Object effects are a pack of eleven Overlay Effects that know where the subject is. Each one scans the layer’s picture for a person or a face, then styles around what it found: a 1-bit print on the background only, contour rings stepping out from a person, a halftone window locked onto a face, a node graph that crowds onto the subject, measuring brackets that follow it through a clip. They are free, and they work on image and video layers.
Because they are ordinary Overlay Effects, everything you know from the chain applies: the dot mutes a card, Mix blends it, Active range limits it to part of the clip, and the cards stack — up to four effects per layer, counting any other Overlay Effects. What is special is the Tracking block at the top of every card: each card scans and stores its own subject, so two Object effects on one layer can follow different things — one the whole person, another only the face.
Add one
- Select an image or video layer and open the Effects tab on the inspector’s rail.
- In the OVERLAY EFFECTS section, click + Select Effect in the Add Overlay Effect field.
- Scroll to the Object pack (or type its name) and pick an effect.
- In the card’s Tracking block, press Scan subject.
Object effects are for regular layers only; an adjustment layer does not offer them, because there is no single picture to scan.
The Tracking block
Before the first scan the block reads Not scanned yet — every control below treats the whole layer as the subject. The effect still draws, but “subject” means the whole layer until you scan.
Press Scan subject and the block shows a progress bar — Loading the detection models…, then Scanning the image… or Scanning the clip… with a percentage — and a Cancel button. When it finishes, the status line summarises what was found, for example subject 56% of frame · face 93% · 12 samples · 40 KB, or no subject found. The button then reads Re-scan subject, and Discard in the block’s header throws the scan away.
- A still is scanned in one pass.
- A clip is scanned across the part of the file the clip actually plays (its trim), a few times per second, and the effect follows the subject as it moves in between. A four-second cut out of a long recording costs four seconds of scanning.
- Detection runs on models that ship inside the app, so it works offline and downloads nothing. It only ever runs when you press Scan, and a project that uses no Object effect loads none of it.
- The scan is stored on the card and saved with the project, so renders and later sessions never scan again.
- You can keep working while it scans. Every control stays live, and the finished scan lands on its own card without undoing anything you changed meanwhile. If you delete the card, the result is dropped; if you select another layer, it waits until you come back.
The block also holds the settings the scan uses:
- Detect — Person silhouette, Face or Person + face.
- Field feather (0–8 cells) — how soft the edge of the subject area is.
- Face weight (0–100 %) — how strongly the face counts inside the subject.
These three are baked in by the scan. If you change one of them, swap the layer’s media file, or extend the clip’s trim past what was scanned, the card says The stored scan was made with a different … and names what changed — re-scan to match.
Most effects also have Apply to in the block — Whole layer, Subject only or Background only — with a Region falloff that softens the boundary when you pick Subject or Background. That is what the scan is for: print the background in newsprint while the person stays in full colour, or engrave only the subject.
The pixel effects
Seven effects restyle the pixels of the layer.
| Effect | What it does | Main controls | Presets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dither Print | Turns the layer into a 1-bit press print in two inks. | Screen (Bayer 4×4, Bayer 8×8, Noise or Halftone dots), Grain pitch, Threshold, Contrast, Edge preserve, Paper, Subject detail (finer cells on the subject), Auto level, Ink and Paper colours | Cyan press, Newsprint, Risograph, Subject only |
| Field Isolines | Draws contour rings stepped out from, and into, the detected subject. It needs a scan — with none it draws nothing. | Rings, Ring spacing, Inward rings, Line weight, Dash, Fade out, Outward / Inward / Silhouette colours | Contour map, Radar, Heavy print |
| Portrait Window | Locks a treated window onto what was detected, with a frame and corner ticks. | Lock to (Face box, Subject bounds or Whole layer), Treatment (Halftone, Engrave or Source (sharp)), Padding, Dot / line pitch, Frame + ticks, Ink / Paper / Frame colours | Portrait, Engraved plate, Register mark |
| Slit Scan | Slices the picture into strips and slides them, optionally holding the subject still while the background shears. | Strips direction (Vertical or Horizontal), Driven by (Subject field, Edge strength, Standing wave or Random), strip count, Displacement, Hold subject, Strip gap, Wave speed (standing wave) | Hold the subject, Edge shear, Standing wave, Shredder |
| Spectral Curtain | Pushes the colour of strong contours out across the frame in bands. | Direction (Down, Up or Both), Density, Extrusion length, Band width, Contour threshold, Colour (From the picture or Custom tint) | Curtain, Rising, Tinted veil |
| Grid System | Packs editorial grid modules over the picture, keeping them large and open over the subject. | Program (Editorial / negative space, Measure / drafting, Fragment / broken modules or Data / signal index), Modules, Subject protect, Panel fill, Gutter, Open modules, Line weight, Cell labels, Seed | Editorial, Drafting, Broken, Signal index |
| Contour Studio | Draws topographic level lines, or an engraving hatch that follows the edges. | Method (Topographic or Flow engraving), Levels, Detail, Line weight, Hatch density, Hatch drift, Subject bias | Topographic, Fine map, Engraving, Subject only |
All seven have Apply to except Portrait Window, which uses Lock to instead. Their look controls keyframe like any Overlay Effect value.
