Who’s behind Chromatose?

Chromatose is indepentendly made with ♥️ in Berlin by people who have been places and seen things.

Ed Rooth - Founder / Engineer / Digital Artist

Ed has a B.S. in Computer Science and 25+ years of software engineering experience. Hekuli is his alter ego for A/V creations and performances.

Franziska Eichler - Marketing / Communication

Franzie is a music industry & event management professional with over 20 years of experience.

Our Mission

Put real‑time, audio‑reactive graphics in everyone’s hands by creating a mobile‑first instrument - fast, approachable, and affordable - so everyone can craft and perform original visuals anywhere.

Background: how Chromatose started

I came to graphics through music. As a long‑time hobbyist DJ and electronic music producer, I wanted audio‑reactive visuals for uploads and live sets - distinctive, not the same tired presets everyone uses. I explored the usual software options and nothing truly resonated.

Then I dove into analog circuit‑bent hardware (YOVOZOL has a solid overview of video glitch / synth gear on YouTube if you want a peek into that rabbit hole). The possibilities are exciting, but the gear is bulky, expensive, and based on vintage systems that are hard to source. The results also tend toward a specific aesthetic. My studio is already full of analog modular audio synths, so I had to pull back before I started drowning in more gear.

I shifted to professional graphics tools. I spent a year learning TouchDesigner and teaching myself shader programming - tiny GPU programs that create imagery in real time. The immediacy of generative art was addictive: organic, complex forms evolving from simple building blocks without the wait of offline rendering. I started building my own live‑performance visual tools, crafting distinct artworks with parameters I could adjust on stage without losing the original character.

That workflow is powerful, but it comes with trade‑offs:

• steep learning curves
• lugging a laptop everywhere
• hard to share or distribute my custom tools
• expensive licenses
• hard to use casually

I wanted to perform at small events without bringing a whole computer. I evaluated some dedicated digital hardware systems - fun, yet often running shaders on chipsets less capable than a typical smartphone. They’re also cumbersome for data management, connectivity, and sharing (which is half the fun).

So I asked: why not run everything on a phone and solve most of this at once?

After all, smartphones are:

• ubiquitous - most of us already carry one
• powerful - capable of complex real‑time graphics
• connected - reliable external display support and plug‑and‑play MIDI
• evolving - they get faster every year

With my UI engineering background, I could make it approachable - democratizing visual creation for people who don’t have a programming background or time for learning complex tools or the budget for racks of gear.

I spent six months learning to build for Apple platforms, then another year heads‑down building Chromatose.

Chromatose started with - and still follows - these guiding principles:

• Mobile‑first
• Real‑time & audio‑reactive
• Fast & performant
• Native look & feel
• Small, composable building blocks for infinite combinations and unlimited possibilities
• Empower users to create unique art from scratch
• First‑class sharing experience
• Easy to learn; assumes no prior experience
• Built sustainably and affordably - no ads, no selling your data
• Frequent updates
• Professional quality

Building on these principles, Chromatose is continuously evolving – with regular updates, new features, and direct community feedback.
👉 See the Changelog

The result is a full-power visual instrument that’s always with you. Now anyone can have fun exploring real-time graphics. We hope you enjoy using it as much as we do.

Acknowledgements

A heartfelt ’thank you’ goes out to all the amazing friends who helped shape Chromatose with their love and support…

Franzie, Danny (the Stoned German), Jens, Dario, Fabio, Alaska, Yuki, Nick, Marcus, Simbaya and the whole Mogli Artcar Tribe.