What named effects are available?

Last reviewed Mon Jul 27 2026 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

Short answer: Forge ships a closed catalog of 23 named effects. The insert palette groups them into four families: Animate (one-shot moments like @shake and the character gestures), Style (persistent looks like @blur and color grading, with an explicit off switch), Particles (15 built-in presets from rain to confetti), and Camera (@camera, @pan, @zoom, @kenburns). The crossfades - @dissolve and @fade - attach to background or sprite changes as transitions rather than standing alone. There is no custom-effect scripting; new effects only arrive through catalog updates.

Animate - one-shot moments

Animate effects fire, play out, and return the stage to normal on their own - nothing to clean up.

Effect What it does
@shake Screen shake - impact, earthquake, tension
@punch A sharp jolt of the stage - hits and slams
@flash Full-screen flash - lightning, gunshot, reveal
@sprite-pop A quick scale pop on one character
@sprite-grow A character grows in from small
@sprite-bounce A springy bounce on one character
@nod The character nods
@headshake The character shakes their head
@flinch A startled recoil
@perk The character perks up
@slump The character slumps

The five gestures (@nod through @slump) are body language you can drop on any line - and the sprite one-shots double as entrance animations a sprite can fire automatically on its first appearance.

Style - persistent looks

Style effects stay applied until you turn them off:

Effect What it does
@blur Softens the frame or background
@color-matrix Color grading for the whole frame - brightness, contrast, saturation, hue
@sprite-color-matrix The same grading applied to a single character - tints and washes
@sprite-opacity Holds a character at a chosen transparency

Each Style editor has an Apply / Clear switch, and a cleared event shows a muted "off" tell in the timeline. Persistent looks end automatically at a scene change. Full behavior: How do persistent style effects work?

Particles

One effect, @particles, carries 15 built-in presets: sparkles, hearts, petals, aura, rain, snow, embers, fireflies, bubbles, leaves, smoke, dust, ash, confetti, and mist - all drawn procedurally with no image files, aimable at the stage, the background, or a named character. See How do I add particles like rain or snow?

Camera

Four moves: @camera (the Shot - pan, zoom, and focus in one aimed move), @pan, @zoom, and @kenburns (the slow documentary drift). The Shot is aimed by dragging a framing rectangle that is exactly what the reader will see. See How do I use the camera?

Dissolve, fade, and pixelate ride other events

@dissolve and @fade blend between two stage states, so they belong on the event that changes the stage - the transition on a background or sprite change - rather than on a line of their own (a standalone crossfade has nothing to blend). The sprite pixelate look (@sprite-pixelate) works the same way: it's offered as the Pixelate in/out transition on sprite shows and hides.

Why the catalog is closed

Folio is narrow by design. Rather than exposing a scripting trapdoor, Vizno curates a tested set of effects that behave consistently in every supported browser - so playback is reliable without creators ever thinking about animation compatibility. There is no custom-effect syntax, and you cannot define your own effects in a script.

If none of these fit your creative need, describe your use case at vizno.com/contact and the team can evaluate it for a future catalog update.

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