Cues are special Timeline markers, which can perform operations to customize Timeline playback, or even trigger other timelines. They are added and edited in their own space on the top of the Timeline and in the Inspector.

Adding, moving and deleting Cues

To add a cue, simply double-click in the cue are on top of the timeline above the clips, which is always visible. Cues can be moved simply by left-mouse drag or in the inspector's Time input field. A single cue can be selected by clicking it, multiple cues are selected by CTRL clicking several cues or by creating a selection marquee. To delete a cue, select it and hit DEL on your keyboard.

It is also possible to add a new cue a the Nowpointer's position by Shift double clicking or, when a cue is selected, by typing N on the keyboard.

Another option to add a Cue (see below) is to right-click a clip and select Add Pause Cue Before Clip or Add Cue at the End of the Clip.

Time to next Cue

The smaller second Timecode display in the Timeline always shows a countdown time until the next cue.

Configuring Cues in the Inspector

Cues always have a Timecode, a number and an Operation assigned. They may also have a Label, which might be mandatory for certain operations. All these properties can be defined in the Inspector once the cue is selected.

Cue Operations

Cues trigger certain operations, as soon as the Nowpointer passes them during playback. The following operations can be assigned to a cue:

Play

Plays the timeline from this cue. If the Nowpointer passes this cue while playing, it simply continues playing, except when there is a Wait Duration defined in the inspector. When there is a Wait Duration, the Nowpointer stops at the cue for the defined time and continues immediately afterward. 

Pause: Pauses the timeline. When paused, the Nowpointer remains at the current location

Stop: Stops playback and returns the Nowpointer to the beginning of the Timeline.

Jump: With Jump Cues, the Nowpointer can be moved to a different point on the Timeline. These cues can be configured to either

• Jump to a certain Timecode
• Jump to a different Cue with a defined Label
• Jump to a diffrent Cue with a Number (the Cue Number is assigned automatically, but can be changed manually)
• Jump to the previous/preceding Cue

Trigger: doesn't affect the timeline, just triggers an action 

Fade Duration

All cues can be assigned a Blend Duration, which is a kind of crossfade between original Nowpointer's position and the new position (e.g. after a jump). 

Activity

Cues can be active or deactivated in the Inspector under the the Activity dropdown menu. The following configurations are available.

• Active: The cue will be executed normally.
• Ignore: The cue is inactive and will be ignored during playback.
• Ignore Once: The cue is inactive the first time it will be passed by the Nowpointer. Afterwards it will be active.

Fade to Cue

By right-clicking on a cue in the Main Cue Layer, the context menu offers the option “Fade to Cue”.
The related settings can be found in the Inspector.

By default, these settings are configured in the General Settings, but they can be overridden in the corresponding input fields.

Trigger Other Timeline

These settings allow you to trigger another Timeline.

Trigger Mode

The Trigger Mode defines the action applied to the triggered Timeline. Available actions include:

• Start – begins playback of the Timeline.
• Stop – stops playback immediately.
• Pause – pauses the Timeline at its current position.

Time Mode

The Time Mode determines when the triggered Timeline starts:

• Current Time – the Timeline starts playing at the position of the Now Pointer.
• Trigger Time – the Timeline starts at a defined interval relative to the trigger event.
• Cue Time – allows you to select a specific Cue on the triggered Timeline and optionally define a Fade Duration for smooth transitions.

Network Command

This option is used to trigger API elements or control elements with the cues.

More information can be found here .

Cue Numbering: Main, Sub and Detail

Cue numbers can contain up to three integer components in the format Main.Sub.Detail. This allows related cues to share a main number while using additional numbers to identify individual cues.

The components are separate integers, rather than decimal places. For example, 2.10 has Main 2 and Sub 10.

Editing a Cue Number

Select a cue and edit Cue Number in the Inspector. Enter a main number, a main and sub number, or all three components, for example 2, 2.5 or 2.5.1.

Periods, commas and slashes are accepted as separators. For example, 2.5.1, 2,5,1 and 2/5/1 identify the same number components.

Automatic Numbering for New Cues

Before PIXERA 26.3

In earlier builds that supported Main.Sub.Detail numbers, automatic numbering worked as expected while all cues used whole numbers. Once subdivided numbers were present, new cues could continue the Detail component instead of the Main component. A subdivided cue could also take precedence over a cue with a higher whole-number value.

For example, adding a cue after 2.1 could produce 2.1.1. With existing cues 2.6.1, 3, 4 and 6, the new cue could receive 2.6.2 instead of 7.

Changing some cues back to whole numbers did not resolve this while other subdivided numbers remained. With Do Not Reuse Cue Numbers for New Cues enabled, the previously recorded highest number could preserve this behavior even after the subdivided cues had been deleted or renumbered.

In PIXERA 26.3 

Creating a new cue increments the highest Main component by one and assigns a whole-number cue number. Subdivided numbers can remain in the timeline without forcing newly created cues to use Sub or Detail numbers.

The examples below assume Do Not Reuse Cue Numbers for New Cues is disabled:

With Do Not Reuse Cue Numbers for New Cues disabled, the calculation uses the cues currently present in the timeline, across all cue layers.

With this option enabled, the calculation uses the highest previously recorded cue number. Deleting or renumbering a cue therefore does not necessarily lower the number assigned to the next new cue.

Copying and Pasting Cues

Previously, copying and pasting with Ensure Unique Cue Numbers enabled used the same automatic number allocation as creating a new cue, including the earlier numbering issue described above.

In PIXERA 26.3 and later, copying and pasting uses a different numbering rule. When Ensure Unique Cue Numbers is enabled, PIXERA increments the last displayed number component of the copied cue until it finds an unused cue number.

For example, pasting a copy of 2.5 produces 2.6 if that number is available. Pasting a copy of 2.5.1 produces 2.5.2 if that number is available.

Selecting Cues via Art-Net or sACN

Before PIXERA 26.3

The single Cues selector supported whole-number cue numbers, such as 3, 4 or 5. It could not directly select subdivided cue numbers such as 2.5 or 2.5.1.

In PIXERA 26.3 

Cue numbers can be selected using three separate patch parameters:

Patch the required parameters and send each component as its own integer value. To select a whole-number cue such as 3, send Main 3, Sub 0 and Detail 0.

When opening an older project, Cues Sub and Cues Detail are initially unpatched. Patch these parameters before using them, and update the lighting console's fixture profile if it does not expose them.

PIXERA 26.1 R 52 | 30. October 2026 | F.E. and S.H.