Isocast 0.0.10 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.10 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+) and, for the first time, Linux (Ubuntu 24.04 and Debian 12, x86-64 and arm64). If you're on 0.0.9, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your permissions carry over. Windows comes in the next release.

Isocast on Linux (new)

• Install: download the .deb for your distro and SHA256SUMS from the release, check it and run sudo apt install ./isocast-…deb. There are packages for Ubuntu 24.04 and for Debian 12 (which needs PipeWire from bookworm-backports), and an Ubuntu 24.04 tarball with a per-user install.sh.
• First launch offers to download Cisco's OpenH264 for H.264 encoding and live previews. It downloads and checks the codec as your user, never as root, and you can skip it and run isocast-openh264-install later. OpenH264 Video Codec provided by Cisco Systems, Inc.
• Window sources: record single windows, each to its own ISO file. You choose each screen or window in your desktop's sharing dialog: when you add the source, from Choose screens and windows when one is waiting, or with isocast screen pick. Isocast reopens your choice without asking while the desktop remembers it.
• 1080p60 on NVIDIA: with NVENC, a tested Tesla T4 records the program and an ISO at 1080p60 without dropped frames, using under half the CPU it did.
• Previews through shared memory: an app on the same computer as its engine reads the monitors straight from shared memory, so the engine no longer encodes video for its own previews.
• Virtual camera through v4l2loopback: Start Virtual Camera feeds the program to a v4l2loopback device, the one labelled "Isocast Camera" if you have several. Isocast never loads the module or asks for root; if there's no device, it shows the one command that makes one.
• Browser sources: web pages render in a separate isocast-browser helper (WebKitGTK 6), with their sound, and restart on their own if a page crashes or hangs. They're in the Ubuntu 24.04 package; Debian 12's GTK is too old for them.
• Looks at home: the window's title bar is dark like the rest of the app, the menu bar uses the app's own menus, shortcuts use Linux key names (Ctrl, Alt, Super) instead of Mac symbols, and Isocast has its own icon at every size, in the taskbar too.
• Properties and Filters show the live source, with its filters applied as you change them.
• Open and Export use your desktop's file chooser.
• Clearer first run and permissions: Linux asks for nothing up front, so Continue is always available; the camera row says whether your user can open it and copies the command that fixes it.
• Cameras: NV12-only cameras (such as the FaceTime camera on Asahi Linux) are listed and record, a camera's infrared sensor no longer shows up as a second camera, and a USB webcam recorded with its own microphone starts cleanly instead of dropping off the bus. Camera access is reported as allowed or denied, with the fix.
• isocast doctor checks real-time scheduling for both the PipeWire server and Isocast's own audio capture, and says what to change when either runs without it.
• Thanks to Mateusz Tymek for window sources, NV12 cameras, USB webcams that start cleanly, camera access, OBS import from ~/.config/obs-studio, flips, the Removed toast and source-removal fixes, and CI and test fixes (#165, #167, #168, #169, #175, #181, #184, #199, #205, #220).

On Mac and Linux

• Copy buttons say whether they worked, and what to do if the clipboard isn't available.
• Web page sound stays in time when a page pauses or switches its audio: the silence is kept, not closed up.

On Mac

• Previews give way to the program: while you record, stream or keep a replay buffer and the program keeps missing frames, previews step down to 15 fps, then 5 fps, then pause, and come back once it keeps up again.
• Flip Horizontal and Flip Vertical in a source's Transform menu. ISO files keep the picture as captured, and OBS scenes with a one-way flip import with it.
• Web page sound is captured on the page's own audio thread, so it keeps up when the page is busy. If a page's sound still has a gap, the recording counts it as an audio dropout instead of closing it up silently.
• Web pages can no longer end a recording by sending malformed sound.
• The Removed toast with Undo appears only once the change is applied, so it never offers to undo a removal that didn't happen.
• Better bug reports: Help › Report a Bug… sends a report even when the engine can't start, and the GitHub form it opens is filled in from your reviewed description.

