Noise & texture guide

Every control

Every noise type and every control, top to bottom. Some sliders are used only by some noise types; the line says which.

Load and save

They stay at the top while the panel scrolls. Your pictures stay on this device for every lab tool until you press × on a tile. Reset puts the controls back: an image you chose stays. Remove it under Image overlay, or with × on its tile.

Image AButton: Your image, laid over the noise. Press it to open one from your device, or drop one on the frame; two at once fill A and B. It is kept on this device, never uploaded, and every lab tool that takes a picture opens with it until you press × on its corner. The picture then takes your image's shape, with its long side at the chosen size.
SwapButton: Changes which tile Noise & texture uses, so a picture you added as B in another tool can be used here. When the other tile is empty, the noise is shown alone.
Image BButton: A second kept picture. Noise & texture lays one image at a time over the noise: the tile it is not using is dimmed and says Not used here, and pressing it only says so.
Randomize the seedButton: Puts a random number in Seed and redraws.
Download PNGButton: Saves the picture as a PNG, named after the noise type and size, such as noise-perlin-512x512.png. See PNG.
Record videoButton: Records one sweep, frame by frame, and saves it as noise-texture.mp4 (H.264, so it plays anywhere); a browser that cannot write MP4 gets a WebM. Sweep starts by itself if it was not running, and stops after. See MP4 and WebM.
CopyButton: Copies the picture to the clipboard as a PNG. See clipboard.

Noise types

The noise types. The first ten are the classic ones; the last eight are listed as advanced. The picture redraws when you pick one.

PerlinButton: Smooth noise made from random slopes on a grid, stacked in octaves. See Perlin noise.
SimplexButton: Smooth noise on a triangle grid, stacked in octaves. See simplex noise.
WorleyButton: Cells, from the distance to the nearest scattered point. See Worley noise.
ValueButton: Softer, blockier noise from random values at grid points. See value noise.
fBmButton: Stacked layers of Perlin noise, each turned and shifted so the layers do not line up, and scaled so the contrast holds as you add octaves. With 1 octave it is plain Perlin. See fractal Brownian motion.
RidgedButton: Perlin noise folded so its creases become sharp ridges. See ridged noise.
TurbulenceButton: Perlin noise folded so it swirls with sharp dark creases. See turbulence.
MarbleButton: In the list: stripes bent by noise into the veins of stone. Under Presets: Marble at Scale 4 and 4 octaves, in grayscale. See marble texture.
WoodButton: Rings around the middle of the picture, bent by noise. See wood grain.
CloudButton: Soft, layered noise. It keeps its own persistence of 0.70, so the Persistence slider does nothing here. See cloud texture.
Voronoi edgeButton: Lines where Worley cells meet. Octaves, Lacunarity and Persistence do nothing here. See Voronoi edges.
ErosionButton: In the list: stacked noise with its slopes carved down, like worn land. It is the slowest type to draw. Under Presets: Erosion at Scale 10 and 5 octaves, in grayscale. See erosion noise.
CurlButton: The steepness of Perlin noise: bright where it changes fast, dark where it is flat. Octaves, Lacunarity and Persistence do nothing here. See curl noise.
CausticsButton: In the list: bright criss-crossing lines from added waves. It does not use the octave sliders. Under Presets: Caustics at Scale 20, in grayscale. See caustics texture.
PlasmaButton: In the list: soft bands from added sine waves. It does not use the octave sliders. Under Presets: Plasma at Scale 8, in Heatmap colours. See plasma.
StuccoButton: A rough wall: cells mixed with fine noise. Octaves, Lacunarity and Persistence do nothing here. See stucco.
Film grainButton: In the list: one random value for every pixel, around mid grey. Scale and the octave sliders do nothing here. Under Presets: Film grain in grayscale. See white noise.
ScratchesButton: Thin lines at random angles in bands down the picture. Scale sets how many bands. See scratches.

Noise

ScaleSlider · 0.5 to 50 · starts at 8: How zoomed in the noise is. Low gives large shapes; high gives small grain. Film grain ignores it. See noise scale.
OctavesSlider · 1 to 8 · starts at 4: How many layers of detail are stacked. More is finer and slower. See octave.
LacunaritySlider · 10 to 40 · starts at 20: How much finer each octave is than the last, shown as 1.0 to 4.0. See lacunarity.
PersistenceSlider · 10 to 100 · starts at 50: How much weaker each octave is than the last, shown as 0.10 to 1.00. See persistence.
SeedText: Any word or number. The same seed always gives the same picture. Caustics and Plasma do not use it. The picture redraws when you leave the box. See seed.