The drawing effects
Four effects draw marks, lines and type over the picture instead of changing its pixels.
| Effect | What it draws | Main controls | Presets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Node Field | Marks on the picture’s strongest points, with optional hero nodes and labels. | Mark (Circle, Square, Diamond, Triangle, Hexagon, Cross, Plus, Bracket or Mixed), Mark size, Line weight, Fill, Size by strength, Size jitter, Align to contour, Hero nodes, Hero scale, Hero ring, Node labels, Label style (Chip, Outlined box, Tag on a rule or Code word), Label size | Node field, Mixed marks, Indexed |
| Link Graph | Lines joining the points into a web. | Link system (Proximity, Delaunay, Edge chain, Radial hubs, Orthogonal or Hybrid), Max distance, Line weight, Strength cut | Delaunay web, Constellation, Contour chain, Circuit |
| Facet Plates | Low-poly triangle plates built from the points. | Triangles from, Max plate size, Plate fill, Shading (Flat colour, Facing ramp or Monochrome), Plate edge, Subject only | Low poly, Faceted, Duotone plates |
| Measure Rig | Measuring annotations around a box: corner brackets, dimension lines with pixel readouts, a centroid cross and a tag. | Target (Subject bounds, Face box or Whole layer), Padding, Corner brackets, Dimension lines, Centroid cross, Readouts, Line weight | Survey, Face lock, Frame rig |
Measure Rig’s readouts show the box’s width and height in pixels, plus a tag with the subject’s share of the frame, the face confidence, or FRAME for the whole layer.
Node Field, Link Graph and Facet Plates find their points in the picture first, and share these controls for that:
- Analysis — the resolution the picture is analysed at, from 256 px (fastest) to 768 px (slowest).
- Max points — a ceiling on how many points are used, not a target.
- Edge threshold — how strong an edge must be to become a point.
- Pre-blur — smooths the picture for detection only; it never touches the picture you see.
- Seed — a different random pick of the same points.
- In the Tracking block, Subject bias (how strongly points crowd onto the subject) and Face protect (Off, Reduce or Exclude — keep marks off the face).
- Stabilise (default 100 %) — video only. Points keep their identity from frame to frame and ease toward their new positions instead of being re-picked every frame, so the marks do not jump, blink or rewire. At 0 % every frame is solved from scratch. A still ignores it.
The four drawing effects take three colours — Ink, a second colour (Second ink, Link ink or Edge) and Accent — and set their strength with Program opacity, which keyframes along with Mix. Their other controls are fixed values rather than keyframe tracks. While the preview plays or you scrub, they draw a lighter, sparser version to keep up; the render always uses full density.
Tips
- Stack for depth. Put Dither Print on the background (Apply to ▸ Background only) and Measure Rig on the face in the same layer — each card tracks its own subject.
- Scan the frames you use. Trim the clip first, then scan; extending the trim afterwards leaves the new frames without tracking, and the card tells you so.
- Re-scan after swapping media. The card notices a replaced file and asks for a fresh scan.
- Time it. Give an Object effect an Active range to bring it in for one beat, or keyframe its Mix to fade it on.
Where to go next
- Overlay Effects — the chain these effects live in, its card controls and Active Range
- Layer Effects — per-layer effects and the order everything runs in
- RotoScope and Magic Mask — cut the subject out as a mask instead
- Keyframe Builder — animating effect values
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