Seen in heat.
Turn a video into a thermal camera feed: the subject glows in false colour, flames burn white-hot and the background cools away, smooth or in pixels, dither or ASCII. A WebGPU video effect for React.
Part of Aperveil Pro · Coming soon. The live demo is open; editing and downloads open in a later release. Free shaders and blocks are available now.
THE SYSTEM BEHIND THE SURFACE
Inside Thermal Vision.
A video is shown through a thermal camera. The shader finds the subject in front, what is in focus and textured or unlike the ground in hue, and gives it the heat, keeping its own light and shade as warmer and cooler parts; bright light sources such as a flame burn hottest, and the background is laid down cool and quiet. The heat runs through a false-colour palette, ironbow by default, and is shown smooth like a sensor's image or printed in pixels, dither or ASCII characters, with a faint sensor flicker. The cursor is a warm hand that heats what it passes over. It opens on its own candle clip; a blooming rose is included, and visitors can bring their own clip, which plays in their browser.
Thermal Vision imitates the look of a thermal camera; it does not read temperature, and what it treats as warm is what is in focus and stands out, not what is hot. Video shaders are not yet offered as packages or Export Kits.
3.342 ms GPU timestamp median; p95 3.342 ms. 1440x900 @ dpr 1.5; Apple M2 (8-core GPU), Metal driver on macOS Version 26.6.2 (Build 25G83); measured 2026-10-12. This is a recorded headless sample, not a browser FPS or mobile-performance guarantee.
How the heat is shown: smooth like the sensor, or printed in pixels, dither or ASCII.
Cell size
Size of one pixel, dither block or character, in device pixels. Smooth ignores it.
Levels
How many steps of the palette pixels and dither print in.
Calm background
How cool and quiet the background is kept, so the subject stands out. Zero heats the whole frame alike.
Color Looks preserve these settings. Open the editor for all 13 controls.
THE SURFACE IN CONTEXT
Made for a real interface.
Give a security, energy or industrial brand, an esports or music campaign, or a product film a striking hero. Use the candle or your own clip with a clear subject, choose Paper for a light page, and switch Print to pixels or ASCII for a more graphic, retro feel.
Infrared imaging
See what the eye misses.
An illustrative page for an imaging lab, with a thermal feed as its hero.
An illustrative layout. Your content stays in HTML; the shader sets the atmosphere.
Try this surface in the editorAPERVEIL PRO
Coming soon.
The live demo is open above and in the editor. Editing its settings and downloading it open with Aperveil Pro in a later release. Free shaders and blocks are available now.
Explore shadersA FEW USEFUL DETAILS
Before you ship.
What this surface does, where it fits, and where it stops.
ANOTHER WAY TO SEE IT
Keep exploring.
YOUR COLORS. YOUR CONTEXT.