# Symbols Effect

> A GPU halftone that rebuilds a photo or video out of little marks. The frame is pixelated into cells; each cell's luminance is bucketed into one of four brightness bands; and that band's symbol glyph (tiled once per cell) is stamped, tinted with the band's colour over a white ground — so the image is reassembled as tiny symbols. Runs live on video through a WebGL (three.js) shader. Fully configurable: cell size, source zoom, background colour, four band colours, four band symbols from a built-in glyph set (dot, ring, frame, star, heart, wave…), the three luminance edges between bands, and a paused flag to freeze the frame. Ships a self-contained glyph set and shaders; the only dependency is three.

- Author: [Arlan](https://21st.dev/@arlanoska)
- License: mit
- Tags: Image, Video, WebGL, Shader, Halftone
- npm dependencies: three
- Live preview: https://21st.dev/@arlanoska/components/symbols-effect

## Install

```bash
npx shadcn@latest add "https://21st.dev/r/arlanoska/symbols-effect?api_key=$API_KEY_21ST"
```

Requires a 21st API key (generate one at https://21st.dev/mcp) passed as `API_KEY_21ST`. Free accounts get a limited number of installs per day; unlimited on a paid plan — see https://21st.dev/pricing.

Full component directory: https://21st.dev/llms.txt · More like this: https://21st.dev/community/components/s/image.md