Features
One application,
the whole rig.
There are no tiers and no add-ons. Everything on this page is in the build you download today, and in every plan.
01 — Cue list
The list is the show.
Everything else hangs off it.
One list, every department
Audio, video, image, text, camera, lighting, MIDI, OSC, HTTP, serial, script and control cues in the same list.
Multiple cue lists
Several lists in one show file, with tabs, and cues that can start or load a cue on another list.
Groups and sub-groups
Run them as a timeline, fire the first cue only, or pick one at random.
Triggers
GO, follow, timed, immediate, hotkey, time of day, MIDI, OSC, DMX and timecode.
Waits and auto-follow
Pre-wait, post-wait and chained immediates, so a sequence runs itself once it is started.
Show Mode
Locks the editing surface so a stray click cannot change the show mid-performance.
Undo and editing tools
Forty levels of undo, cue templates, duplicate, renumber, bulk trim and filters.
Show files are bundles
Your media travels with the show, and the file stays readable whether or not you are subscribed.
02 — Audio
Outputs named for your rig, patched to any channel.
A three-layer output model: hardware device, named output channel, per-cue send.
Named outputs
As many as the rig needs, each bound to a device and a range of hardware channels, at whatever rate the interface runs.
Crosspoint patch matrix
At both levels: output channels onto hardware channels, and file channels onto outputs, with gain on every crosspoint.
Audio Unit racks
Effects on any cue, using the plugin’s own interface, with presets saved into the show.
Fades on real curves
Linear, S-curve, exponential, logarithmic, or one you draw yourself.
Slices
Split a file into sections, repeat or vamp any of them, and release the vamp with a devamp cue.
Trim, rate and pitch
Per cue, with clocks that read wall-clock time.
Live mixer
Output groups, a grand master, mute-all and per-output metering.
Booth monitor and LTC output
A booth feed that follows the mix, and a dedicated timecode output.
Inputs, playlists and tone
Mic and line input cues, playlists, and a noise and tone cue with an output walk for ringing out a system.
03 — Video
A Metal compositor, not just a media player.
Every screen output is rendered on the GPU.
Per-projector geometry
Lens correction, edge blending and mesh warp, calibrated live while content plays.
Composite surfaces
One canvas spanning several projectors, driven by a single cue, with each output keeping its own calibration.
Corner pin and placement
Per-cue position and size, and a test pattern that goes through the same correction.
Colour and effects per cue
Brightness, contrast, saturation, hue, blur, and a chain of effects on top.
Blend modes
Image cues composite over playing video, so a logo or lower third sits where it should.
NDI and Syphon
Output and input, taken after correction when you want it.
Camera cues
Any connected camera, routed like any other video.
Virtual monitor
Preview every output on one screen, with per-output backdrops.
Text and image cues
They stack and fade independently over video.
04 — Lighting
A patch, a stage plan, and cues you can read.
A programmer, not just a DMX sender, and now a live 3D view of the rig.
Light Designer
Your rig drawn as a stage plan. Select fixtures on the picture, set level, colour and position, and record the look into a cue.
3D view
See the rig in 3D, live: beams in haze, pools of light, moving heads following pan and tilt, cue fades and effects as they run. Click fixtures to select them, drag them to place and focus them, and open the same view on an iPad.
Blind mode
Build the next look without touching what is on stage.
Moving heads
16-bit pan and tilt on an XY pad, with wash and spot profiles built in.
GDTF fixture profiles
Import a manufacturer file, or search the online GDTF library from inside the app.
Groups and submasters
Name a set of fixtures and ride them all on one fader.
Effects
Chase, swell, strobe, twinkle, rainbow and ballyhoo, each with rate, size, spread and phase.
Presets
Colour, position and beam. Edit the preset and every cue that uses it follows.
Tracking
With Block cues, so jumping into the middle of a show reproduces the look that should be on stage.
Art-Net and sACN
E1.31 output across multiple universes.
Readable cues
Instruments with named parameters, so a cue can say front-wash.intensity = 80.
