Browse and make versions in History on Mac
In Merrimo on your Mac, History shows every version of a panel's or a character's image, and the videos made from them, on one grid. Click a version to use it, make a new version from any of them, and zoom out to see a long history at once.
Open History
- Select a panel on the canvas, or a character, place or prop in the Cast & World, and show its Image controls.
- Choose View > Show History (or press ⌥⌘L), or click the branch button on the image.
History opens in a floating window beside the canvas, so you can see the canvas while you work. Its title names what it shows (for example "History — Panel 3"), and it follows your selection on the canvas. Close it with its close button.
An AI agent connected to Merrimo (see Settings > External Agents) can open History on a panel or character for you to look at, and step back and forward through its versions the way the image's arrows do.
Read the grid
Every version sits in a cell of the same size, so where a version goes is always the same rule:
- Columns are steps. A version made from the prompt is in the first column. A version made from another version is one column to its right, joined to it by a line.
- Rows are branches. The first version made from a version continues its row. Each later one starts a new row below that version's branch.
- Again starts a row. A version rendered again from the prompt starts its own row in the first column, below the ones before it.
- Nothing moves sideways. A new step at the end of a row moves nothing; a new branch pushes the rows below it down one.
Under each version, its caption says what made it: Prompt, Again, Edit and what the edit asked for, a look's name, or Animate. Hold the pointer over a version to see its prompt, engine, time, seed and cost. The current version has a colored ring and a Current badge. A look made from a Base image that has changed since is joined by a dashed line. When you delete a version that other versions were made from, its cell stays empty so they keep their places.
To see only one look's versions clearly, open the menu at the top right and choose the look: the others are dimmed. Choose All Looks to see them all again. The count at the bottom says how many versions there are, and whether one is rendering or failed.
Use a version
- Click a version to make it the current one: the canvas shows it, and History stays open so you can try several in a row. Hold the pointer over a version to see it on the canvas first.
- Drag a version out of History to copy it into another app or the Finder.
- Control-click a version for Make Current, New Version from This…, Render Again, Copy Image, Save Image As…, Show in Image Tab and Delete Version….
Make a new version from any version
- Hold the pointer over a version and click the + on its right edge. You can also choose New Version from This… from its shortcut menu, or select it and press Return.
- A dashed cell appears where the new version will land, with the composer under it. Choose how to make it:
- Edit: type what should change.
- Again: render the prompt that version came from again, with a new seed. Its version starts a new row in the first column.
- Restyle: choose a look.
- Animate: describe what happens in the shot, to make a video (panels only).
- To use other versions as references, drag them from the grid onto the composer.
- Choose an engine, then click Generate (or press Return). Press Esc to close the composer without making anything.
The version you started from becomes the current one, and the job is the same one the Image controls run, on the engine you chose there too. The new version renders in its cell while the rest of the grid stays put, then becomes the current version. If the job fails, the cell stays with a Failed badge: click its retry button to open the composer again with the same choices, or Control-click it and choose Remove.
Zoom
Zoom History from 25% to 400% with the buttons at the bottom right, ⌘= and ⌘−, or a pinch on the trackpad. Hold ⌘ and scroll to zoom where the pointer is. Click the percentage to go back to 100%, and click the fit button (or press ⌘0) to fit the whole history in the window.
- Under 60%, captions and badges hide and History reads as a contact sheet; the current version keeps its ring.
- From 150%, each version also shows its prompt, engine, time and seed under it.
See the videos made from a panel
Each video you make with Animate appears in the panel's History, one step after the image it was made from, with a play badge and its length. A video made from your description alone starts its own row.
- Hold the pointer over a video to play it, muted and on a loop.
- Click a video to play it at the top of the Image controls.
- Control-click a video and choose Open Video to watch it in your video player, or Save Video As… to save a copy of it.
- Drag a video out of History onto the desktop, a Finder window or another app to export it as a file, named after the video.
Nothing is made from a video, so it has no +. To remove a video, choose Media in the canvas sidebar, then Videos. On your other devices, a video plays from its uploaded copy. If the upload failed, it shows without a picture there and plays only on the Mac that made it.
See every picture in a story
The Images window shows every picture and video in one story: each panel's and character's pictures with their older versions, pictures you've imported, pictures sitting on the canvas on no page, and video takes. Use it to find a picture again, or to drag one anywhere you can use it.
- In a story window, choose View > Show Images (or press ⇧⌘I). To put a button for it in the toolbar, choose View > Customize Toolbar… and drag Images into the toolbar.
- Choose what to show with the control at the top of the window:
- All: everything, newest first.
- Pages: the pictures on the canvas on no page first (under Not on a Page), then each page's pictures. A panel's current picture comes before its older versions.
- Cast & World: your characters' pictures under Cast, then places, props and the rest of the world under World.
- Videos: video takes, newest first. Hold the pointer over one to play it.
- Drag the size slider to see more pictures at a time, or bigger ones. You can also press ⌘+ and ⌘−. Each story's Images window keeps its own size.
- To narrow the window, type in the search field: it matches page and panel names, cast and world names, and prompts.
Hold the pointer over a picture to see where it is (for example, “Page 2, Panel 3”, or “Not on a page · Right of Page 2”). Click it to select it, Shift-click to select a run of pictures, and Command-click to add or remove one. Control-click a picture, or click its ⋯ button, for these commands:
- Show on Canvas: brings the story window forward, switches to the canvas, and selects the picture, or the panel it belongs to.
- Quick Look: a larger look at it (or press Space).
- Copy Image, Save Image As… (Save Video As… for a video) and Share….
- Delete Version…: removes an older version from the story. It's unavailable while a panel, a character or the canvas still shows the picture.
To use a picture somewhere else, drag it out of the window:
- Onto a panel on the canvas to put it in the panel. The panel's old picture stays in its History.
- Onto a prompt (on the canvas, in the inspector, or in the generate tray under the canvas) to have AI write the prompt from it. The new prompt replaces the old one; choose Edit > Undo to get the old one back. In the generate tray, press Escape to stop it while it's writing.
- Onto a reference well in the inspector to use it as a reference.
- Onto the desktop or a Finder window to save it as a PNG file. Drag a video the same way to save the video.
Select several pictures and drag one of them to carry them all as a stack. A place that takes one picture takes the one you dragged.
The Images window closes when you close the story.