Hands-free control

Where these controls live

Both hands-free page-turn controls sit in the reader. With a score open, open the Toolbox and scroll to its Accessibility section:

• Bluetooth page pedal — pairing walkthrough for foot pedals;
• Face gesture page turning — turn pages with your face via the front camera.

Keyboard page-turn keys, the reader's remappable Shortcuts map, and the Apple Pencil toggles are covered in Apple Pencil and keyboard.

Bluetooth page pedal

Page-turn pedals — AirTurn, PageFlip, Donner and the like — present themselves to the iPad as a Bluetooth keyboard. Page Turner has no pairing screen of its own: you pair the pedal once in the iPad's Bluetooth settings, and the reader listens for its key presses from then on.

1. In the reader, open the Toolbox and tap Bluetooth page pedal.
2. Put the pedal into pairing mode — follow the pedal's manual, usually a long press until its light blinks.
3. Tap Open Bluetooth Settings. The button lands in the iPad Settings app; go to Bluetooth and wait for the pedal to appear in the device list.
4. Tap the pedal to connect. It pairs as a keyboard.
5. Back in the score, the pedal turns pages.

Because the pedal registers as a keyboard, it sends the reader's fixed page-turn keys. Those keys, and when they stop responding, are listed in Apple Pencil and keyboard.

Note — The pedal keeps working while a panel or popover is open over the score; you don't have to close it to keep turning pages.

Face gesture page turning

Face gestures use the front TrueDepth camera (the Face ID camera) to turn pages from a facial movement while both hands stay on the instrument.

Set it up

1. In the reader, open the Toolbox and tap Face gesture page turning.
2. Turn on Enable face gesture and allow camera access if asked. Without camera permission the feature cannot run; the panel shows Camera access needed with an Open Settings button.
3. Under Trigger gesture — pick one, choose exactly one trigger:
   • Mouth Open (the default),
   • Eyebrows Raise,
   • Head Turn.
4. If you chose Head Turn, pick its physical motion under Head Turn motion:
   • Tilt head left / right,
   • Turn head (full, with chin) — the default,
   • Look up (chin up) — lift your chin to advance a page.
5. Rehearse the gesture while watching the Live signal meter — the page turns when the signal crosses the threshold line. While this setup panel is open, page turns are suppressed so you can practice safely.
6. Adjust Sensitivity if turns fire too easily or too reluctantly. Around 55% is the recommended starting point: higher triggers more easily (more false turns), lower demands a more deliberate gesture.
7. Relax your face and tap Calibrate under Calibrate at rest. The app samples 3 seconds of your resting expression and filters it out, so your neutral face never turns a page.

Hold duration sets how long the gesture must be held before it fires: Instant, 0.2s (default), 0.5s, or 1s. A longer hold filters out accidental movements; Instant reacts fastest. After each turn there is a short built-in pause (about half a second) before the next gesture can fire, so one long gesture never flips several pages.

Direction

With Tilt head left / right or Turn head (full, with chin), one side goes forward and the other goes back. The Turn head left → next page switch reverses the sides — useful for a pianist seated with their back to the audience, where the natural "forward" side is mirrored. Look up (chin up) always advances to the next page; it has no backward direction.

Camera and battery

The front camera starts when a score opens and Enable face gesture is on. Turn Enable face gesture off in the Toolbox when you are not using face turns and the camera stays off.

Limit — Face gestures require the TrueDepth (Face ID) front camera. On a device without one, the toggle has no effect — tracking never starts.

Limit — While the iPad is in Low Power Mode, face-gesture tracking is switched off even if the toggle is on. Leave Low Power Mode to get it back.

Limit — Only one trigger gesture is active at a time; picking a new one replaces the previous one.

Keyboard shortcuts and Apple Pencil

The reader's twelve remappable keyboard shortcuts, the fixed page-turn keys, and the two Apple Pencil toggles are documented in Apple Pencil and keyboard.