Sign Up Sign Up
Water Ripple Effect

Water Ripple Effect for Photos

Drop a stone into your photo: concentric waves ripple out from a point and bend the image like the surface of a pond.

Image to ASCII Turn any photo into ASCII art — copy it as text or save as PNG.
Image to Pixel Art Make 8-bit pixel art from a photo with retro palettes like PICO-8 and Game Boy.
Glitch Effect RGB split, slice shifts, scanlines and static — a GPU glitch effect for any image.
Halftone Effect Turn photos into print-style halftone dots, squares or diamonds in two colors.
Duotone Effect Map a photo onto two colors — the Spotify-style duotone look.
Pixel Sorting Glitch-art pixel sorting: melt bright or dark pixels into long streaks.
Fluted Glass Effect Reeded glass refraction: look at any photo through ribbed glass.
Shatter Effect Break a photo into flying blocks that scatter away from an intact center.
Photo to Pencil Sketch Turn a photo into a graphite pencil drawing with adjustable line weight.
Photo to Watercolor Soft watercolor washes with ink edges and paper texture from any photo.
Tilt-Shift Effect Miniature-world tilt-shift blur with a movable focus band.
Motion Blur Effect Directional motion blur for speed, panning and dynamic shots.
Film Grain Effect Analog film grain and a soft vignette for a 35mm look.
Chromatic Aberration Split red, green and blue channels for a lens-fringe or 3D-glasses look.
Light Leak Effect Warm analog light leaks and flares in any two colors.
Neon Glow Effect Trace the edges of a photo with glowing neon lines on a dark background.
Paper Cut Effect Layered paper-craft look with cut-out shapes and soft shadows.
Posterize Effect Reduce a photo to a few flat tones for a bold poster look.
Colored Pencil Drawing Turn a photo into a colored pencil drawing that keeps its colors.
Glow Effect Bloom glow: bright areas softly radiate light.
Lens Blur (Bokeh) Dreamy lens blur where bright spots bloom into bokeh.
Zoom Blur Effect Radial zoom or spin blur that rushes toward a point.
Glass Tiles Effect See a photo through hexagonal or square glass blocks with refraction.
Torn Paper Effect Rip a photo into torn paper pieces with white edges and shadows.
Hexagon Mosaic Pixelate a photo into a honeycomb of flat-colored hexagons.
Swirl Effect Twist a photo into a whirlpool around its center.
Bulge & Pinch Effect Magnify the center of a photo like a fisheye — or pinch it in.
Vignette Effect Darken — or tint — the corners to focus attention on the center.
Emboss Effect Raised relief look: turn a photo into an embossed grey surface.
Blur Image Blur a whole image smoothly — clean edges, any strength.
Sharpen Image Make soft photos crisper with an adjustable sharpening filter.
Demo image — drop, paste or upload yours

More image effects

All effects
Swirl Effect example Swirl Effect Twist a photo into a whirlpool around its center. Bulge & Pinch Effect example Bulge & Pinch Effect Magnify the center of a photo like a fisheye — or pinch it in. Glass Tiles Effect example Glass Tiles Effect See a photo through hexagonal or square glass blocks with refraction.

More Images Tools

Image Converter
Switch between PNG, JPG, WebP, AVIF and more.
Image Compressor
Reduce file size while preserving visual quality.
Background Remover
One-click background removal with pixel-perfect edges.

Water Ripple Effect — how it works

Concentric water ripples spreading across a photo.

How ripples are drawn

The image is displaced along circles around the center: each ring pushes pixels slightly outward or inward, following a sine wave. The more waves, the tighter the rings; the more strength, the stronger the bending — exactly how light bends through a rippling water surface.

Place the drop

Move the center to start the ripple from a subject — a face, a logo, the middle of a product shot — and keep the strength low for a realistic reflection or push it up for a psychedelic look.

Rendered on the GPU

The ripple is a WebGL shader running locally, so it previews instantly and the full-size download matches the preview.

Frequently Asked Questions

In Image Flow the Droplets effect creates ripples from several points at once.

No, it never leaves your browser.

Not yet — animated export is on our roadmap.