I revisited this old procedural animation I had previously shown, and I wanted to add some texture to give it a metallic look. I then realized that the effect depends on the scale of the 3D object; the frame and the text receive the same texture map via a "replace material" setting, and the result really surprised me.
A fully procedural, adaptive per-character colored text system built entirely with expressions -- no character level styling, no scripts, no keyframes.
Change the text to whatever you want, tweak the gradient colors, and hit play. That's all.
⚠️ Note: the mechanisms involved -- subframe evaluation, temporal gradient mapping, modulo-based windowing -- may be challenging for beginners. A good understanding of Fusion expressions is recommended.
Three setups covered in this tutorial:
The core engine is the same in all three -- only the animation layer changes.
Note : #Text1.StyledText.Value represents the number of char of the text+.
StyledTextFollower
Delay 1/(#self.Text.Value+1)
Opacity iif(time%1>=0 and time%1<1/(#self.Text.Value+1),1,0)
Note : The follower must refer to it's own text to avoid circular reference
GradientColorModifier (temporal mapping)
Start Time floor(time)
End Time ceil(time)-1/(#Text1.StyledText.Value)
Duplicate / Duplicate3D
Copies #Text1.StyledText.Value
Time Offset 1/(#Text1.StyledText.Value)
Replicate3D
Time Offset 1/(#Text1.StyledText.Value)
Ribbon3D
Subdivision #Text1.StyledText.Value-1
Start X = End X = 0
Note : It's better to rewrite each expression for performance purpose. Fusion doesn't store the result of an expression but revaluate it each time it is needed.
Fusion 21 beta introduced two new 3D nodes: CreateReliefMap and ReliefMap.
Feed them any image and they'll carve realistic surface detail into a 3D shape — cracks, fabric weave, embossed metal, rough stone — without touching the geometry.
Unlike bumpmaps, the shadows and lighting actually look real because the surface can shadow itself. This is the same technique used in real-time game engines like Unreal — now available natively in Fusion.
Fast, non-destructive, and surprisingly powerful for how simple the setup is.
Here is a small hint for the ongoing challenge — not the full solution, just the core engine.
Two standard nodes. No character level styling. No scripts. Just expressions.
The rest is up to you 😏
Note: this core engine works both in 2D and 3D setups. Per-character font variation (grunge, punk styles...) is also under investigation — stay tuned 🤘
A new challenge: one Text+ node (plus 6 others, 7 total) to make this per-character colored text animation. No character level styling. No particles. Just a set-and-forget composition.
Change the text to whatever you want, tweak the colors if you wish... and hit play. That's all.
Can you guess how it works or propose your solution? 🎨
Note: the same approach can easily be extended to per-character font, size, or any other style variation.
Just a fun experiment — The key difference with similar effects (trails, duplicates, echoes, particles, Krokodove's extrusion, shadow): rays shoot only from the outermost contour pixels in the chosen direction.
Hoping to add fade, gradient, and polygon contour export (another project?).