Per-parameter merging
Two cues touching different attributes of the same fixture both hold.
Raw DMX scenes
A console-style keypad, for when you would rather address channels directly.
Fade times per cue
Ramped at 30 Hz from the last frame sent.
DMX input
A lighting console can fire CueStudio cues.
05 — Timecode and integration
It talks to the rest of the rig.
CueStudio is usually not the only machine in the room.
Timecode
LTC, MTC and Art-Net timecode, generated or chased, so cues fire as the incoming timecode crosses them.
MIDI
In and out: notes, control change, program change and MIDI Show Control.
OSC
In and out, with a documented address space and a two-way subscribe protocol.
HTTP, serial and AppleScript
Cues for everything else in the rack.
AppleScript dictionary
A full dictionary, including a cue object graph.
Bonjour advertising
Control surfaces find the machine without you typing an address.
06 — Before the house opens
Find the broken cue before the audience does.
The failures that cost you are the quiet ones. These go looking for them.
Pre-Flight Check
Walks the whole show and lists what is broken, by cue number: missing media, control cues pointing at cues that no longer exist, audio with no output routed.
Status window
The same scan, live while you edit, plus a log of every MIDI, OSC and DMX message arriving, so you can prove a console is reaching the machine.
Rotating backups
Every save is kept, with a browser to restore any earlier version. Restoring backs up where you are first.
Manage Media
Audits the show bundle: what nothing references any more, what has gone missing, and a relink for anything that moved.
Crash recovery
An autosave that keeps the media bundle it was working in.
07 — Getting your show in
Nobody starts from an empty list.
Bring the work you already have.
Import a workspace
From other cue-playback software: cues, names, file references, levels, pre-waits, and Fade, Stop and Start targets resolved to the right cue.
Drag media straight in
A folder of files becomes a group of cues, one per file, in name order.
Cue templates
A cue you have set up once can be dropped into any show.
Archive a show
Pack it with its media into a single file to hand to a venue or another operator.
08 — Redundancy
A second Mac that already knows the show.
Genuinely running it, not holding a copy of the file.
Live mirroring
Edits, transport and the playhead arrive on the backup as they happen.
Silent by default
Nothing double-triggers. Or give the backup its own outputs for a fully redundant rig.
Drift correction
A control loop nudges playback rate so both machines stay locked to the same clock.
Tight-sync GO
The samples themselves are scheduled to one shared deadline, so two machines feeding one room start together.
A shared key
A machine on the same network cannot join a show it should not be in.
Media sync
The backup ends up with the files as well as the show, over the network.
Takeover
In one click, or automatically when the primary stops answering.
Three or more machines
In one session, each with its own local device patch.
09 — Control surfaces
Drive it from wherever you are standing.
However you like to run a show.
Stream Deck over USB
No Companion and no bridge software. Custom key mapping, labels, colours, clocks and progress bars.
Web remote
On any phone or tablet on the network, with nothing to install.
Presenter View
A confidence monitor you lay out yourself, on a second display.
Presenter remotes
And keyboard control, including a fade-to-stop panic.
Hot cues
A cart page for the cues you fire out of order.
Command cues
Write show commands (go list 2 cue 5, stop list 'Foldback') with highlighting and completion as you type.
Requirements
What it runs on.
There is no separate minimum-spec chart because there is nothing useful to put on it: if the Mac runs macOS 15.6, CueStudio runs. How much video and audio you can push at once is a question about your machine and your interfaces, and the free demo answers it faster than we can.
- macOS
- 15.6 Sequoia or later
- Mac
- Any Apple silicon or Intel Mac, one universal build
- Audio
- Any Core Audio device, including aggregate and multi-output devices
- Video
- Any display or projector macOS can see, plus NDI and Syphon
- Network
- Art-Net and sACN, OSC, and the session link over standard interfaces
Run it against your own show.
Try all of it, free, in 30-minute sessions. The only things held back until you subscribe are the outputs that drive a rig.