HUD Window
A floating panel on your desktop, over Pro Tools, at the size and opacity you choose.
Your session data, everywhere.
Live from Pro Tools: the take, transport, track, elapsed time, timecode and the session details you choose, on the booth monitor for talent, an iPad for the producer and the client’s video call.
SessionHUD reads Pro Tools directly and never changes your session. The take moves only when Pro Tools is really recording: pressing Play in QuickPunch doesn’t advance it, and a canceled take puts the last one back. No plugin to install.
SessionHUD is a Mac app. Open this page on your Mac to download it.
Free to try for 14 days.
Then $8 a month or $49 a year per Mac, or $129 once.
Launch prices through
: $39 a year, or $99 once.
Compare plans
macOS 15 or later · Pro Tools 2023.9 or later
Four outputs
SessionHUD sends live Pro Tools session data to four outputs, each with a layout made for its screen, so the engineer, the talent, the producer and a remote client can all see the take, transport and clock.
Full-Screen Display
Fills any connected monitor, such as the one in the booth, sized for talent to read at distance.
Browser Viewer
A local page on any iPad, laptop or phone on your studio network, for the whole team. With Background follows transport on, it turns red while you record: a record light anywhere you can prop an iPad.
Virtual Camera
SessionHUD adds its own virtual camera to your Mac. Pick it in Zoom or any video app, and the remote client sees the take in your video, on its own or over your room camera. They install nothing.
Staged photo; the take card is a real SessionHUD render.
How long has this take been rolling?
Pro Tools’ counter tells you where you are in the session, not how long the take in progress has been going. SessionHUD times every take on its own, from the moment it starts recording, on every screen.
- Pace a long read. On an audiobook chapter, a narration or a long script, talent and director see how far into the take they are without anyone doing the arithmetic.
- Every take starts from zero. The clock starts the moment you record and stops when you stop. The next take starts fresh.
Fewer slates, fewer questions
SessionHUD comes from a post-production audio engineer fifteen years in, who still runs Pro Tools every working day.
Every take used to be slated out loud, and the number lived in the Pro Tools window. A client on the call who missed the slate asked which take that was, and on a long day the slate sometimes didn’t happen at all. With the take on every screen, the slate is optional, nobody has to ask, and the whole room is looking at the same number. That’s time back in every session.
Start from a preset, or design your own
A layout can draw on everything SessionHUD reads from Pro Tools: the take, its track and file; the transport and record mode; elapsed time and timecode; the session’s name, sample rate, bit depth and frame rate; and the armed tracks. Add the talent, role, client, project, engineer and note you type in.
Presets — a counter, a take card, a recording slate, a post-production clock, a one-line strip, a take timer and a talent card — come with the app, each composed for the output it runs on, plus Lamp for the HUD window, the display and the browser: the take, large, with a light that shows record, play or stop. Give any of them an appearance profile and a typeface, then set its size and opacity for the room.
Included presets
Each shown in a different profile and typeface. Any preset can take any of them.
-
Simple Deep Sea profile Rounded type A centered counter with take and transport.
-
Normal SessionHUD profile Neutral type A focused take card with track, transport and elapsed.
-
Timer Booth Amber profile Monospaced type Elapsed take time as the headline, with take, track and transport.
-
Talent Parchment profile Neutral type A talent card: the talent, role and client you type, beside the take.
-
Detailed Midnight profile Condensed type A recording slate with timecode, file and session format.
-
Timecode Cyber profile Monospaced type A large timecode display with frame rate and session context.
-
Banner Paper profile Rounded type A single line for the top or bottom of a page.
Getting SessionHUD
Free for 14 days. Every output works — the HUD, a full-screen display, the browser viewer and the virtual camera — with the built-in presets and nothing to sign up for.
- macOS
- 15 or later
- Pro Tools
- 2023.9 or later
SessionHUD is a Mac app. Open this page on your Mac to download it.
Installation helpChoose your license
Every plan keeps every output running after the 14-day evaluation and adds the layout designer and your own branding. All three include every feature and are priced per Mac.
Launch prices run through , or through if you started your evaluation by then.
Monthly subscription
$8 a month per Mac For a project or a season.
- Every version, for as long as you subscribe
- Works offline for up to 30 days at a time, within the month you paid for
- Cancel from your account whenever you like; it runs to the end of the month you paid for
Annual subscription
Launch price · 20% off
not $49
$39 a year per Mac
Locked in for as long as you subscribe. After the launch, new
subscriptions are $49 a year per Mac.
- Every version, for as long as you subscribe
- Works offline for up to 30 days at a time
- Cancel from your account whenever you like; it runs to the end of the year you paid for
Perpetual license
Launch price · 23% off
not $129
$99 once, per Mac
Version 1 to keep, with no renewal. $129 per Mac after the
launch.
- Every 1.x update included
- Works offline indefinitely once activated, even behind a firewall
- Activates by serial number — no sign-up, no password
- Moving Macs is free: release this one in the app, then activate the new one
Updates, internet and more Macs
- Updates
- Delivered in the app: every version while you subscribe, every 1.x release with a perpetual license. A perpetual license covers version 1; it does not include a later major version, or promise that version 1 runs on every future macOS or Pro Tools.
- Internet
- A moment at first launch to start the evaluation and to activate. A subscription then checks in at least once every 30 days and around each renewal; a perpetual license never has to. Neither sends session contents.
- More Macs
- Buy up to 20 at once, or add more later from your account. On a perpetual license, each further Mac costs what a license costs that day: $99 at the launch price, $129 after.
- A lost Mac
- Revoke it from your account, once in any 12 months; beyond that, write to support.
Already have SessionHUD? Your account has your serial number, receipts and download, and is where you add a Mac or manage a subscription.