Vibary.ai
Go Pro
← All of Image

Neon Sign Effect

Hand it a photograph and it comes back as a neon sign — drawn only in paths a glassblower could actually bend, with every run of tube ending at an electrode and lighting the wall it hangs on. Two fields.

bring a photographicsstillphoto-inlightimage-promptminutes
ExamplesOne photograph in · one neon sign out · every run a real piece of glass
in
Cocktail glass
in
Sitting cat

We made two examples, from two different photographs: a cocktail glass, which is almost a line drawing already, and a cat, which is not. The cat is where the rule about what a glassblower can bend gets tested, and it doesn't hold.

You get a neon sign with a white-hot core inside a coloured tube, a tight halo, real brackets and cable, and the wall lit by the sign itself. With subjects defined by their outline, like the glass, it works from start to finish. Features that depend on inner markings, such as a tabby cat's stripes, can come out as loose dashes connected to nothing, and the wall ends up less lit. Pick a subject whose character is in its silhouette.

Generated for this library

Input
  Tubes       warm white for the glass and the stem; a
              single red tube for the olive
  Wall        a dark painted brick wall, the tube standing
              about a hand's width off it
  Photograph  cocktail.png (1254 x 1254)

Returned   1 image · 1:1 · the glass as a sign

paths      the glass, stem and base are one continuous
           warm white run; the olive is a closed red
           loop
core       a white-hot centre inside a coloured sleeve
           on every run
wall       dark brick, lit by the sign and falling off
           to dark corners
hardware   two mounting brackets and their wiring at
           the foot, unlit
floating   none here - the second run is where it goes
           wrong
words      none, in any script
SKILL.mdthe whole thing, as you would paste it© vibary.ai

You fill in 2 fields — the braced lines at the top. Everything below them is fixed.

  1. 1The tube colours, and what each one draws
  2. 2The wall it hangs on, and how far off it

Neon Sign Effect

What this makes

Hand it a photograph and it comes back as a neon sign — drawn only in paths a glassblower could actually bend, with every run of tube ending at an electrode and lighting the wall it hangs on. Two fields.

The whole template, in one piece. The steps below are the entire workflow.

How to use it

  1. Copy the whole template with the button above.
  2. Attach the photograph and paste the template in the same message.
  3. Replace the two FIELDS lines. Give each colour its own job, because each colour is a separate tube.
  4. Trace one run with a finger. It should go from an end fitting, through every bend, to another end fitting, without ever leaving the glass.
  5. Look at the wall. If it is evenly lit, the run applied a glow filter rather than hanging a light in front of a surface.

What you swap

The tube colours, and what each one draws
warm white for the glass and the stem; a single red tube for the olive
The wall it hangs on, and how far off it
a dark painted brick wall, the tube standing about a hand's width off it

Before it runs

  • A photograph, attached to the message, of something known by its outline. A sign is a few bent lines, so anything recognisable only by its surface will not survive.
  • A subject simple enough to be drawn without lifting the pen many times. Every separate run of tube is a real piece of glass with two ends, and a picture needing forty of them is not a sign.
  • A wall. The best half of a neon photograph is what the sign does to the surface behind it, and 'a dark background' is not a surface.
  • Acceptance that detail goes entirely. Neon has no interior, no shading and no texture — only where the glass runs.

When to reach for it

When something should look like it hangs above a bar: a title card, a cover, a shopfront mock, a poster, a sticker. Templates in this genre ask for a glowing neon style and hand back a picture with a glow filter on it — floating strokes that start and stop in mid-air, which no piece of glass has ever done.

What changes

  • One photograph in, one neon sign out — the subject reduced to bendable runs of tube.
  • Every run is continuous from one electrode to the other, so nothing floats and nothing stops in mid-air.
  • The tube has a white-hot core inside a coloured sleeve, which is what a real tube looks like up close.
  • The sign lights the wall behind it, and the light falls off with distance instead of sitting as an even haze.
  • One image, no type, no border, no lens flare, no bokeh.

Pairs with