Sessions & Projects
How OSC-1 saves your work — the projects library, autosave, Cmd+S, .beamtracer files, and resetting a session.
OSC-1 treats everything you set up — sources, presets, effects, synth state, scenes — as a project. Freehand and line drawings, including unfinished lines and trace speed, are part of each project. Projects save automatically in your browser, live side by side in a named library, and can be exported as files.
Projects
OSC-1 keeps a library of named projects rather than one running session. Open it with the PROJECTS button at the bottom of the Sources panel.
Each project shows a preview of its last saved look, its name, and when it was last opened — most recent first. From the library you can:
- Open a project — the one you are leaving is stored first, so nothing is lost in a switch
- Create a new empty project
- Rename a project, or Duplicate it to try a variation without risking the original
- Export a project as a
.beamtracerfile, or Import one - Delete a project, which asks for confirmation first
If a project has autosaved changes that are not in its saved copy yet, its row says so.
Autosave and saving
OSC-1 autosaves shortly after a change, per project. Closing the tab and reopening restores where you left off on the same browser and machine — each project keeps its own autosave, so they never overwrite one another.
If a storage error interrupts a save or replacement import, OSC-1 restores the previous stored copy. If the browser also refuses restoration, the error says the previous version could not be restored. Export your current work before closing the tab or trying again.
The project name is shown in the header. Click it to rename the project. Next to it, a status dot shows Unsaved changes (amber) or All changes saved.
Press Cmd/Ctrl+S at any time to save immediately, or use the save button in the projects library. The one exception: while a laser is armed and ready to start, Cmd/Ctrl+S is the laser START key, so save from the projects library instead — see keyboard control.
If OSC-1 reopens showing autosaved work that never made it into a save — after a crash or a closed tab — an amber notice appears above the library with SAVE THEM to keep those changes, or the option to reload the last saved version and drop them. You choose; nothing is decided for you.
Restoring or switching a project restores its drawing without starting playback. A new empty project starts with an empty drawing. Older project files without drawing data open with an empty drawing too. SAVE DRAWING and OPEN DRAWING in CREATOR → DRAWING offer a separate editable file; see drawing files.
Project Files (.beamtracer)
Exporting downloads your project as a .beamtracer file named after it. Importing brings one back in — if the name already exists, OSC-1 asks what you want to do rather than silently overwriting.
If a project file cannot be read, OSC-1 shows an error in the Projects panel and keeps your current project and library unchanged.
Because autosave lives in your browser, project files are how you move work between machines:
Save tonight's set, reload at the venue. Build and test your set at home, export it to a .beamtracer file, then at the venue open OSC-1 and import it — your sources, presets, and scenes come back exactly as saved.
Resetting a Session
The RESET SESSION button in the session footer clears the current audio, resets all settings to defaults, and returns the app to its initial state. A confirmation dialog appears first. After resetting, Undo Reset session restores the authored project settings and selected track as one step; playback and recording stay stopped. Export a .beamtracer file beforehand when you need a portable recovery copy or want to preserve live playback state.