Permanent lighting design software
Design permanent architectural lighting from a photo of the property
Trace the lines you would mount to, once. The footage, the fitting count, the price, the customer proposal and the crew work order all read from that one design.
A project is holiday or permanent from the moment you create it, and permanent rates live in your price book independently of your seasonal ones — so a year-round install is never quoted off a Christmas per-foot number.
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No credit card required. Full access for 14 days, and the trial does not convert — at the end of it access pauses until you choose to subscribe, and your projects are kept either way.
Choosing a plan starts a subscription — $69/month or $499/year — which renews automatically on that interval unless you cancel before the renewal date. Canceling stops the next renewal; the period you have paid for runs to the end.
Who this is for
The lighting contractor who already sells seasonal work and is being asked for a year-round system — and who is quoting it from a tape measure, a photo on a phone and a spreadsheet with the Christmas rates still in it.
You install permanent and seasonal both
The same crew, the same ladders, two very different price structures that keep getting mixed up in one spreadsheet.
You need footage before you can order
A permanent system is bought by the foot in fixed lengths. The measurement decides the order, and the order is not refundable in October.
You want the customer to see it first
Permanent lighting is a larger commitment than a season of C9. The design being visible on their own house is the same argument, with more of the sale riding on it.
01 — Scale
Set the scale on something you already know.
The measurement problem on a permanent job is the same one as a seasonal job and the consequences are longer-lived. Tap the two sides of a garage opening or an entry door and the photograph starts measuring in real feet.
02 — Trace
Trace the architectural lines, at your spacing.
Each run carries its own product, colour and spacing, and measures as you draw it. Permanent architectural lighting is track-mounted, app-controlled RGBW - a fixed channel along the eave with individually addressable diodes - and it is sold by the foot, which is the number this trace produces. The spacing you set is what turns that footage into a fitting count.
Spacing drives the count
Set the spacing your track uses and a traced 40-foot line becomes a fitting count, not an estimate. Change the spacing and the count follows.
Pitch is recorded, not guessed
A photograph flattens a steep gable and the run measures short. Record the pitch and the length corrects for the climb.
The measurement is never invented
No scale, no length. On a permanent system ordered in fixed lengths, a number produced to fill a gap is an order you cannot send back.
What is shared, and what is not
The measuring, pricing, proposal and work-order steps are the same code a holiday job runs through, and are verified on holiday jobs. C9X PRO does not model RGBW colour zones, scenes, schedules or controller channels - that lives in your track vendor's own app, and this does not replace it.
03 — Render
What we are not showing you yet.
Rendering works off the traced geometry regardless of lighting type. The worked example published on this site is a Christmas roofline, so there is no permanent-lighting render here that we did not have to fake — and a holiday picture with a different caption is exactly the thing this product exists to argue against.
Product image still needed
A nighttime render of a permanent architectural installation, generated by C9X PRO from a real traced permanent project — track-mounted RGBW along the eaves and rooflines — beside the daylight photograph it was designed on.
Everything else on this page is the product as it ships. The trial takes no card and runs fourteen days, which is a better answer to “show me a permanent job” than a picture we made up.
What this does not do
Permanent lighting has a software layer that C9X PRO is not, and a contractor comparing feature lists should find that out here rather than on day three of a trial.
01
No scene programming
Channels, zones, colour scenes and the phone app belong to whatever system you install. This does not touch them.
02
No dealer catalogue
It prices from your price book, not from a manufacturer's product list. What you buy and what you charge stay your decisions.
03
No scheduling or invoicing
There is no CRM, calendar, routing or payment collection here. It is the design, the measurement, the proposal and the work order.
Where this sits in the job
A permanent job walks the identical six steps a seasonal one does. What changes is the lighting type on the project and the rates in your price book — not the way the property is measured or the way the crew is handed what was sold.
Before you ask us
Questions about permanent lighting
Is permanent lighting actually supported, or is this a Christmas tool?
It is supported as its own lighting type. A project is set up as holiday or permanent when you create it, the price book carries a permanent category with its own rates - track-mounted RGBW, billed by the linear foot. A permanent run — — traces, measures, prices and reaches the crew work order on exactly the same path a seasonal run does. What it does not do is configure the system: colour zones, scenes, schedules and controller channels stay in your track vendor's app.
Does it design RGB colour scenes or programme the controller?
No, and it is worth being blunt about that. C9X PRO handles the design, measurement, price, proposal and work order. It does not lay out channels, assign zones, programme scenes or drive an app. Whatever system you install, its own software still does that part.
Can I see a render of a permanent installation before I buy?
Not yet in the public material. Rendering runs on the geometry you trace regardless of lighting type, but the worked example published here is a Christmas roofline, and we would rather say so than show you a holiday render with a different caption on it. The 14-day trial takes no card, which is the honest way to answer this question.
How is a permanent job measured differently from a seasonal one?
It is not — and that is the point. You photograph the property, set the scale against a known reference, and trace the architectural lines you would mount to. The footage, the fitting count at your spacing and the material list all come off that trace the same way.
Can one property have both a permanent install and a seasonal display?
They are separate projects, each with its own lighting type, price book rates and proposal. That keeps a permanent install quoted at permanent rates rather than inheriting a seasonal per-foot number, and keeps the two documents a customer receives from contradicting each other.
Does the crew get the same frozen scope on a permanent job?
Yes. Accepting the quote freezes what was sold, and the work order is generated from that snapshot — per-run footage, product, spacing and the materials to load — even if the design is edited afterwards. On a permanent install, where the mounting is not coming down in January, having the crew work from what was actually sold matters more, not less.
What does it cost, and is permanent lighting priced separately?
One subscription covers both. The price book is where the difference lives: permanent rates are yours to set independently of your seasonal ones, so a year-round install is never quoted off a Christmas per-foot number.
Set up a permanent project and quote it at your own rates.
Already have an account? Log in to subscribe or manage your plan.
No credit card required. Full access for 14 days, and the trial does not convert — at the end of it access pauses until you choose to subscribe, and your projects are kept either way.
Choosing a plan starts a subscription — $69/month or $499/year — which renews automatically on that interval unless you cancel before the renewal date. Canceling stops the next renewal; the period you have paid for runs to the end.
The rest of the same job
Year-round, measured the same way.
Permanent or seasonal, the property is photographed once, traced once and measured once — and the crew installs from what the customer actually bought.
No credit card. Full access for 14 days, and the trial does not convert — access pauses at the end of it until you choose a plan, $69/month or $499/year, each renewing on that interval unless cancelled. Your projects are kept either way.