Known limits

• Linux has no automatic updates: to update, finish any recording, quit Isocast, run isocast engine shutdown and install the newer .deb the same way.
• Debian 12 needs PipeWire 1.0.5 or later from bookworm-backports for screen and audio capture.
• On Hyprland, a window source whose window closes keeps its last picture in its ISO until the take stops. Window capture on GNOME and KDE isn't tested yet.
• Windows comes in 0.0.11, once its installer is code-signed.

Linux install and update

Choose the .deb for your distro and architecture (dpkg --print-architecture) and download SHA256SUMS beside it. In an empty download folder run sha256sum --ignore-missing -c SHA256SUMS, check your package says OK, then sudo apt install ./isocast-*.deb. Debian 12 needs PipeWire ≥1.0.5 from bookworm-backports first; install instructions. To update, finish all outputs, quit the app, stop the idle engine and install the newer package.

Full Changelog: v0.0.9...v0.0.10

Isocast 0.0.9 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.9 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.8, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your permissions carry over.

A recorder, with takes that go to your editor

• The in-app editor is gone: the Editor window, timelines, recording targets and .isoprj project files are removed, so Isocast stays a recorder. Your recordings are unchanged, and older project files stay on disk untouched; Isocast just no longer opens them.
• Export a take for your editor: isocast project export-nle --format fcpxml|xmeml|otio writes a take as a Final Cut Pro, Premiere Pro (DaVinci Resolve with --app resolve) or OpenTimelineIO project, with every ISO source on its own track and the program on top, lined up from the take's session file, with its markers. It points at your original files, so nothing is re-encoded or copied. Agents use the MCP tool export_take_nle.

Control Isocast on another Mac (early)

• Settings › Remote has two switches, both off: Control Other Computers and Let Other Computers Control This One. Pair once with a code, then pick the engine in the engine menu (bottom left); it opens in a window of its own.
• The program plays as live video, with WebRTC sound once you turn on the program monitor's speaker (off by default to avoid an echo).
• Remote viewing does less CPU work: resizing reuses its GPU setup between pictures, and decoded video stays on the Mac's GPU instead of being copied through CPU images. Remote and local pictures use the same colour handling.
• Sound recovers from lost network packets without waiting through a long gap. Remote video also supports clients that need H.264 Constrained Baseline; recording quality and profiles are unchanged.
• Pair on your local network or over Tailscale, with each side's identity pinned when you pair. Both computers need the same Isocast version. The isocast command and MCP reach a paired engine with --engine.

Screen colour depth

• Settings › Recording › ISO Recording › Screen / ISO Colour Depth: 8-bit (the default, smaller files) or 10-bit HEVC (smoother gradients, more CPU and about 40% larger screen files). This sets the depth for all ISO files; a source's Properties can override it.
• 10-bit HEVC screen files keep the screen's colours instead of shifting in tone.

Behind the scenes

• Previews give recordings priority: on a busy Mac with a 30 fps canvas, previews step down to 15 fps sooner. Engines using software graphics pause previews during recording or streaming and resume afterward.
• isocast api spec --json describes every engine method as an OpenRPC document, the contract the app, the isocast command and MCP all use.
• A like-for-like comparison with OBS: both apps recorded the same synthetic 1080p60 program plus one 1080p60 ISO file (OBS Studio 32.2.2 with the Source Record plugin; HEVC, no B-frames, AAC 256 kb/s) on a MacBook Pro with M4 Max. A development build from 22 October used 43.8% of one core and 208 MiB, OBS 97.2% and 1,192 MiB, both writing every frame (median of 3 interleaved runs, VideoToolbox encoding included). It is not a measurement of this exact build.

Full Changelog: v0.0.8...v0.0.9

Isocast 0.0.8

Isocast 0.0.8 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.7, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your permissions carry over.

