Getting started

An ArcLight show is a deck. Each slide is a scene: your camera, a screen, a title, an image. You build it in the editor, press Play, and step through it live while ArcLight sends one clean picture to a call, a recording or a second display.

This page walks you through a first show in about ten minutes: a camera slide, a title, a transition, and Play.

Install and allow access

1. Put ArcLight in Applications. Drag it into /Applications before you open it. macOS only installs the ArcLight virtual camera from apps in the Applications folder. ArcLight needs macOS 14 or later.

2. Allow the camera. The first time a slide shows a camera, macOS asks for camera access. Choose Allow.

3. Allow screen recording, if you'll show your screen. In the toolbar, open the Screen menu and choose Allow Screen Recording…, then turn ArcLight on in System Settings ▸ Privacy & Security. macOS may ask you to quit and reopen ArcLight.

4. Allow the microphone when asked. ArcLight asks only when you record your microphone or use the teleprompter's voice tracking.

Install the virtual camera

To use your show as a camera in Zoom, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams, install ArcLight Camera once:

1. Click Document at the right end of the toolbar to open the Document inspector.

2. Under Virtual Camera, click Install Virtual Camera.

3. If the status says Waiting for approval in System Settings, click Open System Settings and allow the ArcLight extension, then come back and click Check Again. The status reads Installed when it's ready.

There's more about choosing the camera in your call app in Running the show.

Start a show from a template

Choose File ▸ New. ArcLight shows Choose a Template:

• Blank: one empty slide.
• Basic: a title, a camera with a lower third, and picture-in-picture.
• YouTube Creator: starting soon, intro, talking head, screen and camera, interview, be right back, and an end screen.

Pick one and click Create. Everything in a template is editable. Cancel starts you with a blank slide.

The window works like Keynote: slides in the navigator on the left, the canvas in the middle, and the inspector on the right. See Slides and layers for the full tour.

Add a camera slide

1. Click Add Slide in the toolbar and choose Full-Screen Camera. The new slide fills the frame with your default camera.

2. To use a different camera, or to add a camera to a slide you already have, open the Camera menu in the toolbar and choose Default Camera or a camera by name. Drag the layer to place it, and drag its handles to size it.

Masks, crop and background blur are in Cameras and screens.

Add a title

With the camera slide selected, open Graphics in the toolbar and choose a title under Titles: Lower Third, Name Strap, Quote, Chapter Card or Headline. Titles arrive with their animations already set up.

Double-click any text on the canvas to edit it in place. For a plain text box, click Text in the toolbar. Style it in the Format inspector (click Format in the toolbar).

Add a transition

1. Select a slide in the navigator and click an empty part of the canvas, so no layer is selected.

2. Click Animate in the toolbar. The inspector shows the transition into this slide.

3. Click Change and pick an effect. Magic Move is a good start: layers that show the same camera, screen, image or video glide to their new position and size, and everything else crossfades.

4. Set the Duration, then click Preview to watch it. Apply to All Slides copies the transition to every slide.

More in Transitions and builds.

Press Play

1. Select the slide to start from and click Play in the toolbar, or press ⌥⌘P.

2. The window switches to the Play screen: the program, as large as it fits, beside the next slide, your notes and timers.

3. Press →, Space or Return to go forward. If the slide has builds, each press runs the next one before the slide changes. Press ← to go back, or a number key 1–9 to jump to that slide.

4. Press Esc to stop the show.

While the show plays, the virtual camera sends the program (the setting Send program while playing is on by default), and a second display gets the program full screen. See Running the show.

Keyboard shortcuts

Editing

Running the show

ArcLight also has global shortcuts that work while another app is in front, like Zoom or Keynote. They start with ⌃⌥ and are listed in Running the show.