Lumiera

Lumiera is a cinematic camera and cutscene mod for Minecraft. Build camera shots from keyframes in an in-game timeline, add cues like fades, sound, and screen shake, then play the whole thing back from a key, a command, or a datapack.

Features

• Keyframe camera shots in a timeline editor and scrub or preview them live.
• Several ways to move between keyframes: straight lines, Catmull-Rom, Bezier with handles, cosine, and stepped holds. Centripetal Catmull-Rom is the safe pick for most shots since it won't loop on sharp turns.
• Per-segment easing, from plain ease in/out to the quad, cubic, sine, expo, back, elastic, and bounce curves, for control over timing.
• Animate FOV and roll per keyframe, bank the camera into turns, or have it follow an entity or a fixed point.
• A per-world library for saving, renaming, duplicating, and deleting your paths and cutscenes.

Cutscene cues

Camera paths can carry timed events that fire as they play:

• Fades and letterbox bars
• On-screen text and action bar messages
• Sound and particle cues, placed in the world or pinned to the camera
• Screen shake with adjustable intensity, frequency, and decay
• Hide or show the HUD, lock or restore the time of day
• Run a command at any point on the timeline

On 1.21.1 you can also stage actors: entities, players, items, blocks, armor stands, or particles. Each gets its own pose keyframes and a track of timed actions like swinging, jumping, attacking, breaking a block, dying, or playing a sound.

Creating shots in-game

Open the timeline with G. Move your camera and press = to drop a keyframe, scrub the timeline, then press [ to preview. Every key is listed under Controls and can be rebound:

• G timeline, . edit mode, , view mode
• = add keyframe, Delete remove, K duplicate
• [ play, End reset, M library

Commands cover the same ground for servers and command blocks:

• /lumiera play <name> [speed] [loop] [target]
• /lumiera stop and /lumiera reset
• /lumiera list and /lumiera info <name>
• /lumiera save <name> and /lumiera load_here <name>
• /lumiera import and /lumiera export

On NeoForge, /cutscene play <id> [targets] [anchor] runs cutscenes loaded from datapacks.

Datapacks

Map makers can ship cutscenes as JSON under data/<namespace>/cutscenes/. A short one:

{
  "schema": 1,
  "id": "intro",
  "duration_ticks": 40,
  "fov": { "mode": "keyframed", "default": 90.0 },
  "keyframes": [
    { "time": 0.0, "pos": { "x": 0, "y": 65, "z": 0 }, "rot": { "yaw": 0, "pitch": 0 }, "fov": 90.0, "path_type": "linear" },
    { "time": 2.0, "pos": { "x": 8, "y": 67, "z": 4 }, "rot": { "yaw": -30, "pitch": 10 }, "fov": 70.0, "path_type": "smooth" }
  ],
  "camera_position_mode": "absolute"
}

Camera paths under data/<namespace>/camera_paths/ take an events list for the cues above. Times can be given as tick, time, or at (seconds), and event types accept namespaced ids like lumiera:shake_camera.

For developers

Lumiera exposes a camera modifier API so other mods can drive the camera without fighting over it. Modifiers stack by priority with a separate background layer, so one mod's cutscene won't stomp another's. A small runtime API starts and stops cutscenes by id.

Supported versions

• Minecraft 1.21.1 on NeoForge

Other Minecraft versions are in progress.

Lumiera

Lumiera is a camera and cutscene tool for Minecraft. You build camera shots from keyframes on an in-game timeline, hang timed events like fades, sound, and screen shake off the path, and play the whole thing back from a key, a command, or a datapack.

It runs on Forge, Fabric, and NeoForge across three Minecraft versions, so a shot you build in one place works the same everywhere the mod is installed.

What you can do

• Drop camera keyframes as you fly around, then scrub the timeline and preview the result live.
• Choose how the camera moves between keyframes: straight lines, Catmull-Rom, Bezier with handles, cosine, or a stepped hold. Centripetal Catmull-Rom is the safe default; it won't loop on sharp turns.
• Set easing per segment. Plain ease in/out is there, along with quad, cubic, sine, expo, back, elastic, and bounce, all solved as real cubic-bezier curves.
• Animate field of view and roll per keyframe, bank into turns, or lock the aim onto an entity or a fixed point.
• Keep a per-world library of your paths and cutscenes to rename, duplicate, or delete.

Cutscene cues

A path can carry events that fire as it plays:

• Fades, colour-ramp veils, and letterbox bars
• On-screen text, action bar messages, and styled captions
• Sound and particle cues, placed in the world or pinned to the camera
• Screen shake with adjustable intensity, frequency, and decay
• Fog, vignette, and a smooth time-of-day ramp for mood
• Look-at, orbit, and offset moves layered on top of the path
• Expression-driven field of view, rotation, and position for handheld drift
• HUD hide, time-of-day lock, and a command run at any point on the timeline

On 1.21.1 and newer you can also stage actors: entities, players, items, blocks, armor stands, or particles. Each one gets its own pose keyframes and a track of timed actions like swinging, jumping, attacking, breaking a block, dying, or playing a sound.

Building a shot in-game

Open the timeline with G. Fly your camera into place and press = to drop a keyframe. Add a few more, scrub the timeline, and press ] to preview. Every key is listed under Controls and can be rebound:

• G timeline, . edit mode, , view mode
• = add keyframe, Delete remove, K duplicate
• [ play, ] preview, End reset, M library

Commands

Servers and command blocks get the same reach through /lumiera:

• /lumiera play <id> [speed] [targets] [center], where center is an entity or x y z
• /lumiera stop [target] and /lumiera reset [target]
• /lumiera list [saved|datapack] and /lumiera info <id>
• /lumiera delete <id> and /lumiera rename <id> <newId>
• /lumiera interpolation, /lumiera center, /lumiera reload

/lumiera cutscene play <id> [targets] plays a datapack cutscene, with stop, pause, resume, skip, and seek <tick> alongside it.

Datapacks

Ship cutscenes with a map by dropping JSON under data/<namespace>/cutscenes/:

{
  "schema": 1,
  "id": "intro",
  "duration_ticks": 40,
  "fov": { "mode": "keyframed", "default": 90.0 },
  "keyframes": [
    { "time": 0.0, "pos": { "x": 0, "y": 65, "z": 0 }, "rot": { "yaw": 0, "pitch": 0 }, "fov": 90.0, "path_type": "linear" },
    { "time": 2.0, "pos": { "x": 8, "y": 67, "z": 4 }, "rot": { "yaw": -30, "pitch": 10 }, "fov": 70.0, "path_type": "smooth" }
  ],
  "camera_position_mode": "absolute"
}

Camera paths under data/<namespace>/camera_paths/ take an events list for the cues above. Times can be given as tick, time, or at in seconds, and event types accept namespaced ids like lumiera:shake_camera.

Supported versions

• Minecraft 1.20.1 on Forge and Fabric
• Minecraft 1.21.1 on NeoForge and Fabric
• Minecraft 26.1 on NeoForge and Fabric

Actor staging is 1.21.1 and newer. The fog cue applies on NeoForge 1.21.1 for now; elsewhere it loads but has no effect. On-screen text and captions use EmbersTextAPI on the client.

For modders

Lumiera exposes a camera modifier API so other mods can drive the camera without fighting over it. Modifiers stack by priority on a separate background layer, so one mod's cutscene won't stomp another's. A small runtime API starts and stops cutscenes by id.

License

Lumiera is released under Ember's Modding Licence (EML) v1.2. See https://tysontheember.dev/modding-licence/. In short: use it and feature it freely, but don't rehost the files, fork it or use the code in your own projects without permission.