A canvas for every destination

• Up to eight extra canvases, each with its own size, frame rate, scenes or per-scene layouts, recording and stream destinations: 16:9 to Twitch and 9:16 to YouTube Shorts at the same time. The vertical canvas is now one of them, and existing setups load unchanged.
• Per-destination settings: each destination can set its own bitrate, rate control, keyframe interval and audio bitrate; destinations with the same format share one encoder.
• In the app: the canvas monitor next to the stage shows any canvas, with a menu of every canvas and its actions. The layout editor edits any canvas, and projectors, multiview, the replay buffer and the virtual camera work per canvas.
• OBS import brings in Aitum Multistream and Vertical Canvas setups (stream keys are never read), and obs-websocket answers the Vertical Canvas plugin's requests.

Advanced masks

• Shape masks (rectangle with rounded corners, circle, ellipse, polygon, star, heart) with soft edges, drawn with handles on the picture; gradient masks; and source masks, which use any source or scene, a video included, as a live mask, in step with the program frame by frame.
• Masks stack (intersect, add, subtract), every setting can be animated, and Advanced Masks filters come in through OBS import.

Isocast tunes itself to your Mac

• A measured machine profile drives the capacity warnings and Optimize, including ProRes and mixed H.264/HEVC setups.
• A live quality governor watches the encoders, GPU and memory while you record or stream, and steps down streams, previews, multiview and extra canvases when the Mac falls behind, then back up when it recovers. It never lowers your program or ISO files on its own, and settings you pin stay put. Settings › Advanced › Automatic Quality.
• Safer defaults on base and 8 GB Macs.

Recordings you can trust more

• A frame budget across every output: the program and ISO files always get frames first; previews, extra canvases, multiview, masks and the virtual camera give way before a recording could drop a frame.
• Videos and stingers no longer repeat a frame now and then at 60 fps, and looping playlists don't stutter between files.
• Clear recording targets: choose next to Record whether a recording starts a new project or adds a take to the current timeline.
• HE-AAC audio in MKV files plays on time; switching to a scene collection with a source named "edited" renames it instead of refusing; system audio always leaves out Isocast's own sounds.
• Optimize says so when it can't measure this Mac instead of reporting nothing to change.

Behind the scenes: every recording, ISO file, canvas, mask, transition and editor export, including Final Cut, Premiere and Resolve projects, is now checked frame by frame against an independent model before each change ships.

Full Changelog: v0.0.7...v0.0.8

Isocast 0.0.7

Isocast 0.0.7 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.6, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your permissions carry over.

Take your edit to Final Cut Pro, Premiere Pro or Resolve

• Export for your editor: File › Export › For Final Cut Pro / Premiere Pro / DaVinci Resolve writes a project that opens with every angle on its own track, lined up and cut like your Isocast edit. It points at your original files, so nothing is re-encoded or copied. Crops, markers and each source's audio come along. From the command line: isocast timeline export --nle fcpxml|xmeml|otio.
• Sound in the editor: playback now has sound, in sync with the picture (2× and 4× are pitch-corrected). It stays silent while you're recording or streaming system audio, so it never ends up in a take.
• Export › With Vertical (9:16) in the editor, and 10-bit angles in 8-bit programs export cleanly.

Faster and steadier

• One GPU device for the whole app, and frames Isocast can't keep up with no longer cost a GPU conversion.
• A much lighter multiview: about half the GPU time and memory with projectors open.
• Isocast recovers from a stalled or lost GPU without restarting.

Vertical canvas

• Each canvas fails on its own: a problem on one never stops the other's streams.
• Replay buffer and virtual camera for the vertical canvas.
• A scene without its own vertical layout now shows the main picture fitted and centred (nested scenes and animations included). Scenes without a vertical layout record differently on the vertical canvas than in 0.0.6.

