I’ven playing with the demo version of Lumen the last couple of weeks and I fell in love with the possibilities of mangling videos and syncing with gear.
Unfortunately I don’t have the money to pay the full version, and I’ve started to get mad looking the watermarks everywhere hahaha
Is there a similar software but cheaper?
I love Lumen!
When I looked for alternatives after upgrading my Mac to one with M1 chip, I couldn’t find any real alternative. I had a show to prepare, so I invested in Resolume Avenue. I am happy, because this is a real step up in terms of specs, although I miss the simplicity of Lumen.
Yeah simplicity is what attracted me the most from Lumen, because knowing a bit of synth patching you can do a lot.
I looked Resolume web page and it looks really interestijg, but quite convoluted for my needs ahahaha Resolume Wire looks really cool too.
Thanks! I’ll take a look.
I’ve looked into this as well. I really like Visual Synthesizer by imaginando (great little company, nice people) as well as Cathedemer (available via Steam). I have to admit though, haven’t done much with either because a lack of time….
I understand your struggle, time neve is enough 
I have Zwobot which are Max For Live modules that you can combine, very good value for money but you need Max For Live
Ned rush posted his visual max for live patch on his patreon, maybe thats a quick/ cheap way to get something working too.
and supports him…
This!! And ebosuite for sure 
i used both for live visuals and zwobot is really really good with a/v.
I haven’t really found many decent “alternatives” in software with the same vision and quality.
You could check Paracosm for any sales, unsure if they’ve had them since release 
i have Zwobatmax and i love it! i can definitely bog my computer down with it but it’s really fun
Unfortunately I don’t have Max for Live I’ve been using Lumen specially with the DT, using the midi tracks to sequence some parameters from Lumen.
I’m saving for a new computer and Ableton Live, so I’ll still take a look at those options.
Thanks!
Never used lumen, though I’m also very satisfied with magic. It’s exactly the right level of complexity for all my needs and it interfaces nicely with standard glsl shaders and (this I really like) the ISF-shader format.
VDMX is a good host application for everything but especially ISFs
If you are willing to get a little more nerdy about it Touchdesigner (non commercial) can be used for free. It is insanely powerful, although I think some apects is a little more GPU intensive… which might make your mileage vary with out a dedicated GPU.
ebosuite does isf’s in ableton also <3
What is ISF? I really know nothing about the technical stuffs about this hahahah
You can think of it as a parameterized shader.
And a shader is a little program that runs directly on the gpu. You can have a look on Shadertoy.com for all kinds of shaders in general and there is a bunch of examples of ISF shaders on the ISF website :). As you can see the isf shaders have all kinds of sliders ,buttons, inputs, etc, which in the end are just exposed variables from a shader just like the ones on Shadertoy.