# Build a board

Start a Studio board from a starter flow or from nothing, put cards on it from Add or your Library, wire them together, and let Auto layout keep it in order.

![Starter flows open from Add: Static creative test, Animate the winners, Advertorial funnel, Consistent UGC cast and Strategy to creative, each with the cards it lays out and what to bring](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/starters.58c65630.avif)

A board is the plan of what Studio makes: cards for each thing to make, wired in the order one builds on the next. You can start from a starter flow, which lays out a working set of cards, or from an empty board. Building costs nothing; only running a card does.

## Before you start

- You are an owner, an admin or a member of the workspace.
- Something to build on, such as an angle in your Library. Without one, a card can make it first.
- About five minutes.

## Start a new board

1. **Open Studio**

   In the sidebar, under **Generation**, choose **Studio**. It opens on the newest board of your store. A store without a board opens on an empty one, which reads **Start anywhere**.

2. **Press the arrow beside the board's name, then New**

   The arrow is **All flows**, in the pill at the top left. Its menu lists **Flows in this store**; **New** opens an empty board, named **Untitled flow**.

   ![The flows menu: Flows in this store, with New, Duplicate and Delete at its foot](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/new.87fd2bd9.avif)

3. **Name it**

   Double-click the name, type a new one, and press `Enter`.

## Start from a starter flow

An empty board offers three starter flows. All five are under **Add**, bottom left, in **Flows**. Press one: its cards land on the board, wired together, and the first card that still needs something opens beside it. The line under each starter says what to bring, such as **Bring: A marketing angle**.

## Add a card

1. **Rest the pointer on Add**

   **Add**, at the bottom left, unrolls into **Inputs**, **Strategy** and **Creative**.

2. **Choose a kind**

   Press one, such as **Angle**. Its tray opens: **Generate new** lists the cards that make one, **From your library** the ones you already have.

   ![The Angle tray: Generate new with Marketing Angle, From your library with the store's angles, each with its description](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/tray.e2350348.avif)

3. **Place it**

   Press a card in the tray, or drag it onto the board.

You can also double-click an empty part of the board, or press `/`, and search everything there is to add.

An item from your Library brings what it was made from. An angle lands with its avatar, the research behind it and its product, each joined to the next by a dotted line. They are what the cards you wire it into are built on.

## Wire two cards

Drag from the dot on the right edge of a card and drop it on the card it should feed. While you drag, the inputs that can take it light up; drop it on one, such as **Overlay** on an Images card, and the wire takes that input's name.

[Watch the clip](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/wire.d739a6f2.mp4): A wire drawn from the angle The 3am Economy into the Angle input of a Hooks card; once it is dropped, the board lays itself out, the angle and what it was made from to the left of Hooks, then Images

To add the next card already wired, right-click a card, choose **Next step**, and pick what it should feed. The list holds only the cards that can take it, each with the input it fills.

![The right-click menu of the angle The 3am Economy, and beside it Next step: Hooks, Bodies, Primary texts, Headlines, Descriptions, the kinds of page copy and Images, each as angle](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/next-step.dd9f437c.avif)

An open card has a third way: **Add**, beside each of its inputs. See [Wires and context](https://docs.omnymous.com/generation/studio/wires-and-context).

## Let Auto layout arrange it

Auto layout is on for every board: each card you add finds its place, and a card you drag springs back when you let go. The first time, a note says why: **Auto layout keeps every card in its place**, with **Turn off**.

[Watch the clip](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/spring.bfad3179.mp4): The Hooks card dragged down and away from its place on the board, and springing back to it when it is let go

To place cards by hand, turn it off with **Auto layout**, the switch beside the map at the bottom right, or press `Shift` + `T`. On a phone, tap the board's name at the top: the switch is in its sheet. The board keeps the setting.

![The bar at the bottom right: zoom out, 41%, zoom in, fit everything, then the Auto layout switch, on, and the map](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/layout.1e9e11c4.avif)

## Check that it worked

The line beside the run bar reads **Saved just now**: the board is on Omnymous, and anyone in your workspace can open it from **All flows**. The run bar counts the cards that still need something before they can run, such as **2 need inputs**.

![The run bar of a new board with a starter flow on it: Saved just now, then Not run yet, 2 need inputs, and Run all](https://docs.omnymous.com/media/generation/studio/build-a-board/saved.1debc309.avif)

## If something goes wrong

| What you see                                                  | What to do                                                                                                                                                                       |
| ------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| A message such as **Hooks don’t take image as an input.**     | That card has no input for it. Use **Next step** on the card you start from: it lists only the cards that can take it.                                                           |
| **… can’t be wired in**, with what the card already **sells** | The wire would give the card a second product, offer, angle or cast. Keep the one it has, or remove the wire that brings it first.                                               |
| **That would make a loop.**                                   | The card already feeds the one you are wiring into it.                                                                                                                           |
| **Library items already exist — they only feed other nodes.** | Library cards and briefs have no inputs. Wire them into a card that makes something.                                                                                             |
| **Offline** beside the run bar                                | The board is kept on this device and saved when the connection is back.                                                                                                          |
| **Not saved** beside the run bar                              | Omnymous refused the board, and it is kept on this device. A store holds at most 500 boards, and a board at most 500 cards: delete boards you no longer need, or split this one. |

## Related

- [Cards and models](https://docs.omnymous.com/generation/studio/cards-and-models): What a card on a Studio board shows, and its editor: how many it makes, the model each of its stages runs on, its inputs, its settings and its direction.
- [Wires and context](https://docs.omnymous.com/generation/studio/wires-and-context): A wire gives a card one of its inputs. The card makes its count for each item on its main input, and carries everything those items stand on.
- [Run a board and control its cost](https://docs.omnymous.com/generation/studio/run-and-cost): Run one card, a card and what follows, a selection or the whole board; read what it should cost and set the most it may spend; then stop, finish or retry it.

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Source: https://docs.omnymous.com/generation/studio/build-a-board · Checked against Omnymous on 25 October 2026