Overlay shaders

Every zone-overlay shader that ships with PlasmaZones, with category, author, and tunable-parameter count.

Overlay shaders render through a multipass GLSL ShaderEffect as zone highlights, snap previews, and drag ghosts. 27 ship in-box across 6 categories, each taking up to four image textures; user shaders drop into ~/.local/share/plasmazones/overlays/ and hot-reload on save. Authoring contract, uniform block, and helper functions are in the Shader authoring guide.

Two sibling families ship alongside these: surface shaders draw on the windows themselves, and animations cover open, close, minimize, and desktop-switch transitions.

Branded

Distro-themed. Logos, palettes, and visual motifs for specific Linux distributions.

Arch Drift A procedural Arch Linux mountain logo built as 95-vertex SDF geometry drifts through scrolling terminal rain, an isometric chevron grid, traveling data packets, and CRT scan lines. The logo interior shows roiling cloud flow, lightning flashes, rain streaks, animated energy contour waves, a summit beacon, and traveling edge pulses with dense per-band audio reactivity
36 params
PlasmaZones
CachyOS Drift Multiple procedural CachyOS logos drawn as SDF geometry drift independently through the scene. Each facet animates with per-segment audio reactivity, bass-driven facet scatter, shockwave rings, and faceted edge sparks
35 params
PlasmaZones
EndeavourOS Drift A procedural EndeavourOS tri-sail logo built as three overlapping SDF polygon shapes drifts over flowing wind currents with parallax sail silhouettes at three depths. The logo interior shows simplex noise flow tinted per sail, per-sail bass pulses, a summit convergence glow, and shared-edge highlights, over a warm purple-to-coral gradient wash background with dense per-band audio reactivity
34 params
PlasmaZones
Fedora Drift A procedural Fedora infinity-f logo drawn as SDF geometry drifts through the scene. The logo sits behind frosted glass and brightens with the bass, with pulse rings sweeping inward from the zone edge, over a background of drifting data streams, a dot matrix, and a network of connected nodes
36 params
PlasmaZones
KDE Neon Drift A procedural KDE Neon gear logo drawn as SDF geometry drifts through the scene. Concentric rings, radial teeth, and orbital dots animate with per-part audio reactivity, bass shatter, shockwave rings, and edge sparks
36 params
PlasmaZones
NixOS Drift A procedural NixOS snowflake logo with 6-fold SDF geometry and a two-tone twilight gradient fill drifts through a crystal field. Aurora curtains, constellation particles, crystal growth lines, and a border of hexagonal cells that light up in a wave travelling round the zone all animate with per-arm audio reactivity
30 params
PlasmaZones
openSUSE Drift An iridescent chameleon scale field with thin-film color shifting, Turing pattern markings, curl noise dust particles, and a polygon SDF Geeko logo. The audio reactivity drives a chromatophore cascade, tail pulse, turret eye, camouflage shimmer, nanocrystal prism bursts, and scale ripple propagation
36 params
PlasmaZones
phosphor-flux preview pending
Phosphor Flux The official Phosphor look. Zones rest on the deep navy brand surface while two depths of luminous gradient ribbons drift through them, ember dust rises with the gradient, bright signal pulses travel a sparse node graph, nested containment strokes breathe inside each zone, and all the borders sample one shared gradient frame with a gleam orbiting each zone. With audio, every ember column rides its own spectrum band, the ribbons warp where the music is loud, bass blooms the graph nodes into small plasma vortices and breathes the shells, and the frame gleams run hotter with the energy.
23 params
PlasmaZones
Tumbleweed Drift A warm desert horizon with wind-carved sand dune textures, rolling tumbleweed pinwheel logos, dust devil vortices, parallax sand particles, erosion flow lines, and bass shockwave rings. The audio reactivity drives wind intensity, multi-layer logo glow, treble sand glints, a sandstorm band, wind-etched sandstone labels, and an iridescent inner glow. Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
32 params
PlasmaZones

Audio Visualizer

Reactive to CAVA — bass, mids, treble, or the full spectrum. Enable audio visualization in Settings.

