ANR Expanding Paths

Overview

Expanding Paths sends out outlined shapes from a centre point at a steady rate. Each shape grows outward at Expansion Speed, turns at Rotation Speed and fades to nothing over its Lifetime. Polygon Sides picks circles or regular polygons: triangles, squares, hexagons and so on.

The emission is a steady loop with nothing to key: shapes are already on screen on the first frame. They are drawn over Source, or alone on transparency.

Inputs

1. Sourceoptional

   The image the shapes are drawn over. Leave it empty for shapes alone on transparency.

2. Maskoptional

   Limits where the shapes appear: where its alpha is black, Source shows unchanged.

Output. The shapes over Source, or alone on transparency with their own alpha, covering the project format.

Quick start

1. Add ANR Expanding Paths. Connect a background to Source, or leave it empty.
2. Set Center X and Center Y, as fractions of the frame: 0.5, 0.5 is the centre.
3. Set Emission Rate for how often a shape is born, Expansion Speed for how fast it grows and Lifetime for how long it lasts.
4. Leave Polygon Sides at 0 for circles, or set 3 or more for polygons; Rotation Speed turns them.
5. Set Line Width and Color.

The panel

The node's panel as Nuke shows it, with the values of a new node. Click any control to see what it does; tabs and sections work as in Nuke.

All controls

Tips

• For a single pulse, such as a shockwave or a sonar ping, set Emission Rate to 0.1 and Start Frame to the frame where it should start: shapes then come every 10 seconds, one of them born exactly on the Start Frame.
• Rotation only shows on polygons; a circle looks the same at any angle.
• Stack a few nodes with different rates, colours and sides for layered radar or HUD graphics.
• Add a glow after the node for neon rings.

Good to know

• Every shape on screen is centred on the current Center X and Center Y: keying the centre moves all of them together, including the ones already out.
• Shapes keep growing past the edge of the frame until their Lifetime ends.

Works with

ANR Ripple TankWater ripples from one or two drops that spread, bounce off the frame edges and fade, as a height map or as a ripple distortion of your image.ANR Audio BarsTurns a music or sound WAV file into animated spectrum bars, in a row or around a circle, for music videos, lyric videos and audio visualisers.ANR GlowA soft, layered bloom around bright lights and highlights, with control over its size, spread and colour, and a matte input to choose which lights glow.