Distortion

Warp XSlider · 0 to 100 · starts at 0: Pushes the pattern sideways by the amount a second noise gives. Seamless tiling ignores it. See domain warping.
Warp YSlider · 0 to 100 · starts at 0: Pushes the pattern up and down the same way. Seamless tiling ignores it.
ContrastSlider · 50 to 300 · starts at 100: Spreads the values further apart or pulls them together, shown as 0.5 to 3.0. See contrast.
BrightnessSlider · -50 to 50 · starts at 0: Makes the whole picture lighter or darker.

Output

256 · 512 · 1024Pick one: How many pixels wide and tall the picture is. See resolution.

256: 256 × 256. The quickest to draw.

512: 512 × 512. Where the page opens.

1024: 1024 × 1024. Phones and touch screens draw it at 512.
Seamless tilingOn or off · starts off: Draws the noise so its left edge meets its right and its top meets its bottom. The pattern changes when you turn it on. See seamless tile.
Grayscale · Gradient · Heatmap · Terrain · TintPick one: How the grey values become colour. See colour ramp.

Grayscale: Black to white. See grayscale.

Gradient: From a start colour to an end colour. See gradient.

Heatmap: Dark blue through cyan, green and yellow to red. See heatmap.

Terrain: Deep water, shallow water, grass, earth, stone and snow, from low to high.

Tint: Black to one colour of your choice. See tint.
Start colourColour · starts #000000: The colour for the lowest values. Shows when Colour mode is Gradient.
End colourColour · starts #ffffff: The colour for the highest values. Shows when Colour mode is Gradient.
Tint colourColour · starts #10B981: The colour for the highest values. Shows when Colour mode is Tint.
InvertOn or off · starts off: Swaps low and high before colouring, so light turns dark. See invert.

Presets

Each preset picks a noise type and sets Scale, Octaves, Lacunarity, Persistence, the colour mode and the two Gradient colours. It leaves the seed, the Distortion sliders, the size, Seamless tiling and Invert as they are.

CloudsButton: Cloud at Scale 20, 6 octaves and persistence 0.65, in grayscale.
MarbleButton: In the list: stripes bent by noise into the veins of stone. Under Presets: Marble at Scale 4 and 4 octaves, in grayscale. See marble texture.
Wood grainButton: Wood at Scale 15 and 3 octaves, in grayscale.
TerrainButton: fBm at Scale 8 and 6 octaves, in a Gradient from dark green to brown.
LavaButton: Ridged at Scale 5 and 5 octaves, in a Gradient from red to yellow.
WaterButton: Simplex at Scale 30 and 4 octaves, in a Gradient from deep blue to light blue.
Film grainButton: In the list: one random value for every pixel, around mid grey. Scale and the octave sliders do nothing here. Under Presets: Film grain in grayscale. See white noise.
CausticsButton: In the list: bright criss-crossing lines from added waves. It does not use the octave sliders. Under Presets: Caustics at Scale 20, in grayscale. See caustics texture.
Stucco wallButton: Stucco at Scale 12, in grayscale.
PlasmaButton: In the list: soft bands from added sine waves. It does not use the octave sliders. Under Presets: Plasma at Scale 8, in Heatmap colours. See plasma.
ErosionButton: In the list: stacked noise with its slopes carved down, like worn land. It is the slowest type to draw. Under Presets: Erosion at Scale 10 and 5 octaves, in grayscale. See erosion noise.
Scratched metalButton: Scratches at Scale 30, in grayscale.

Image overlay

Your imageFilled in by the tool: The image you chose, with a Remove the image button under it. The button does what × does on the tile in use: the image is forgotten on this device too.
Overlay · Multiply · Screen · Soft light · Add · NormalPick one: How the noise mixes with your image. Shows once an image is chosen. See blend mode.

Overlay: Darkens the dark parts and lightens the light parts of your image.

Multiply: Darkens: white noise leaves the image as it is.

Screen: Lightens: black noise leaves the image as it is.

Soft light: A gentler Overlay.

Add: Adds the noise to the image, so it only gets brighter.

Normal: Lays the noise on top.
OpacitySlider · 0 to 100 · starts at 60: How strongly the noise is mixed in. At 0 you see only your image.

Tile preview

Four small copies of the picture, two by two, so a seam shows at once. It updates on every redraw. See tile preview.

Sweep

Space presses Sweep, the lab's one keyboard. See loop.

SweepButton: Starts and stops the sweep: Warp X breathes around the value you set, a smooth wave, and returns to it when you stop. See sine wave and easing.
Seconds a cycleSlider · 1 to 12 · starts at 4: How long one breath takes, in seconds. Record video keeps exactly one, so the clip loops. See loop.
WidthSlider · 10 to 100 · starts at 60: How far the slider travels from end to end, as a share of its whole range, centred on your value. 100 swings the whole way.

Reset

ResetButton: Puts every control back to how the page opened.