Liquid Metal
Chrome · aberrationMolten chrome is a mirror that won't hold still. Liquid Metal turns the bright parts of your picture into a raised, flowing metal surface and lets it reflect a room, a sky or your own picture.
The sample with the Neon Chrome preset. Drag to compare, or press Play with it to tune it live. Open as a shared look
What it's like
Think of mercury pooled on a table, or a chrome logo from a late-night TV ident. The metal has no color of its own. Everything you see in it is the room around it, bent over every curve. Liquid Metal casts your picture in that metal, then lets it ripple, sag and splash through the loop.
When to reach for it
- Chrome type and logos. Metal only forms where your art is, so a logo on a clear background comes out as a solid chrome piece.
- Album and cover art with a liquid, poured feel. Turn up Drip and set Flow to 2×.
- A picture reflected in its own metal. Set Reflects to Picture.
How it works
Liquid Metal reads how bright each part of your picture is and treats it as height. Bright is raised, dark is low. It softens that height into smooth slopes, works out which way each point of the surface faces, then looks up what a mirror facing that way would see in the chosen room. Where the picture is darker than Mask, there's no metal, and the picture shows through instead.
Controls
16 controls in 4 sections, in the order Tune shows them.
Metal
- Hero knobHeight
0 to 100 · rests at 55
The hero. How tall the relief stands. Low is a shallow emboss, high is deep, rolling chrome.
- KnobSmooth
0 to 100 · rests at 50
How soft the forms are. Low keeps detail and sharp creases, high melts everything into round blobs.
- KnobRipple
0 to 100 · rests at 40
Waves running across the surface. They also wobble the picture behind.
- SelectFlow
1×2×Still
How fast the ripples move. Once a loop, twice a loop, or Still.
- KnobDrip
0 to 100 · rests at 0
The metal sags and runs downward from the bright parts.
- Pulse buttonSplash
Momentary · fires and falls back · can be recorded
Press it and a ring runs out from the middle, like a drop landing in the metal.
Surface
- SelectSurface
HammeredBrushedPitted
The finish. Hammered is dimpled, Brushed is fine streaks, Pitted is scattered pocks.
- KnobTexture
0 to 100 · rests at 0
How deep the finish goes.
Light
- SelectReflects
StudioSkySunsetNeonPicture
What the metal reflects. Studio is soft lights in a gray room, Sky is a clear day with a sun glint, Sunset is purple into orange, Neon is a dark room of magenta and cyan strips, and Picture is your own picture.
- KnobHighlight
0 to 100 · rests at 0
A sharp hot spot where a light catches the metal.
- KnobLight angle
0° to 360° · rests at 45°
Which way that light comes from, around the full circle.
Finish
- KnobAberration
0 to 100 · rests at 50
Color fringes along the curves, red on one side and blue on the other.
- KnobMask
0 to 100 · rests at 15
How bright the picture must be to turn to metal. Raise it and only the highlights become metal.
- SelectTint
ChromeGoldOil slickCopper
The metal. Chrome, Gold, Oil slick for a rainbow sheen that follows the curves and moves through the loop, or Copper for a hot copper orange.
- KnobRim
0 to 100 · rests at 0
Darkens the steep sides, so each form gets a dark outline.
- KnobBackground
0 to 100 · rests at 12
How much of the picture shows where there's no metal. At zero it's black.
Presets
5 presets. Each one opens in the studio as a shared look. Add it on top of your picture, or save it to My looks.
