accomplish, what makes it difficult, what would make the offered help believable and what they need to do next.

For Max LVL marketing, the recipient is a prospective client. For client marketing, the recipient is that business's customer. For software, distinguish the operator from the eventual recipient of an artifact. A service provider's expertise is connected to the customer's outcome; their identity becomes relevant where it helps the reader understand or trust that connection.

The brand's expressive personality belongs to the speaker. The content is selected for the receiver. A filmmaker's eye can make an ordinary home-service moment interesting and understandable. It does not require the homeowner or business owner to identify as a creative person.

## 2. Optional machine brief

```json
{
  "system": "max-lvl-brand-experience",
  "version": "3.0",
  "artifact": "website",
  "speaker": {
    "name": "The business or product speaking",
    "voiceSource": "The appropriate authored voice",
    "visualIdentity": "Max LVL or the client's supplied identity"
  },
  "recipient": {
    "person": "One concrete customer or user situation",
    "presentSituation": "What is happening in their world now",
    "wantedChange": "The practical result and relevant emotional meaning",
    "readiness": "Urgent need, evaluating, exploring, returning or described context",
    "evidenceForInsight": "Supplied source or clearly labeled assumption"
  },
  "offerConnection": {
    "realCapability": "What the actual offer does",
    "whyItHelps": "How that connects to this person's result",
    "proof": "Relevant evidence and its scope",
    "openFacts": []
  },
  "experience": {
    "register": "Expressive, Everyday, Editorial or a purposeful combination",
    "creativeIdea": "An authored treatment for this particular subject",
    "primaryAction": "Actual action, target and result",
    "requiredStates": ["States relevant to the real interaction"],
    "themes": ["dark"],
    "themeSelection": "none",
    "recipientPreview": "Own identity and output colors, if different from the workspace"
  },
  "delivery": {
    "format": "Requested artifact format",
    "location": "Authorized destination",
    "contentStatus": "Draft, illustrative, verified or mixed with labels"
  }
}
```

This is a custom briefing shape. It describes meaning; it is not a required customer intake form. Fill it from the user's actual request when the information is already available. An editorial piece can have a reading goal instead of an action button. A simple working screen may need only a task, state and result. The sample uses one dark appearance; choose light, dark or multiple appearances for the actual piece using [the experience guide's theme scope](EXPERIENCE-SYSTEM.md#4-type-themes-and-visual-hierarchy). Library options do not imply a switcher.

## 3. Source routing

| Assignment | Read |
|---|---|
| Positioning, campaign or copy | Strategy sections 1-4 and the actual offer/customer research |
| Max LVL website | Strategy sections 1-7; experience guide website, composition and access recipes; tokens; `frontend-design` skill and routed `standard.frontend-quality` |
| Client website | Customer/voice distinctions and relevant UX recipe; the client's own identity and actual service facts; `frontend-design` for new design or modernization |
| Software | Experience guide plus `CLAUDE-HANDOFF.md`, the live application profile `../ui.tokens.json`, and the relevant working module |
| Interactive tool | Actual input/output model; experience guide tool and data sections; relevant theme values |
| Proposal, PDF or book | Strategy editorial direction; experience guide publication recipe; actual content and delivery requirements |
| Email, social or video | Recipient readiness, strategy writing/motion guidance and the relevant medium recipe |

The broad Base Principles, original notes and applied customer examples are mapped in `../source/research-notes.md`. Older offer-specific documents provide context where their particular assignment matches. Avoid treating an implementation-era choice as a universal creative condition.

For a new website or substantial redesign, read the installed `frontend-design`
skill before composing the first page. Builder exposes it through skill discovery
for Claude and Codex; its canonical source is `skills/frontend-design/SKILL.md`
in the Max LVL Builder repository. Use its bundled base guidance through that
entrypoint rather than loading additional overlapping design skills. The actual
brief, brand identity and approved copy retain precedence. Small edits preserve
the established design.

Resolve `core.build` and `standard.frontend-quality` through the current Build
Standards registry. Add `standard.patterns-pages` when developing reusable page
families and `standard.motion-blocks` for motion work. Keep their bodies available
by reference rather than duplicating technical requirements in this brand guide.

