Overview
What effects do
The Effects area is where the source becomes an instrument. Each effect contributes a different kind of transformation: analog degradation, glow, channel separation, recursive time, geometric symmetry, depth, line extraction, or color remapping.
Effects can be loaded together, reordered, blended with Mix, and treated as live controls. A subtle chain can polish a camera feed; an aggressive chain can turn the same feed into a reactive texture source for a whole performance.
Screenshot placeholder: the Effects tray with several active effect blocks in order
Workflow
Building an effects chain
Step 1
Start with source-level balance
Use General properties first when the video needs broad tuning. Effects are easier to shape when the source is already readable.
Step 2
Choose the role of each effect
Think of each effect as a voice in the synth: texture, color, geometry, time, feedback, or degradation. Add effects because they have a job in the look.
Step 3
Set Mix early
Mix decides how strongly an effect enters the chain. Keeping Mix playable makes an effect useful as a live gesture instead of a fixed treatment.
Step 4
Order effects deliberately
Earlier effects reshape what later effects receive. A color effect before Edge Detection changes what edges are found; Delay before Color Wash changes what gets recolored.
Performance
Using effects live
Modulate the expressive controls
Assign modulators to the controls that visibly move the effect, then keep Mix available for bringing the effect in and out. Modulation is most useful when it moves one or two meaningful parameters instead of every parameter at once.
Lock what already works
Lock parameters that are dialed in before using dice or broader randomization. This keeps exploration from erasing the useful parts of the look.
Randomize with intent
Use randomization to discover combinations, then narrow the result by locking key parameters, lowering Mix, or reducing the range of the controls that are moving too far.
Think in layers of behavior
A strong chain often has one effect for texture, one for color, one for motion or recursion, and one performance control that can change the whole feel quickly.
Reference
Effect catalog
CRT
CRT adds curved glass, scanlines, edge darkening, phosphor glow, and display-mask texture for classic monitor looks.
VHS
VHS creates analog tape instability with tracking drift, static, chroma bleed, tearing, wobble, and dropouts.
Chromatic Aberration
Chromatic Aberration separates color channels for lens fringing, prismatic offsets, and radial color drift.
Bloom
Bloom builds glow around bright areas, from soft highlight lift to bright lens-flare-style spread.
RGB Split
RGB Split offsets color channels for digital misregistration, stepped pixel splits, and wobbling channel motion.
Delay
Delay recirculates previous frames to create echoes, trails, smeared repeats, and time-based feedback patterns.
Frequency Shifter
Frequency Shifter remaps hue, saturation, brightness, and luminance into alien palettes and posterized color bands.
Kaleidoscope
Kaleidoscope mirrors the source into radial segments, then rotates, zooms, and pans the sampled pattern.
Edge Detection
Edge Detection extracts outlines from the image and blends them back as colored technical or illustrative edge lines.
Wireframe
Wireframe overlays a mesh-like grid that can be colored, displaced by luminance, and mixed with the source.
Mirror
Mirror flips, reflects, and segments the source with split-line, feather, offset, rotation, zoom, and kaleidoscope-style options.
Depth 3D
Depth 3D estimates layered depth from the image and uses it for parallax, focus, blur, edge glow, and red/cyan separation.
Feedback
Feedback recursively samples previous frames, then shifts, rotates, zooms, decays, and hue-shifts the trail.
Cel Shade
Cel Shade posterizes color into graphic bands and adds cartoon-style outlines with adjustable color and smoothing.
Color Wash
Color Wash sends animated color bands across the image with controllable band count, direction, waveform, blend, and hue.