Gates

A gate holds a step at its end until someone says go, whether that's a tap, a look, a step closer, or a grab. An optional timeout keeps the show moving.

What a gate does

Normally a step runs for its duration and the next step begins. Add a gate and the step plays to its end, then holds. The scene stays alive (video keeps playing, ambience continues), but advancement waits for input. Gates are how you hand pacing to the audience: the timeline proposes, the gate disposes.

Gate types

Every gate has a type: the audience action that releases it. Whatever the type, the gate's optional timeout is always a second way through, so a gated experience is self-paced but never stuck.

Tap. A pinch or a tap anywhere in the scene. The universal gate: zero setup, works everywhere, and the right default for "continue when ready."
Gaze at Entity. The viewer looks at a specific entity and holds their gaze on it. Pick the target from the gate editor's entity list. Perfect for attention beats: the story continues when the audience has actually seen the thing.
Approach Entity. The viewer physically walks toward a target entity. A trigger radius (in meters, 1 m by default) sets how close counts as arrived. This is the gate for room-scale staging: scenes that unfold as the audience crosses the space.
Grab Entity. The viewer pinch-grabs the target entity. The most deliberate of the four: the audience literally takes hold of the story to move it forward. Pair it with a prompt so they know the object is the key.

The three entity-watching types release on their target no matter where it came from, whether that's a placed model, an imported asset, or even a particle emitter.

Timeout and prompt

Two optional settings round out a gate:

Timeout. When enabled, the gate auto-advances after a set number of seconds even if no tap arrives (30 seconds by default when you turn it on; settable from 1 to 120). Turn it off entirely for a gate that waits as long as it takes. The timeout is your safety net for unattended installations and distracted audiences; the show never stalls forever.
Prompt. Optional text the player shows the audience while the gate holds, such as "Tap to continue" or "Look at the doorway and pinch." Without a prompt the hold is silent, which suits pieces where the audience shouldn't feel a pause point at all.

Tip. For ambient installations, gate with a generous timeout and no prompt. Visitors who tap move at their own pace, and the piece quietly keeps cycling for those who just watch.

Editing gates

Find the gate flag on the ruler. Steps with gates show a yellow flag on the timeline ruler at the step boundary where the hold happens. It's the timeline's way of saying "the show may pause here."
Click the flag. The source step is selected and the segment inspector opens the gate editor.
Edit the gate. The Gate toggle adds or removes a gate on the selected step (new gates hold for a tap and start with a 30-second timeout). Pick the gate type; the entity-watching types add a Target picker listing the project's entities, and Approach adds the trigger radius. Below those, enter an optional prompt and enable the timeout if you want auto-advance.

You can also reach the same editor by selecting any step in the segment inspector; the flag is just the fast path. Both Chapter Studio and Chapter Vision edit gates, and changes sync live between them.

Gates and animation

Note. While a gate holds, the segment's animation clock pauses with it — keyframe curves hold their current pose rather than running ahead. A model mid-glide waits exactly where it is, and the moment the gate releases, motion resumes seamlessly. You never need to choreograph around "how long will they wait?" See the animation overview.

Putting gates to work

Guided tours. Gate the end of every stop with a short prompt. Visitors linger as long as they like; the tour never rushes ahead of them.
Waiting for the audience. Open a chapter with a gated first step ("Tap when you're ready") so the experience starts on the viewer's breath, not the app launch. Add a timeout for the resilient version: audience-paced, and never stuck.
Attention direction. Gaze-gate the reveal: the narration about the artifact only begins once the viewer is actually looking at it.
Room-scale staging. Approach-gate a doorway or a far corner so the next scene literally waits for the audience to arrive in it.
Held objects. Grab-gate a key prop — the lantern, the letter, the handle — and the story advances the moment it's in the viewer's hand.

Gates pair naturally with presentation-mode changes. Gating the step before a switch into full immersion lets the viewer choose the moment they leave the real world behind.