Blur

A Blur emitter blurs the whole view for a moment: a hit, a flashbang, a dizzy spell. It is made by transforming a BlurEffect. Each emit makes one blur, a temporary duplicate of the original, and its strength follows a graph over its life.

What it makes possible:

• A blur on a hit. Emit 1, Lifetime 0.3, a Size graph from 20 to 0.
• A view that goes soft and stays soft. Mode Animate, Loop off, a Size graph from 0 to 20, Linger 3.
• A dizzy pulse. Mode Animate, Loop on, Lifetime 2, a Size graph of 0, 12, 0.
• A blur when a projectile lands. Make the Blur emitter the target of the projectile’s On Hit event.

Exercise 11 fires a screen effect for the first time. Its Variations table includes the first blur above.

Blur, Bloom and ColorCorrection emitters behave alike. This page describes the shared behaviour in full. Where it says “screen effect”, the same holds for all three.

At a glance

Made from	A BlurEffect
One particle is	One blur
Emit count starts at	1
Modes	Emit and Animate
Sections	Emission, Appearance, Events, Advanced
Not present	Spawn, Motion and Link. A blur has no place in the world.

The Emit count starts at 1. A new Blur emitter plays once at the first press of the Emit button.

What an emit does

Each emit makes one duplicate of the effect and switches it on. The duplicate follows its graphs for the Lifetime. Then it is removed, after the Linger if one is set.

The first value of every graph is set before the duplicate is switched on. The view never shows the original’s values for a frame before the graphs begin.

Transform switches the original effect off, and it stays off. A transformed effect adds nothing to the view until it emits.

Duplicates are temporary. They are never saved with the place, and they are removed when the plugin is switched off.

Where the screen effect is shown

Where the original effect sits plays no part. A transformed BlurEffect works from a Folder of emitters. It does not need to be in Lighting. See A screen effect outside Lighting.

Emit Into decides where the duplicate is placed:

Emit Into	The duplicate is placed	Seen
Empty	With the current camera	By the one player whose camera it is.
Lighting	In Lighting	In the editor, by Team Create collaborators as well.
Any other instance	On that instance	By nobody. Roblox shows such an effect only in Lighting or under a camera.

In the editor the duplicate is shown in the Studio viewport. With Emit Into empty, Team Create collaborators do not see it.

NOTE

In a game, a screen effect is seen by one player: the one whose machine fires it. For every player to see it, each player’s machine must fire the emitter. See Firing an effect.

Transform

Transform switches the original BlurEffect off. It keeps the effect’s Size as a level graph.

Emission

Row	Kind	Starts at	Unit	What it does
Mode	List	Emit		Emit or Animate. See Emit against Animate.
Loop	Switch	Off		Shown in Animate mode. Repeats the cycle until switched off. Switching it on starts a cycle at once.
Enabled	Switch	Off		Shown in Emit mode. Makes blurs at the Rate until switched off.
Rate	Number	10	Blurs per second	How many blurs are made each second while Enabled is on, or during a Duration.
Lifetime	Two numbers	1	Seconds	How long each blur lasts. Each picks a value between the two.
Linger	Number	0	Seconds	After its life ends, the blur stays at its last value for this long.
Timescale	Graph	1		The speed of the blur’s own clock.

The Rate row stays on show in Animate mode. Animate mode does not use it.

The Emit, Delay and Duration boxes on the HUD fire a Blur emitter as they fire any other. Emission and the HUD describes the shared rows in full.

Appearance

Row	Kind	Starts at	Unit	What it does
Size	Graph	The BlurEffect’s own Size		The strength of the blur, over its life.

The box of a graph row takes one number, or two numbers as lo, hi. Two numbers give each blur one value between them for its whole life. The ⋯ button opens the graph editor.

A keypoint below 0 is kept as 0. A random spread larger than the value is cut down to the value.

The plugin sets no upper limit on Size. Roblox applies its own.

The graph is read in steps, Anim. Steps times over one Lifetime.

Events

The Events section holds On Emit, On Death and On Destruction. There is no On Hit. See Events.

Advanced

Row	Kind	Starts at	What it does
Anim. Steps	Number	100	How many times the graph is read over one Lifetime. A value of 0 or less is run as 100.
Emit Into	Instance, picked with *	None	Where the duplicate is placed. Any instance can be picked. The row can be cleared. See Where the screen effect is shown.

Advanced describes these rows in full.

Several at once

In Emit mode every emit makes its own duplicate. The plugin does not merge them, limit them or fade one into the next.

Each duplicate is an independent Roblox effect. Overlapping duplicates stack, so a high Rate quickly becomes far stronger than one duplicate.

CAUTION

With Enabled on, Rate 10 and Lifetime 1, about ten screen effects are active at any moment. For a single blur use the Emit box with a count of 1.

The only limit is the Particle Cap in Settings. Each duplicate counts as one particle.

Emit against Animate

	Emit	Animate
What plays	A new duplicate for each emit.	One duplicate for the emitter.
Emit count and Rate	Used.	Not used. A count of 0 still plays.
Fired again while playing	Another duplicate is added.	The press is ignored until the cycle ends.
At the end	The duplicate is removed, after the Linger.	With Loop off, the duplicate holds its last look for the Linger. Then it is removed.
Loop	Not shown.	The same duplicate replays until Loop is switched off.

In Animate mode the rule of one duplicate holds for each emitter. Two Blur emitters in Animate mode give two blurs at once.

The Emit button, events and scripts all follow the rule.

With Loop on, each pass reads the graphs, Anim. Steps and Timescale again. An edit made while the loop runs shows from the next pass. Lifetime picks a new value between its two numbers at each pass. Emit Into is read only when the duplicate is made.

Nesting and events

A screen effect emitter can be placed inside another emitter’s RenderTemplate. It then fires once for each parent particle, with its own Emit count, Delay and Duration. See Nesting.

• A nested screen effect with an Emit count of 0 and a Duration of 0 never fires.
• The duplicate is still placed with the camera. It does not follow the parent particle.
• Emitters placed inside a Blur, Bloom or ColorCorrection emitter are never fired.

A screen effect emitter can be the target of an event. See Events.

• It fires in place. An event cannot move it to another position.
• An Emit count of 0 is treated as 1.

With the tools

Tool	Effect on a Blur emitter
Size	Multiplies the Size graph.
Time	Multiplies Rate and divides Lifetime.

Size and Time describes both tools.

Limits

• No Spawn rows, no Motion rows and no Link.
• In a game, one player sees the blur: the one whose machine fires it.
• With Enabled on, blurs overlap and stack. For a steady blur, use Mode Animate with Loop on. That is one blur.
• Each emitted blur counts as one particle toward the Particle Cap.