Sound f/x Cue Playback Software

I just started using Cuefire. Its free software that works great for general purpose cueing. Im running it off a Windows 7 desktop, and it is reliable and intuitive. It has two modes, edit and show. Only bug i found was that the audio files have to be transfered with the show file when transferring to another computer. Otherwise free and awesome

Sent from Taptalk for Android, this was.
 
I'm beginning to use Q-Lab and exploring options to communicate to my Yamaha LS9 and EOS Ion to execute cues. Does anyone have experience with this? What other peripherals do you use to bridge the connection?
 
Fountain: cuefire sounds interesting, but Google does not seem to point me to an actual website for the program, only a collection of variably cockamamie looking download pages. Do you have a link for the project homepage?
 
From the website " Dear CueFire user, unfortunately we had to quit further development of the audio playback software "CueFire" due to lack of time.
Therefore there will be no future versions and no support any more.
The latest CueFire FREE version will stay available for free via this website."
Sad day
Here is the download link
http://www.audiobytes.eu

Sent from Taptalk for Android, this was.
 
Since this seems to be a recurring topic for discussion, I'd like to make a sticky thread in this forum to describe the various applications out there for sound cue playback. Please post a short description of a cue playback program if you are familiar with it, as well as requirements (platform, interfaces, etc) so that folks unfamiliar with the options available can decide what program(s) best fits their needs.

I'll start:

QLab (Mac Only)
QLab :: Live Show Control for Mac OS X
Free; Advanced licenses available (>2 channel playback; MIDI; Video)
QLab is a Mac-based cue playback system that can play back audio files, video files, MIDI cues, and many other things. It features the ability to use up to 8 channels of output in the free version, as well as advanced cueing features. There is a large user base for QLab, and an active mailing list dedicated to user support.


From the makers of QLab is QCart. It is absolutely worth the $100 price tag. I would never use anything else. I am not sure if they offer any of the rental options like they do for QLab, but it might be out there.

Here is a link to the website. http://figure53.com/qcart/

We use them a lot and have never had any failures. Knock on wood it stays that way.
 
Whatever you buy, don't buy SFX!!! have had tons of problems and going to replace.
I've had great experiences with SFX over the years and, at least in this region, it's the industry standard product used in all the professional theaters. Have you used it on a dedicated system or one used for other things? I'm currently putting together a system which will run SFX. It will be setup with a nice stable clean install, install audio editing software, and then taken off line never allowed back on the internet again and no other software allowed to run on it. If you do that SFX should run fine.

Don't think of your sound playback computer as a normal computer. It's a dedicated digital audio workstation. A device for one purpose, locked in time as a stable clean system. Treat it right and it will treat you right for years to come!
 
Regarding Free Qlab - someone once told me that after a period of time, Free Qlab will stop working, making you pay for it. In all the research I've done for it, I haven't come across anything that states that. I'm going from my laptop into a Mackie ProFX board and would only need 2 channels (can't even think of any circumstance I would need 8 or more) and am hoping I don't need to incur this expense.
 
I'm running my 4th show on Q2free, most of 6 months now, and nothing like that yet. There are *specific cue types*, like pause, and looping, which don't work on the free version, but that's all I've encountered.
 
Soundplant39/42: Keyboard Sound Triggering Software

If anyone is looking for hot keying capabilities, Soundplant39 (now Soundplant42, which I have not used) worked really well for me. Their free, non-commercial version has most things a basic theater setup would need: individual pan, pitch, volume, looping, and fading, as well as multiple keymodes to control pausing, muting, fading, and stopping. The licensed version, US $50, extends its capabilities to various audio file formats, audio device selection, etc. It is basic and has no cueing capabilities, but its also pretty useful and fun to play with if nothing else.
 
I've used multiplay on windows environment computers for a while now. This app used to work wonderfully until windows 7/8. After much research following some problems playing mp3's lately: In windows 7/8' multiplay tries to use a codec that was native In xp, that is no longer included In newer versions of windows. Mp3's therefore do not play correctly and sound muddy. Wav files, however, still play great. My work around is to convert everything to wav now before a show. Still a great app with good features, worth a look.

Mac: qlab
 
Cricket 2.2.5 (OS X/Mac Only)
http://cricketsound.com/
Freeware.
Cricket is a FREE audio-only modular cue-base sound performance environment for live theater.
Cue playback is extremely customizable and detailed. Cricket will NOT load any compressed file format, it is easiest to just stick with .AIFF files. While the interface is clunky, it does have massive levels of functionality, that are unavailable in any other free cue playback software.

If renting Qlab Audio is what you go for, I highly suggest giving Cricket 2.2 a try.
 