Polish and safety

• Every screen was checked at every window size; clipped labels, overlapping text and cut-off controls are fixed, and narrow windows use short labels with full names in tooltips.
• Plugins can't widen their own access through folders they name, hotkeys or obs-websocket.
• Project files are saved when you quit; obs-websocket can open projectors; HE-AAC audio in MKV files plays on time.
• This update window now shows the full release notes.

Full Changelog: v0.0.6...v0.0.7

Isocast 0.0.6

Isocast 0.0.6 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.5, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your permissions carry over.

Projectors, multiview and a vertical canvas

• Projectors: show the program, the preview, any scene or any source full screen on another display, or in a window. Right-click › Open Projector, or View › Projector. They reopen where you left them and close cleanly when a display is unplugged.
• Multiview: an OBS-style grid of preview, program and your scenes, with labels, safe areas and tally. Click a tile to preview it, double-click to cut.
• Vertical canvas: a second 9:16 canvas with its own layouts for the same sources, recorded and streamed alongside the main one. It can follow the main canvas's scene switches or run its own. Set up its streams in Settings › Stream. When your Mac runs out of encoders, the main recording and stream keep every frame and the vertical canvas gives way.
• Tally colours follow the broadcast standard everywhere: red for program, green for preview.

Edit in Isocast

• Crop in the editor: drag handles or pick 9:16, 1:1, 4:5 or 16:9. Only cropped clips are re-encoded; your originals are never touched.
• Waveforms, snapping, rolls and zoom on the timeline, and smoother playback.
• Project files: every recording folder gets a .isoprj. Copy the folder anywhere, double-click the file, and the editor opens with your edits. Missing files show as offline and can be relinked. File › Open and Open Recent.
• Open Editor After Recording (Settings › Output, off by default).
• Exports play everywhere, including HEVC exports with cuts in Chrome. timeline export --vertical also writes a 9:16 file.

Audio

• Audio interfaces: pick which inputs a microphone source uses (input 3 alone, inputs 3+4…). One input records as centred mono at full level. A Mono switch per source in the mixer and Advanced Audio Properties.
• Interfaces with more than two inputs now record inputs 1 + 2 by default, instead of macOS's mix of every input. This changes what those interfaces record; pick other inputs in the source's Properties.
• If a microphone disconnects or loses its input during a take, Isocast says so, and the take's details record which source stopped and when.

Reliability

• Isocast warns when another app is using the video encoders, or your Mac is under heavy load or hot, before frames drop.
• Rapid splits always write every file they announce; a refused start no longer blocks the next one.
• Busy setups no longer fail with "no hardware encoder is free" when the real problem was too many open files.
• obs-websocket treats multistream as one stream, like OBS.

Full Changelog: v0.0.5...v0.0.6

Isocast 0.0.5 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.5 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.4, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it. Your camera, microphone and screen permissions carry over.

Switch from OBS

• Import from OBS on first launch: Isocast finds your OBS scene collections and brings them in with their profile's settings, then Optimize picks settings for Recording, Streaming or Both on your Mac.
• obs-websocket v5: turn it on with isocast websocket enable and tools built for OBS (Touch Portal, community Stream Deck plugins, obs-websocket scripts) drive Isocast.
• Replay buffer: save the last 30 seconds (up to 5 minutes) on a hotkey.
• Virtual camera: Isocast shows up as a camera in Zoom, FaceTime and other apps (macOS asks you to allow it once). Remove it any time from the camera popover.
• Multistream: stream to several destinations at once from one encode.

Edit in Isocast

• The editor window (Window › Editor, ⌘E): every ISO track of a take on one timeline. Trim, split, switch angles, and export frame-accurately without touching the originals.

