jtannahill/amaran-mcp

A Model Context Protocol server and CLI through which an AI assistant drives an
amaran light from a Mac, built for two uses of equal weight. It works with
Claude Code, Cursor, GrokBot and any other MCP client that runs a local server.
| Studio lighting from a prompt | Music mode |
| Describe the shot (a talking head, a corporate interview) or show Claude a photo of the set; it sets colour temperature, tint and level, and a saved scene brings the look back. | The light follows what the Mac plays by the structure of the track rather than its beat: it drifts through the groove, pales when the kick drops out, blooms when a breakdown's chords lift, and opens out at the drop. |
Underneath, Apple's on-device sound classifier separates singing from speech,
and a 50/50 blend of gradient-boosted trees and a log-mel CNN, trained on 402
expert-labelled Creative Commons EDM tracks, names the section once a second
in 3 ms of numpy: balanced accuracy 0.49 on held-out tracks, against 0.36 for
hand-written rules. Everything runs on the Mac.
Play a breakdown: press play on
a vocal trance track and watch what music mode does, second by second, in step
with the music, next to an expert's reading of the same track.
So what · When to use this ·
How to use this · Music mode ·
Studio lighting · Tools ·
What's next · How it reaches the light ·
Research
## So what
Most music-reactive lights flash on every beat. It looks like a club toy, and
in a room you work or listen in it wears thin in minutes. Music mode listens
the way a musician does instead: it hears the tempo, the chords, the singing
and the sections of a track, so the light drifts through the groove, pales
when the kick drops out and blooms when a breakdown's chords lift, then opens
out at the drop. It never flashes; colour can only change so fast.
> [!IMPORTANT]
> Context matters, and so does the human imagination. Trance music evokes
> different vibes in everyone. Euphoric trance, however, is euphoric for many
> who listen, myself included; therefore, a bias towards a calming palette
> was introduced.
Lighting a talking head well is fiddly in the other direction: white balance,
tint and level, set by hand and lost by the next call. Here you describe the
shot, or show Claude a photo of the set, and it sets the light; a scene brings
the same look back tomorrow. Alone in frame, you can say the change out loud
instead of getting up to make it.
Everything runs on the Mac: the audio never leaves it, and the light is
reached through amaran Desktop or directly over Bluetooth.
## When to use this
| You are | Use | Why |
| Listening to a trance or house set at your desk, with the light in view | Music mode (ethereal, deep or dawn) | The room moves with the track's sections, not its kick drum |
| Streaming or recording with music playing on the Mac | Music mode | It follows whatever the Mac plays, AirPlay from an iPhone included |
| On a video call, recording a talking head or a corporate interview | Studio lighting from a prompt | White light matched to the camera, no colour on the face |
| Hosting a show or recording alone, in frame at the Mac | Voice commands to Claude | Look at the monitor, say the change, stay in your seat |