During the actual site build, develop and visually assess a representative page
with real content at desktop and mobile sizes before extending its direction
across the site. Stabilize the shared type, spacing, component and composition
choices there. A finished site page can later become a brand-library reference;
creating speculative reference pages is not a prerequisite for starting the site.
Continue within the user's authorized scope without adding approval rounds.

## 4. Develop the idea

Use V.A.L.U.E. and victim/villain/vow to understand the relationship between the present situation, its causes, the wanted change and the actual offer. Then write and design in the receiver's language. The visible piece can begin with a recognizable moment, an interesting fact, a question, a demonstration, an aspiration, or a direct service answer. Choose what earns relevance in that context.

A feature becomes useful through its consequence. A film can let someone see how a professional explains a problem. An appointment reminder can answer the question that would otherwise make them hesitate. A pricing explanation can make a choice manageable. A dashboard can make it possible to see whether a follow-up happened. Keep those connections as concise as the person's need allows.

Give the idea a visual form. Rich color and dimension may help a campaign hold attention. An intimate portrait may help a reader understand whom they would meet. A simple diagram may make the choice click. A calm interface may make the next action obvious. The same underlying care can produce very different forms.

For Max LVL color, the ribbon image provides a reference for depth and light. Rare and Epic keep deep, slightly muted bodies; Legendary amber is deliberately brighter and more saturated. Use the art bodies in `semantic.THEME.color.art` for the chosen colored material, with the corresponding `art-shadow` and `art-highlight` families where the composition benefits. Readable colored text comes from `art-text`. A highlight or readable label color is not the default body color. The strategy's color section owns the exact range and its intended use; the ribbon form itself is optional.

Tactile cinematic collage offers another expressive route: human presence, real textures, painted interventions, overlapping fragments, light and depth. The doorway example is one scene, not a mandatory portal, female subject or symbol for transformation. Do not infer a required circle or orbit motif from a book or art specimen. Develop the imagery for this assignment. In the collage direction, concentrate amber in material, painted details and light; broad amber CTA-section or form backgrounds are discouraged for that treatment. This leaves other purposeful color compositions available.

## 5. Ready-to-use briefs

### Max LVL's own page

Create a homepage concept for one owner of an expert-led or service business who is frustrated that the business's real value is difficult to recognize before contact. Use the actual selected niche when available. The desired change is a clearer path to appropriate prospects and better first conversations.

Explore the proposed opening “A better first conversation starts before the phone rings.” Explain how the actual offer connects website, video and follow-up to the decisions prospects are trying to make. Show the relationship through an example before presenting a large service inventory. Use real proof when supplied and label any concept example. Make an appropriate next step easy to understand.

Use Max LVL's existing logo, Blue Steel, strong red and selected deep cobalt or amethyst, with brighter, saturated Legendary amber available in localized material and light for the collage direction. Give it an authored composition and a purposeful motion idea. Ribbon art, tactile collage or another subject-specific treatment can support the idea. Choose the appearance for this page and develop a narrow layout. A contact form's behavior must reflect its real destination and supported states in a future implementation.

### A plumbing customer's page

Create a water-heater service concept for a homeowner whose shower turns cold. They want dependable hot water and help understanding the repair decision. Match the page to whether they need service now or are comparing replacement choices. Put availability/contact information early when urgency warrants it.

Explain the symptom, what assessment can clarify and how options are compared. Provider identity and process details should answer the homeowner's questions. Use only supplied service coverage, prices, warranties, response commitments and savings evidence. Style the result with the plumbing business's identity; a Max LVL-colored version is a clearly labeled brand-system exercise. Keep the service request simple and preserve the description of the problem if submission fails.

### A retirement customer's explanation

Create an educational planning concept for a person who wants to understand whether a trip fits within their retirement spending. Address that specific decision. Show how planned spending, income, costs and assumptions are considered in the actual planning process. Distinguish modeled scenarios from known facts.

