Backdrop 0.7.0

What's new: a second camera

Show a second camera. In Present (or Add › Window, Screen or Camera… in the menu bar), the picker now has a Cameras section next to your screens and windows. A second camera can be a USB or HDMI-capture camera over your desk or a whiteboard, an iPhone used as a Continuity Camera or its Desk View, the built-in camera when your main one is external, or anything else macOS lists as a camera. Your main camera and Backdrop Camera are left out of the list.

It is shown exactly like a shared window, so it can sit behind you, float as a panel in a corner, or fill the picture with you over it, and you can move, resize and snap it with your hands the same way as a shared screen. Layout presets (Left, Right, Centre, Corner Bubble, Side by Side) work on it too.

It is only on while it is showing. Backdrop's own camera has to be on first, pausing (⌃⌥P) or stopping closes it so its light goes off, and the picker shows no live pictures since looking would turn every camera on. If you unplug it, everyone on the call sees a calm "disconnected" card until it is plugged back in, and it returns by itself. If you pick the second camera as your main camera, it steps aside and your previous background comes back.

Also fixed. The slash on the "window closed" card had a thick black halo. It is now a clean gap in the outline, and the new "camera disconnected" card has the same.

Install

1. Unzip it and drag Backdrop.app into Applications. It has to live there for macOS to accept its camera extension.
2. Open it. Click the menu bar icon, then Set Up Backdrop Camera, and approve it in System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions › Camera Extensions.
3. Turn the camera on, then choose Backdrop Camera in your video app.

Upgrading: replace the app in Applications and open it. It updates its own camera extension when it starts. If another app (Discord, a browser, FaceTime) is using the camera at that moment, macOS can leave Backdrop Camera missing from the list afterwards. Quit those apps and restart Backdrop; if it is still missing, restart your Mac.

Requires macOS 15.1 or later on Apple silicon. AI backgrounds need Apple Intelligence. Sharing a window or screen asks for Screen Recording permission the first time; a second camera does not need it.

Verify

Signed with a Developer ID certificate and notarized by Apple. To check the download:

shasum -a 256 -c Backdrop-0.7.0.zip.sha256

Early release

Developed and tested on a single Apple silicon Mac running macOS 27. The engine has automated tests, but the virtual camera, hand tracking and the lenses have had limited real-world testing, so expect rough edges. In particular:

• The second camera was built and tested without a second camera. The capture is the same code as the main camera's and the rest is covered by tests and pictures, but plugging one in, pulling it out in the middle of a call, an iPhone as a Continuity Camera and two cameras on one USB hub have not been tried with real hardware. Only one second camera can be shown at a time, and it cannot be shown together with a shared screen. It is shown as it arrives (a phone held upright gives a tall picture; there is no rotate or mirror option) and is limited to 720p.
• Present's hand control and Dragon Ball's poses were tuned without real hands, on made-up hands and Vision's reading of emoji hands, so how easily a pinch grabs and how a real cupped hand reads are the first things to tune.
• Dragon Ball is heavier than most lenses: its top form in the middle of a move took about 20 ms a frame on a busy Mac in the tests, so check it in a real call before relying on it at 30 frames a second.
• Hand and face thresholds in the older lenses are still tuned on drawn faces and hands, and speed was measured on one busy Mac.