Wireframe trail

Wireframe trail leaves copies of a moving object behind it drawn as its own wireframe: the real edges of its mesh as fine lines. Each edge then retracts into its middle at its own moment, so the copy comes apart line by line, shading from the wire colour into the fade colour as it ages. The object itself stays solid. It shows wherever the object moves, from an effect such as Flip, an animation clip, an ongoing motion or a drag in the studio, and leaves nothing while it stands still.

How it works

The lines are the object's actual geometry, so a low-poly model leaves a few bold strokes and a detailed one a dense mesh drawing. A copy is laid each time the object has travelled a set distance. Kept on an object, the trail switches on before the entrance and keeps going through the exit, and it combines with every other trail.

Settings

- Length: how long each wire copy lasts. - Amount: how often a copy is left. - Strength: how bright the lines are. - Wire colour and Fade colour: cyan ageing to violet by default. - Fade: how long the trail takes to switch on and off.

Use it for

Tech and engineering stories, product design reveals, retro-futuristic and game scenes. For a line drawing of the object that stays, see Unweave; for a scanner look, LiDAR scan.