Minotor wiki · restored page

How does it work

We spent hours thinking about how we wanted to create and play a video performance. We quickly realised that a video performance is not like a DJ performance (except for video scratching), and Minotor should not be like a virtual mixing console.

Animations

Minotor works with animations generated in real time. It doesn't work with video files — other software exists for that, and that was not our goal :)

If you need to use some kind of video, you can still use the animated GIF animation to load a loop that will be tempo-synchronised (but don't use a big resolution).

For the moment Minotor embeds more than 10 animations that are fully configurable to fit your needs. You can, for example, change the colour, the speed or the density of each animation.

Some properties are common to all animations (e.g. colour, loop); others are dedicated to specific animations.

Animation property

Each animation has many properties. Each property is configurable through its parameters, to adapt the animation's rendering to your needs.

Animation parameter

A parameter is a value that changes an animation property. Most animation properties have only one parameter, but some can have several. The best example is the colour property, which is controlled by two parameters: hue and lightness. The combination of the parameter values gives the property value — in this case, hue and lightness together give the colour.

Animation groups

When you want to use an animation, Minotor automatically creates an animation group. This group can contain one or several animations that react as one single animation. This means you can create your own custom animations out of the ones provided with Minotor.

Animations are piled up in each group: the first animation of a group (on the left) is rendered under the last one (on the right). Most animations use alpha, so you can combine several and place them in the right order for what you need.

Program

A program is a set of animation groups. You can activate each animation group independently. When an animation group is activated, it is rendered to the program's preview window. Several animation groups can be active at the same time. We advise you to build animation groups containing all the animations you need, rather than activating lots of animation groups; multiple active groups are better kept for transitions or temporary variations — but it's up to you :)

Program bank

Minotor has a program bank where you can create multiple programs for your performance. Each program in the bank has an “On Air” button that sends its rendering to the master. Only one program can be On Air: when you activate one program, the others are deactivated.

Modes

Minotor has two display modes, for different situations.

Editor mode

In this mode you can access the animation library and the program bank. You can drag animations into your programs and configure them to prepare your live performance.

Live mode

In this mode you can access the program bank and the master. This mode is for the live performance itself: you play with the master and change which program is On Air.

Original page: wiki.minotor.org/doku.php/how_does_it_work. Written by the Minotor team and licensed CC BY-SA 3.0. Changes: spelling and grammar corrected, one “FIXME: add an example here” placeholder removed, editor's note added. This page is available under the same licence. Updated 2026-09.