Visual Effects and Animations
Some chassis have ambient animations and signature visual effects beyond static styling. This article catalogs what's where, what it costs in performance, and how to handle motion sensitivity.
Effects by chassis
| Chassis | Effect | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Apsis | Parallax canvas starfield | On |
| Matrix | Falling green code rain (canvas) | On |
| Quant | Scrolling market ticker (top strip) | On |
| Nyquest | Drifting grid + subtle shimmer | On |
| Prism | Running spectrum (panning gradient) | On |
| Atlas | Static (no animations) | — |
| Atelier | Static (no animations) | — |
| Courtroom | Static (no animations) | — |
| Garden | Static (no animations) | — |
| Paper | Static (no animations) | — |
| Ridgeline | Static (no animations) | — |
| Studio | Static (no animations) | — |
The "static" chassis are intentionally calm. If ambient motion bothers you, the static chassis are the right choice.
Apsis starfield
A canvas-based parallax starfield with three depth layers. Stars are randomly placed and slowly drift in the background.
Cost: ~1-2% CPU, 60fps, ~5-10MB GPU memory. Negligible on any device made in the last 8 years.
Toggle: not currently exposed as a setting. The canvas respects prefers-reduced-motion (see below) — if your OS has reduced motion enabled, the starfield is static (no drift) but still rendered.
Matrix rain
The green falling code rain you'd recognize from the movie. Canvas-based, characters drawn in JetBrains Mono.
Cost: ~3-5% CPU, 60fps, ~5MB GPU. Slightly heavier than the starfield because more characters render per frame.
Toggle: not exposed as a setting. Respects prefers-reduced-motion (no falling motion when set; static glyphs).
Quant ticker
A scrolling market ticker at the top of the chassis showing live equity quotes from a configurable watchlist. Live data is fetched periodically from Stooq (a free public source).
Cost: ~1% CPU for the scroll animation; periodic ~10KB network fetch every 5 minutes for fresh quotes.
Toggle: there's a small gear icon in the ticker bar that opens the watchlist editor. You can:
- Add tickers (e.g. AAPL, MSFT, BTC)
- Remove tickers
- Reorder
- Set the refresh interval (60s minimum)
The ticker is per-browser (localStorage) — your watchlist doesn't sync across devices.
Reduced motion handling
The platform respects the OS-level prefers-reduced-motion: reduce setting. When enabled:
- Apsis starfield: stops drifting (renders static)
- Matrix rain: stops falling (renders static glyphs)
- All CSS transitions: shortened or disabled
To enable reduced motion:
- macOS: System Settings → Accessibility → Display → "Reduce motion"
- Windows: Settings → Accessibility → Visual effects → "Animation effects" off
- iOS / Android: similar accessibility settings
The platform does not have its own "reduce motion" toggle separate from the OS setting. If you want chassis-specific motion disable without changing your OS setting, switch to a static chassis (Atlas, Atelier, Courtroom, Garden, Paper, Ridgeline, Studio).
Performance tuning
If a chassis feels sluggish:
- Check tab count — many tabs running canvas animations compound. Close other animation-heavy tabs.
- Check power mode — laptops in battery-saver throttle GPU which hits canvas chassis hardest.
- Switch chassis temporarily — Ridgeline or Paper has zero canvas overhead.
- Browser hardware acceleration — should be ON in Chrome/Edge/Firefox settings. Off makes canvas 5-10× slower.
- Update GPU drivers — old drivers can hurt canvas performance more than the chassis itself.
If a specific chassis is consistently slow on a modern device, that's a bug — talk to a real human.
Where to next
- Workspace Overview — customization scope
- Switching Chassis — how to swap
- Per-Chassis Terminology — labels per chassis
- Picking a Chassis — comparison guide
- Browser, Mobile, UI Issues — performance debugging