ImmersiveCinematics

ImmersiveCinematics

Cinematic cutscenes for your modpack — scripted in JSON, triggered by the world. No command blocks, no redstone.

A server-side trigger system decides when a scene plays; a client-side player renders it — keyframed camera, letterboxing, overlays, spatial audio — and a queue keeps scenes from fighting each other. Write scripts by hand in JSON, or build them in the editor with a live preview. Forge and Fabric, client and server, no dependencies.

Intro fly-ins · boss pre-fight cinematics · chest close-ups · fixed-camera puzzle rooms · world tours.

Camera

• 6-DOF keyframes: position, yaw, pitch, roll, FOV, zoom
• Bézier paths with arc-length parameterisation — curves at constant speed
• Follow an entity, or look at an entity / coordinate / structure centre
• Direction bases: world angle, entity facing, or a line between two points
• Handheld breathing shake, four noise models, reproducible from a seed
• Morph transitions; overlapping clips; per-clip looping (repeat / ping-pong); macro loop over a range

Overlays & audio

• Fade, images (PNG and animated GIF), subtitles
• Resolution-independent geometry — positions are window percentages, so one script composes right at any resolution
• OGG/WAV tracks or vanilla sound events; keyframed volume, pitch, position, fades
• Camera listener mode — footsteps, mobs and biome ambience are sampled at the camera, so the mix follows the shot

Triggers

23 types, evaluated server-side:

login · location · advancement · biome · entity_kill · entity_interact · block_interact · item_on_interact · dimension_change · dimension (residency) · item_craft · item_use · item_consume · item_release · item_instant_use · item_use_interrupt · item_pickup · item_drop · xp · observation · inventory · structure · gamestage

AND/OR conditions, wildcards, per-trigger delay; repeatable or single-fire with on_enter / exit_buffer; prerequisites — a trigger can require another script to have played first; per-player state synced to the client.

Playback control

• Priority queue: un-interruptible scenes queue newcomers and hand over automatically
• Skippable with a configurable hold key; multiplayer skip voting
• Input and mob-AI blocking, per-layer HUD hiding, arm hiding, view-bob and distortion suppression, pause-aware
• Multiplayer instance tracking and completion sync

World streaming

A cutscene that flies away from the player keeps its surroundings loaded: vanilla chunk tracking is driven from a virtual camera centre, so chunks and entities arrive by the game’s own rules, then the difference is released when the shot ends.

Editor

In-game timeline editor (F6) — multi-track editing, keyframes, box selection, snapping, clipboard, undo/redo, live preview viewport, camera flight mode for framing.

Standalone WebUI editor — shares the mod’s script schema and a local preview stream, so it always matches the installed version.

Commands

| Command | Description |
|—|—|
| /icinematics play <file> [players] | Play a script (@a / @p accepted) |
| /icinematics stop [players] | Stop playback |
| /icinematics status | Playback status |
| /icinematics reload | Sync scripts and rebuild triggers |
| /icinematics validate <file> | Static-validate a script |

Requirements

Minecraft 1.20.1 · Forge 47.x+ · Fabric Loader 0.16.10+ · no dependencies. Sodium / Rubidium / Embeddium compatible, shader-friendly, pause-aware. Script format v3, MIT licensed.

Script format & triggers · AI scripting guide · Source & issues

Version history — 0.3.5: chunk streaming, audio listener modes, script folders, trigger prerequisites, breathing v2, GIF overlays, presets, editor flight, no more Architectury · 0.3.4: audio, overlays, event track rework, camera tracking · 0.3.0: rewrite

Coming in 0.3.6

| Feature | Status |
|—|—|
| Colour grading track — curves, colour wheels, channel mixer, .cube LUTs, blend modes | ✅ Done |
| Multi-camera composition — split screen, picture-in-picture, crossfades between lanes | ✅ Done |
| Per-clip rules — if / until conditions that fire camera, overlay, sound or command actions mid-shot | ✅ Done |
| Motion models (spring, inertia, exponential smoothing) and per-parameter transitions | ✅ Done |
| Point sources, per-axis yaw / pitch locks, block and body-part look-at | ✅ Done |
| New triggers — death, facing, nestable all_of / any (27 total) | ✅ Done |
| Subtitle and description localisation (@lang: keys) | ✅ Done |
| Iris / Oculus multi-camera compatibility | ✅ Done |
| Standalone WebUI editor becomes the main workflow (F9); in-game F6 editor retired | 🚧 In progress |
| Editor-side templates and clip presets | 🚧 In progress |