Control Conductor channels through Node Editor

Last updated 7 August 2026
Drive Conductor channels live from the Backstage node editor instead of from a timeline — and add that control to a show that is already programmed.

Before you start

Your Conductor licence has to include remote control over UDP, and the Conductor version must not be older than 30.07.2024.

Colour channels cannot be driven this way — they cannot be sent over OSC.

Steps

1. Build the values in Backstage

  1. Open the Node Editor Window.

  2. Work out how many channels you need — RGB lamps need three per lamp.

  3. Add a Datatype:Pack node with one float per channel: type one F into the Layout field for each. Use the left column to name the values.

  4. Create the value sources:

    1. Drag from each diamond-shaped input of the Pack onto the canvas to create a Datatype:Float for it.

    2. Click the expand button in the top-right corner of each float node.

    3. Set Min to -100 and Max to 100.

    4. Select Slider to get a simple input slider.

The full -100.00 to 100.00 range maps to 0–100 % on the Conductor channel. Anything can generate that float — a slider is just the simplest source.

2. Send them to Conductor

  1. Add a Brainsalt:ConductorInputController patch and connect the Pack's first output to the patch's first input.

  2. Enter the receiver IP of the machine running Conductor — 127.0.0.1 if it is the same machine.

  3. Tick Enable.

3. Prepare Conductor

  1. Go to Tools → Settings and tick Enable Remote Control.

  2. Open the Input Controllers category and make sure Enable OSC is ticked.

  3. Open the INPUT CONTROLLERS window and select the Backstage OscDevice.

No OscDevice named Backstage yet — or whatever you set as the input name in the node editor? Switch to Backstage and move each float slider from minimum to maximum once. The device appears when Conductor first receives values from it.

  1. The lower area now lists one channel per float in your Pack. Drag them onto the block marked Drag properties here to use them.

  2. Rename them there if it helps. You can also invert them or change the value range, which is useful when your source cannot produce -100 to 100.

  3. Moving a slider in Backstage should now change the Value[%] variable in Conductor.

  4. Click the image-20240813-094618.png icon to save this input controller configuration as the default.

4. Create a recording group

  1. Open the RECORDING GROUPS window and select CONFIGURATION.

  2. Click the image-20240813-094549.png icon to create a group, and name it.

  3. Drag your channels from the right-hand side of the Input Controllers window into the Recording Groups window, one after another.

  4. Drag the channels you want to control from the LAYOUT window on the right onto the newly created channels. The recording target channel changes to the one you dragged.

  5. Click image-20240813-094618.png here too, to save the recording group as the default.

Retargeting works for Numeric, DMX, Digital, Servo, PWM and CAN channels only.

Common Mistakes

  • The OscDevice never appears in Conductor — it is created on first receipt, so nothing shows until values actually arrive. Sweep each slider once, and check the receiver IP and the Enable checkbox.

  • Channels respond over only part of the slider travel — the source range is not -100 to 100. Either fix the range on the float node or compensate in Conductor.

  • Colour channels do not respond — they cannot be carried over OSC at all. Drive the underlying numeric channels instead.

  • The configuration is gone after a restart — both the input controller and the recording group have to be saved as default with the save icon.

Tips

Where several channels need identical values, create one reference numeric channel and point the others at it. That saves input channels.

The Brainsalt:ConductorInputController patch puts Conductor into rehearsal mode: received values are emitted but not recorded onto the channels. Adding this to an existing show therefore overwrites no programming — the live input simply takes priority over what is stored.

Link Conductor to Backstage — running Conductor shows in sync with Backstage sequencers

Node Editor Window — where the value nodes and the patch live