ART-NET CONTROLLER
Art-Net & sACN DMX control · iPad
The power of a professional console, organised around how you actually think during a show. Make light, record it, play it back — without the wall of switches.
BUILD — looks, faders and sequences, all recorded from one programmer.
Simple to run. Deep when you need it.
Clear structure, with the flexibility to do things your own way — everything a full desk can do, and nothing you have to memorize.
The signal model
Everything the desk does ends as one number per channel, per universe, sent over the network many times a second. Several sources each have an opinion; a per-channel merge resolves them; two masters scale it; it goes out the wire.
Art-Net 3 / sACNGrand + Subs scale the output; only changed frames are sent, up to ~45 fps.
Programmer wins. Whatever you touch right now overrides everything beneath it — grab a channel and it moves, no matter what a cue is doing. Intensity piles up HTP; colour and position pick one source LTP. Each channel is tagged with the rule it follows.
Three rooms
The desk splits the work into three rooms you switch with one tap. The split isn't cosmetic — it's the main safety mechanism.
Patch fixtures, address them, name and colour them, set up MIDI. What you have, before any show exists.
Make light in the programmer; record it into looks, faders and sequences. Editing lives here — and only here.
Apply looks, ride faders, fire GO. Every record and edit control is removed on purpose — a stray tap can't overwrite your show.
On the desk
Touch a channel, dial a colour, position a mover — it lands in the programmer as a green bar and sits above everything until you record or clear it.
Tap RECORD and the desk shows every place a look can live — a Look, a Fader, or a Sequence step. Tap the target. No record mode to toggle.
A look is a button you tap; a fader is that look on a handle you ride; a sequence is looks in order with fade and wait, advanced by GO. They stack, they don't fight.
Plug in more than one APC mini through a hub — each gets its own surface and its own mapping, no merger box. Pads light to mirror desk state: green for captured, red for armed, and blink or pulse where you want a look to catch the eye.
Import fixture files you already own — one file, a folder, a zip archive or a whole library installer — and search them instantly. Or search the Open Fixture Library online without importing anything.
Scan the network for Art-Net nodes, or let them announce themselves and add them with one tap. Aim the output at several nodes at once by listing their addresses.
CLEAR exists exactly once, top-right, in every room. A tap empties the programmer; a hold instantly blacks out every fader, sequence and playback, with no fade.
A full RDM controller for discovering and configuring fixtures over the wire, framed as a diagnostic tool under RIG › Advanced.
Up to four universes of 512 channels each, independently addressed, over Art-Net 3 or sACN (E1.31) — with a live output view to prove the numbers.
A new show gets a working name immediately, so your programming has a home the instant you start. Save with a name for a portable .show.zip you can hand off or back up.
Screens
Documentation
Three PDFs — one to get running fast, one on the thinking behind the desk, one that labels every control on the screen.
Network setup, your node's IP, first output — everything to get light on stage in a few minutes.
Open → PDF · CONCEPTThe thinking behind the desk — the signal model, the three rooms, and the record workflow, in eight short chapters.
Open → PDF · REFERENCEEvery control on every screen, annotated — the map to keep beside you while you learn the surface.
Open →Honest edges
Running on iPad inherits a few of the platform's constraints. Rather than hide them, the design names them at the point they matter.
Finding nodes works: the desk scans for them, and nodes that announce themselves appear on their own. Output is then aimed straight at those addresses — several at once if you like. What's still missing is broadcast output, which iOS gates behind an Apple permission we've applied for; a node that only listens for broadcast can't be driven yet.
iOS won't run the app in the background or on boot. Guided Access with the screen kept on is the honest setup for a fixed installation.
Nothing ships preloaded. You either search the Open Fixture Library online, or import personality files you already own — both take seconds, but neither happens by itself.
The full controller is implemented and software-verified, but hasn't yet met a real gateway. Treat it as a diagnostic tool, not a showtime control.