Recording

• Crash-safe takes, on by default: if Isocast or your Mac crashes, you lose about half a second, and the files are repaired on the next launch.
• Per-ISO audio: choose each ISO file's audio (camera + mic, screen + desktop audio).
• Per-app audio: record one app's sound, or everything except some apps (macOS 14.2+).
• ISO capacity warnings: Isocast tells you when your Mac can't keep up with your ISO files, with a one-click fix, and picks sizes that fit.
• Streaming after you start recording no longer costs ISO frames, and the program and audio stay clean at your Mac's limit.
• VP8 WebM stingers (older OBS stingers) play without converting.

Fixes

• After an update, Isocast replaces an older engine still running (never mid-take).
• A microphone whose driver stops answering no longer blocks recording for minutes.
• Faster CLI commands; a hard-to-hit crash when listing silent media as ISO audio; macOS prompts now say "Isocast Engine".

Full Changelog: v0.0.4...v0.0.5

Isocast 0.0.4 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.4 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.3, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it.

New

• Permissions step on first launch. Camera, microphone and screen recording each have a row that turns Allowed by itself; a floating helper shows where to drag Isocast in System Settings, and Relaunch appears when macOS needs one.
• WebM and MKV stingers and media, including VP9 with transparency, the usual OBS stinger format. VP8 files get a message with a one-line conversion command.
• Plugins: events with full context and file paths, a folder per recording session (isocast project), and read or write access to recordings.

Fixes

• The program and stream no longer drop frames after a split while streaming. When the hardware encoder stalled, Isocast didn't notice and the ISOs kept their share; now the program and stream keep priority.
• Streaming to a server on your local network works. Isocast now asks for Local Network access.
• Saving a stream key always works. Each build keeps its own Keychain entry. If you used a development build, enter your key once more in Settings › Stream.
• Pause, Marker and the camera settings button in the Controls dock are no longer cut off.

Full Changelog: v0.0.3...v0.0.4

Isocast 0.0.3 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.3 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+). If you're on 0.0.2, Isocast › Check for Updates… installs it.

Fixes

• Camera and microphone work again. 0.0.2 couldn't ask for them, so they were refused without a prompt. Now macOS asks once.
• ISO files no longer drop frames on the M4 Max when several hardware encoders start together (some takes lost 40–70% of their ISO frames).
• Dock splitters and resize handles follow the mouse exactly, idle or recording. Before, splitters moved half as far and glitched.

New

• Developer mode (Settings › Advanced › Developer, or isocast debug on): verbose logs, once-a-second timing for every output, a stats overlay and a Developer menu. It turns itself off after 24 hours.

Open the DMG and drag Isocast to Applications. The virtual camera still needs its one-time installation.

Full Changelog: v0.0.2...v0.0.3

Isocast 0.0.2 Alpha

Isocast 0.0.2 for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+).

New: Isocast updates itself. Isocast › Check for Updates…, plus a daily check you can turn off in Settings › General. An update never installs while you're recording, paused, streaming, exporting or using the virtual camera; it waits until you stop or quit. Install this version by hand once; later releases arrive on their own.

Fixes and improvements

• Stopping a recording now warns about every file that dropped frames, with the count and percentage (for example "FACECAM take 3: 16,601 frames dropped (39%)").
• isocast restart refuses safely while anything is running, so a recording started at that moment is never cut short.
• A redesigned installer window.

Open the DMG and drag Isocast to Applications. The CLI is bundled inside the app. The virtual camera still needs its one-time installation.

Isocast 0.0.1 Alpha

Isocast's first alpha for Apple-silicon Macs (macOS 14+), refreshed with the latest fixes and live report service.

• Native macOS app with scenes, sources and Studio Mode.
• Program and per-source ISO recording, streaming, and pause/resume.
• Virtual camera (requires the one-time installation) and customizable hotkeys.
• Create view for recording, retaking and arranging takes.
• Report a Bug with diagnostic previews and one-click Send Report.

Includes the latest ISO audio-sync, focused-hotkey, dock and reporting fixes.

Open the DMG and drag Isocast to Applications. The CLI is bundled inside the app. See the virtual-camera installation guide for its one-time setup.