I hope there is nothing wrong if I ask a question here. It's about QLab2 and Qlab3.
Currently running all my shows on QLab2 with Pro Audio license. I would like to try QLab 3 and maybe to couple of simple shows on Qlab3 free version for testing. Am I able to keep both QLabs on same computer, with no conflict? I would use QLab2 for old shows (have more channels than 2) and when QLab 3 for new stuff testing.
If we decide to upgrade to QLab3. Will i still keep my QLab2 Pro audio license for old shows so I wouldn't have to convert all the fades to QLab3?
[TBODY] [/TBODY]
 
I hope there is nothing wrong if I ask a question here. It's about QLab2 and Qlab3.
Currently running all my shows on QLab2 with Pro Audio license. I would like to try QLab 3 and maybe to couple of simple shows on Qlab3 free version for testing. Am I able to keep both QLabs on same computer, with no conflict? I would use QLab2 for old shows (have more channels than 2) and when QLab 3 for new stuff testing.
If we decide to upgrade to QLab3. Will i still keep my QLab2 Pro audio license for old shows so I wouldn't have to convert all the fades to QLab3?
I have both 2 and 3 on my computer at the theatre with no issues. Just make sure you open the correct one with the files! If you have 2Pro and then open the files in 3 (which is the free version) you may indeed have issues!
 
Just did a middle-school production of "Aladdin Jr," and had to pick a simple, reliable player that the kids could use and that would play a track from a list and stop (rather than go on to the next track). I simply could not make Windows Media Player stop on a track-by-track basis, but I was able to make the free VLCPortable (downloadable at downloads.cnet.com) do this. It required drilling down rather a long way to find the proper setting: Tools / Preferences / Show Settings All (bottom left) / Playlist / check "Play and stop."

It's hardly a professional tool, but it worked great for track-by-track playback. Click the track you want and press Enter. Use the cursor keys to go to the next track. Space bar pauses and restarts. For middle school kids who never ran sound before, it turned out to be just the thing.

Warning: Windows 10 likes to put little banners into the lower-right corner of your screen whenever it thinks it has some delightful news to share with you, like the availability of a new version of Office 365, or the discovery that an update to some product you don't remember buying just came out. When it does this, it is initially set to play a happy sounding little chord, which will come out of the same headphones jack your cues are coming from. That can really break the mood of a show. To turn that sound off, click the Window (what used to be the Start) button, then All Apps / Windows System / Control Panel / Sound / Sounds / Notification, and set it to "(None)." Yes, that's an absurd amount of effort to have to go to just to turn off an annoying feature that only Microsoft wants you to have, but you only have to do it once. Beware of anything else that might make a noise out your headphone jack, however. If you're nervous, consider creating a new Sound Scheme that sets everything to "(None)," and use that whenever you're in your show space. (Creating a new Sound Scheme is left as an exercise for the reader :).)
 
Warning: Windows 10 likes to put little banners into the lower-right corner of your screen whenever it thinks it has some delightful news to share with you, like the availability of a new version of Office 365, or the discovery that an update to some product you don't remember buying just came out. When it does this, it is initially set to play a happy sounding little chord, which will come out of the same headphones jack your cues are coming from. That can really break the mood of a show. To turn that sound off, click the Window (what used to be the Start) button, then All Apps / Windows System / Control Panel / Sound / Sounds / Notification, and set it to "(None)." Yes, that's an absurd amount of effort to have to go to just to turn off an annoying feature that only Microsoft wants you to have, but you only have to do it once. Beware of anything else that might make a noise out your headphone jack, however. If you're nervous, consider creating a new Sound Scheme that sets everything to "(None)," and use that whenever you're in your show space. (Creating a new Sound Scheme is left as an exercise for the reader :).)

Annoyingly, OS/X has such a switch as well, and ignores it in undocmented circumstances.
 
Just did a middle-school production of "Aladdin Jr," and had to pick a simple, reliable player that the kids could use and that would play a track from a list and stop (rather than go on to the next track). I simply could not make Windows Media Player stop on a track-by-track basis, but I was able to make the free VLCPortable (downloadable at downloads.cnet.com) do this. It required drilling down rather a long way to find the proper setting: Tools / Preferences / Show Settings All (bottom left) / Playlist / check "Play and stop."

It's hardly a professional tool, but it worked great for track-by-track playback. Click the track you want and press Enter. Use the cursor keys to go to the next track. Space bar pauses and restarts. For middle school kids who never ran sound before, it turned out to be just the thing Tutuapp 9Apps Showbox.

Warning: Windows 10 likes to put little banners into the lower-right corner of your screen whenever it thinks it has some delightful news to share with you, like the availability of a new version of Office 365, or the discovery that an update to some product you don't remember buying just came out. When it does this, it is initially set to play a happy sounding little chord, which will come out of the same headphones jack your cues are coming from. That can really break the mood of a show. To turn that sound off, click the Window (what used to be the Start) button, then All Apps / Windows System / Control Panel / Sound / Sounds / Notification, and set it to "(None)." Yes, that's an absurd amount of effort to have to go to just to turn off an annoying feature that only Microsoft wants you to have, but you only have to do it once. Beware of anything else that might make a noise out your headphone jack, however. If you're nervous, consider creating a new Sound Scheme that sets everything to "(None)," and use that whenever you're in your show space. (Creating a new Sound Scheme is left as an exercise for the reader
:).)
what about windows seven ? are he like put little banners into the lower-right corner of our screen ?
 
Last edited:

Users who are viewing this thread

Back