Strobe 1.0.0

What's new in 1.0.0

Strobe 1.0: the app has run maad avenue's live shows, and it's ready for yours. Nothing changes from 0.7.0, apart from the version number: 1.0 says Strobe is stable, and that shows made with it will keep opening in the versions to come.

Highlights

• A setlist of tracks: each with its audio, its length and its light automation, played from Strobe or driven by MainStage.
• DMX buttons: each lights a set of cells with a color and an effect, fired by a click, a key of a MIDI controller, or patterns recorded along with the song.
• A 3D view of the stage: your lights in place, showing live what the DMX output does, fog included. Add your own devices with fixture files.
• Made for the stage: a narrow window for playing a show, automatic updates that never come during one, and an example show to start from.

Install

Strobe 1.0.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.7.0

What's new in 0.7.0

New

• Audio files that really import: drop an audio file on a track's waveform, or right-click it and choose Choose Audio File…, Replace Audio File… or Remove Audio (also in the setlist's right-click menu). The file is copied into the show when you save it. WAV, MP3, M4A, FLAC and OGG play as they are; AIFF and CAF are turned into WAV. While a file is dragged over the waveform, it says what dropping it will do. A file Strobe can't find shows up in red, with its name.
• Track length: every track now has an end: the length you set, else its audio's, else 64 bars. Drag the tab at the track's end (it snaps to the audio's end), or double-click it to type a length, like 3:30 or 96 bars. Playback stops there, and a track without audio plays too.
• Loops you can stretch: drag a loop's end to make it repeat longer or shorter. A loop stops at the next pattern or at the track's end.

Improved

• Recording: Record starts playback, and Pause stops both. The pattern being recorded grows with the cursor, ends on the beat after its last note, and stops where the next pattern starts (a loop included) or at the track's end. Notes go on the nearest sixteenth, so a note played a hair early still lands on the beat. If you click elsewhere in the timeline while recording, what you've played is kept and recording goes on from there. If nothing was played, no empty pattern is left behind.
• Saving keeps only the audio the tracks play: files of deleted tracks no longer pile up in the show.

Fixed

• Space after picking a track: Space now starts playback right after you select a track, like the Play button.
• Clicking a pattern or a note: a click that slips by a pixel or two only selects it, without moving it.
• Recording with a pattern right after the cursor: Record now turns itself off when there's no room at the cursor, instead of staying on and recording nothing.

Install

Strobe 0.7.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.6.1

What's new in 0.6.1

Improved

• A cleaner Welcome screen: it now looks like the rest of Strobe. New Show and Open Other Show… are buttons like the app's, with an icon each. A recent show lights up under the mouse, with a cross to forget it and an arrow to open it. The link to the example show is quieter.

Install

Strobe 0.6.1 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.6.0

What's new in 0.6.0

New

• Example show: new to Strobe? Open the example show from the Welcome screen or File › Open Example Show: the first 100 seconds of maad avenue's "Dead In My Head", with its lights, buttons, MIDI patterns and stage. It opens as an unsaved copy: the first Save asks where to keep it, and copies its audio along.
• Automatic updates: new versions download in the background and are installed the next time Strobe starts, never during a show. Strobe › Check for Updates… looks right away, and Strobe › Restart to Install installs a downloaded version at once. From this version on, you won't need to download Strobe again.

Improved

• Keyboard shortcuts: every shortcut is now in the menus, to be found: a new Pattern menu (Split T, Join J, Loop L), Copy, Paste, Delete and Select All on patterns and notes in the Edit menu, one beat back or forward and the previous or next track in the Playback menu, and View › Show / Hide Setlist (⌘). The timeline shows the keys that apply right now: the cursor's when nothing is selected, the selection's otherwise.
• Switch tracks with the setlist hidden: ↑ and ↓ go to the previous or next track even when the setlist is collapsed.

Install

Strobe 0.6.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.5.0

What's new in 0.5.0

New

• Seek while playing: click in the timeline, or use the arrows, Return or Back to Start, and the cursor jumps there while the show keeps playing, the audio with it. Over the timeline, the mouse becomes a playhead and a faint cursor shows where a click will land.
• MainStage in charge: while MainStage drives playback, a pulsing MainStage badge glows next to the transport, and Play, Space and Back to Start are greyed out so the two can't fight. Strobe's own playback stops when MainStage starts.
• Playback menu: Play / Pause (Space) and Back to Start (Return), with the shortcuts also shown in the transport buttons' tooltips.
• Show file icon: show files have their own icon, in the Finder and in the window's title bar.
• Anonymous usage statistics and crash reports: Strobe sends which features are used and the crashes it hits, never a show's or a track's name, nor any content. Turn it off in Strobe › Share Anonymous Usage Statistics and Crash Reports. The README's Privacy section lists exactly what is sent.

Improved

• Window title: before any show is open, the window is just titled STROBE, not "Untitled".

Install

Strobe 0.5.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.4.0

What's new in 0.4.0

New

• Follow the cursor: while the show plays, the track automation turns its pages to keep the cursor in sight. Scroll away by hand and it stays where you put it, until the cursor shows in the view again or you press Play.
• Narrow window: under 800 pixels wide, Strobe shows a single column made for playing a show. The top bar holds the current track, a click on it opens the setlist, and a dot each for MIDI and DMX. Below come a low track automation, the buttons and the scene. Buttons play without being selected, and editing waits for a wider window.
• Camera motion: the 3D scene's camera drifts slightly while the show plays. It can be turned off in the scene's display settings.

Improved

• Darker unlit lights: a light that is off now looks off, and a lens dims smoothly down to dark.

Install

Strobe 0.4.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.3.0

Strobe 0.3.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.

Strobe 0.2.0

Strobe 0.2.0 for Macs with Apple silicon (M1 and later). Open Strobe.dmg, then drag Strobe into Applications.