BlinderKitten
A free lighting software without restriction
BlinderKitten is a free lighting software designed to be used during live events or theater. Unlike other lighting softwares, there is no restrictions that you can lift by paying or buying a dongle. Everything is available, unrestricted and free.
The software is "fixture-oriented", it means that you don't have to learn and control each DMX channel by hand like in a traditionnal lighting desk, here, you just have to tell BlinderKitten what kind of device you're using (called a fixture type), add one fixture per device patched on your stage, fill the address in the fixture and BlinderKitten has now full control of your device.
You can then have a control of your channels by moving the channels encoders corresponding to your needs.
Every composition you make with your fixtures can be recorded in a cuelist, containing one cue by composition. You can define timing to go from one to anothers and act like a conductor, and you can also have multiple cuelists working together, respecting LTP and HTP priorities.
Cuelists are a center component of BlinderKitten, they have lot of options and usages.
There is currently three functions to add automatic behaviors to your fixtures : effects, carousels and mappers.
Effects use a curve to add values to you fixtures, Carousels use key values, both of them spread your fixtures and loop to add movement to your values.
Mappers apply a value depending on another value for each selected fixture. They allow you for example to change your fixture's color depending on its intensity.
To render your creations, you have a panel with virtual faders and one with virtual buttons. BlinderKitten doesn't have a physical console, so there is no limitation on the number of buttons or faders. You can also set the number of buttons above and below each fader.
BlinderKitten can output as many universes as you need (or want) and can be remote controlled by OSC or MIIDI. Sinceit can output Art-Net, it is fully compatible with capture.
Pick your favorite color with your mouse
View actual output of your universe and test channels
Easy access to all your devices parameters.
Your fixtures well arranged in grid with their IDs.
Grid for groups, presets, cuelists, effects and carousels
A console-like input panel to call fixtures and assign values.
Explode a command into multiple commands to access every parameter easily.
Assign any command to them, you can set the grid size.
Assign and control your effects and cuelists, layout can be modified in parameters.
All informations about developpement are on the github page of the project. The software is continuously in developpement.
An online documentation is avalable on gitbook. There is a step by step guide to understand the primary concepts of the software and one dedicated page for every object of the software.
A discord server is available to discuss, ask help or request changes or new features in the soft.
Some video tutorials and demo are on the youtube page.
Begin to learn a software from scratch can be annoying, so you can use Capture Student Edition with the demo capture project and the demo show file presents in the shared data zip file. Installation and setup are explained in this page of documentation.
Do you need inspiration ? A lighting cookbook is on construction on this site. Feel free to use it and to add your contributions to it.
If you need help to use blinderkitten, or experiencing bug or crashes, feel free to join the discord server to post your feedbacks.
If you wish to receive training, a one-week training course affiliated with AFDAS is available here.
If you want to help BlinderKitten, there is a lot of things you can do :
Olga - Marie Moino - Ben Kuperberg
Jeffrey King - Clément Rignault - Theo Quoniam - Guillaume Ohrel - Sebastian Soto - Aurelien Martinelli - Adrien Delolme - Freddy Rollan - Sébastien Bonnefoy - Benjamin Fichot - Giacomo Gorini - Sarah De Battice / Compagnie Dérivation - Adrien Girardeau - Hugo Michael - Ziggy Sono
Marti - MatB - Edrig - Guesn - Victor Maillardet Scenomatic 
- Micka poulpo - Whaim - Benjamin Henry - Viki - Frousse - Tigris