Use the advisory business's actual offer, identity and review requirements when supplied. The experience should make the person feel able to ask a useful question and understand the planning work. A calculator, if requested, uses the supplied model and displays its assumptions. A proposed headline can ask, “Can you say yes to the trip and still feel comfortable about next year?” Final financial claims require appropriate factual support for that assignment.

### An inquiry-follow-up workspace

Design a product screen for an owner or marketer checking whether an inquiry received an appropriate answer. Show the original question, the proposed reply, the intended recipient and an accurate draft/sent/unknown state. Make editing, previewing and confirming the real action straightforward. Operator detail and customer preview are distinct views of the same work.

Use the Everyday register, an appearance suited to the task, DM Sans and semantic color roles. Include a recoverable failure that preserves the draft, a response with an unknown delivery outcome, and a no-matches state. Sample contacts and activity are explicitly illustrative. A prototype's controls operate locally or are clearly identified as static specimens.

### A proposal or educational book

Create the document around the recipient's objective or question. For a proposal, explain the fit, approach, actual scope, responsibilities, assumptions and decision needed. For a book, let examples and ideas develop toward the reader's understanding. Use Editorial for sustained reading and more expressive treatment where it contributes to a meaningful moment.

Choose format, type, measure and image scale for the delivery conditions. Use live text, descriptive links and a logical reading order. Inspect all rendered pages and address the actual accessibility/print requirement. Public proof, fees, delivery dates and biographies come from supplied evidence; unresolved fields remain explicit in the working material.

For the doorway cover specimen, use the tall 2:3 `../assets/doorway-cover-portrait.png` edge to edge. Place a separate live HTML title in the dark left area, leaving the color and sunlit doorway on the right visible. Use the image's actual composition to set the title's position, measure and contrast. This specimen is a full-image cover, without a white title block above a thumbnail. It demonstrates one cover treatment, not a template required for every book.

## 6. Practical handoff

Another AI should be able to find the authored content, exact theme values, assets, real source evidence and unresolved facts. Keep those in their owning files. Use `../brand.tokens.json` with `../brand.css` for the marketing and brand profile, and `../ui.tokens.json` with `../css/foundation.css` for the application profile. The experience's context determines its semantic owner; both profiles preserve the shared identity. Native applications and documents translate the appropriate semantic roles into their own implementation.

Use `../source/logo-assets.md` and its machine mapping to select the supplied logo, wordmark or icon for the local background. Working files are under `../assets/`; unchanged source masters are under `../assets/masters/`. Preserve each SVG's native proportions. The Builder lockup's mapped role follows its actual dark-background artwork, as documented in the asset guide.

Keep image source, concept status, permitted use and meaningful crop information available. The preserved masters are unchanged; working light exports apply the confirmed red as recorded in the asset mapping. Choose the correct working variant for the local background. A client artifact uses that client's approved artwork. Preserve the distinction between illustration and proof.

When a collage needs independently movable or reusable parts, request or create separate scene/backdrop, subject, foreground collage and light exports, with useful crop and transparency information. Keep typography in HTML for web work and as editable typeset text in documents. The supplied `../assets/doorway-art.png` is a flattened illustration used with independent CSS light and HTML text; the 2:3 `../assets/doorway-cover-portrait.png` is a separate flattened illustration composed for the full-bleed book cover. `../assets/doorway-v1-original.png` preserves the original concept. These PNGs should not be described as existing layered PSDs or equivalent sources. Separate production layers remain a future asset-creation task when the assignment needs them.

Test what the artifact actually asks someone to do. Check the normal path and the failure most likely to matter, then the relevant themes and smaller format. A change in an input should produce the right result; a save should mean the named persistence succeeded; a preview should represent what the recipient receives. Strong visual direction and accurate behavior should reinforce one another.

## 7. Critique with the actual person in mind

Who is this for? What can they recognize from their own situation? What is becoming possible, and why should they believe it? Does each piece of company information help them judge that decision? Can they understand and complete the next step?

Then assess authorship: is there an interesting image, phrase, composition, performance or interaction that makes the idea land? Does the visual range feel sufficient for the subject? Does the tone respect both the person's intelligence and their moment of attention?

The finished artifact should make sense on its own. Write the intended result cleanly, with the reasoning and source history available behind it.