Mosaic Pulse Audio-reactive mosaic tiles ripple across the zone. Bass scatters the tile hues, mids sweep the colour across the grid, and treble pops individual tiles and sets them sparkling.
audio-reactive 19 params
PlasmaZones
Sonic Ripple Concentric audio rings radiate from the middle of the screen and pass through every zone. Bass fattens the low rings and warms the core, and treble sparks the edges, so every beat is visible. Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
audio-reactive 15 params
PlasmaZones
Spectrum Bloom A polar spectrum contour seen through the zone, morphing with the full frequency spectrum. Bass to treble maps around the circle, and every bar defines the shape. Works best with 256 spectrum bars. Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
audio-reactive 20 params
PlasmaZones
Spectrum Pulse Reactive neon energy. Bass expands the glow, energy pulses race around the borders, the spectrum paints a flowing aurora, and treble fires off sparks. Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
audio-reactive 20 params
PlasmaZones

Cyberpunk

Neon, grids, CRT artifacts, and scan lines. Heavy on saturated rose, cyan, and purple.

Aretha Shell Ghost in the Shell inspired cyberpunk effect with color grading, hex grid, and data streams
35 params
PlasmaZones
Chrome Protocol A 3D stacked targeting array of 7 concentric rings raymarched in Z with an orbiting camera, a live 7-segment audio readout, rotating HUD panels, a hexagonal background grid, and a spectrum-bar strip that replaces the original rolling blocks. Bass breathes the ring thickness and camera orbit, mids widen the camera orbit, and treble fractures the grid with glitch bands.
26 params
PlasmaZones
Neon Venom Organic bioluminescent venom veins pulse through toxic pools with rising acid bubbles and venomous mist, inspired by Neon Venom
27 params
PlasmaZones
Toxic Circuit A cyberpunk venom overlay with glowing circuit traces, toxic drip effects, digital corruption, and neon shimmer, inspired by the Neon Venom aesthetic
21 params
PlasmaZones

Energy

Plasma-like motion with pulses, arcs, and charge fields that don't tie to a color scheme.

Magnetic Field Mouse-reactive magnetic field effect with orbiting particles and energy waves
19 params
PlasmaZones
Nexus Cascade Layered plasma energy with distortion, chromatic aberration, bloom, and zone masking
multipass 24 params
PlasmaZones
Plasma Sigil The PlasmaZones icon rendered as a glowing holographic energy sigil. Five zone rectangles from the app icon are recreated with signed distance fields and animated with gradient energy flow, racing perimeter pulses, and energy bridge connections through the layout dividers. Bass pulses the sigil and expands the glow, mids cycle the gradient palette, and treble spawns edge sparks along the icon strokes
20 params
PlasmaZones
Prismata A crystalline prismatic overlay where facets and caustics flow across zones. It reacts to sound, and highlighted zones get chromatic fracture and inner resonance
21 params
PlasmaZones
Pulse Flow A lightweight energy aura. Zone borders emit flowing energy that spirals inward through ping-pong feedback to build smooth radiant halos. Bass drives emission surges and radial pulses, mids shift the spiral topology and cycle colors, and treble injects spark traces. Built for full-screen performance
multipass 17 params
PlasmaZones

Organic

Soft edges and slow, drifting motion that reads as ambient rather than reactive.

Berry Drift Organic metaball blobs in berry and violet tones with mint sparkles, bubblegum glow halos, and a deep purple-black backdrop
25 params
PlasmaZones
Cosmic Flow Flowing fractal noise with an animated color palette and mesmerizing organic patterns
25 params
PlasmaZones
Liquid Canvas The desktop wallpaper becomes a living liquid painting. A procedural flow field distorts the image like paint on flowing water, with multipass bloom and audio-reactive ripples
multipasswallpaper 21 params
PlasmaZones

3D

Multipass effects with a depth buffer. Camera-stable scenes with real depth.

Neon City Fly past an infinite grid of pixel buildings lit by cascading neon signs and drifting street lights. Bass lifts the fog and pumps the street lights, treble flickers the signs, and mids cycle the window palette while the camera stays stable. Adapted from 'Neon City' by nikitamashchenko (Shadertoy). Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
multipassdepth 20 params
PlasmaZones (adapted from nikitamashchenko, Shadertoy)
Voxel Terrain Fly through an infinite 3D voxel world with floating islands and overhangs. Audio drives the wireframe glow, face emission, and volumetric haze while the geometry stays stable. Dark and moody, with bright neon edges that pulse to the beat. Enable CAVA audio visualization in settings.
multipassdepth 18 params
PlasmaZones

Using shaders

Shader authoring guide → GLSL 450 contract, uniform block, metadata schema, multipass, audio reactivity.
Surface shaders → The sibling family that draws on the windows themselves rather than the overlay.
Animation packs → Open, close, minimize, and desktop-switch transitions built on the same contract.
Shader D-Bus interface → Enumerate, refresh, and open the user-shader directory from scripts.
Bundled shader sources on GitHub → Every shader listed here, complete with GLSL source for reference.