Looks

What a Look Is

A Look (Create group) is a named, reusable output state your cues fire. Author it once, reference it from any number of cues, then repoint it at something else mid-show without touching a single cue. Available in all editions.

Renamed 2026-08-22. This screen was called Palette and its cross-protocol items were called Scenes. "Palette" is a first-class object on ETC Eos, Avolites Titan and ChamSys MagicQ — an attribute-level reference value, never a fire target — and "Scene" already meant two other things in CueSync: the middle number in Act.Scene.Cue, and a row of Cue Pads. One noun now: Look. The URL of this page is unchanged.

One noun, two boards

The screen's tabs name the scope each board covers, because the items on all of them are Looks.

• GrandMA3 — Looks that point at a single executor, cuelist, preset or sequence on your MA3. Firing one tells the console to activate that element.
• All Protocols — Looks for everything else: a Resolume clip, a QLab cue, an ETC Eos cue, a DMX channel snapshot, a pixel look. Most bind one target on one protocol.
• Pixels — the pixel wall designer. Unlike the other two this is not a library: there is one wall, so no count badge and no bank rail. Its colours and choreography are app settings that follow the machine, not the show file.

Both library boards behave the same way otherwise — fired from cues, pads or Auto Pilot, and released back to the prior state when they end. The split is scope, not capability.

Firing several protocols at once

Choose the Bundle type on the All Protocols board. A Bundle holds children across any mix of connected systems and fires them as a unit — it is the cross-protocol coordination primitive. Reference the Bundle from the cue rather than adding a separate action per protocol.

Common Tasks

1. Create a GrandMA3 Look — On the GrandMA3 tab, click +, name it, and select the executor, cuelist or preset to bind.
2. Create a Look for any other protocol — On the All Protocols tab, click +, name it, pick the target type, then set its address.
3. Test-fire — Select any Look and click its test-fire button; output fires immediately and a success or failure toast appears. A Bundle fires every child at once.
4. Check usage — The number badge on each tile shows how many cues or pads reference it. A zero count means nothing will fire it during the show.

Tips & Gotchas

• Orphaned references become silent no-ops. If you delete a Look that cues still reference, those cue actions silently do nothing at fire time. The usage badge and a delete confirmation help you avoid this.
• Auto Pilot picks from both boards. Set a Look's phrase, energy and BPM affinity to let Auto Pilot choose it for a musical moment. A Look with no affinity is deliberately excluded from automatic selection — it stays manual and timecode-only, so adding affinity is the opt-in.
• Test-fire always works, even with Auto Pilot paused. Auto Pilot's paused state only suppresses its own automatic firing.

Related Articles

• Working with Cues
• Using CuePads
• GrandMA3 Setup Guide