pixijs-filters

Attach visual effects by assigning one filter (or an array for chaining) to container.filters. Built-in filters cover blur, color matrix, displacement, alpha, and noise; custom filters wrap a GLSL/WGSL fragment shader via Filter.from(...).

Quick Start

const sprite = new Sprite(await Assets.load("hero.png"));
app.stage.addChild(sprite);

const blur = new BlurFilter({ strength: 4, quality: 4 });
const colorMatrix = new ColorMatrixFilter();
colorMatrix.brightness(1.2, false);

sprite.filters = [blur, colorMatrix];

const container = new Container();
container.filters = [new BlurFilter({ strength: 2 })];
container.filterArea = new Rectangle(0, 0, 800, 600);
app.stage.addChild(container);

Related skills: pixijs-custom-rendering (shader internals, uniform types), pixijs-blend-modes (composing with filters), pixijs-performance (filter tuning, filterArea).

Core Patterns

Built-in filters

import {
  AlphaFilter,
  BlurFilter,
  ColorMatrixFilter,
  DisplacementFilter,
  NoiseFilter,
  Assets,
  Sprite,
} from "pixi.js";

// Alpha (uniform transparency without per-child layering)
const alpha = new AlphaFilter({ alpha: 0.5 });

// Blur — strength/quality are uniform; strengthX/strengthY split axes;
// kernelSize must be odd (5, 7, 9, ... 15); repeatEdgePixels avoids transparent edges
const blur = new BlurFilter({
  strength: 4,
  quality: 4,
  kernelSize: 5,
  repeatEdgePixels: false,
});

// Color matrix — brightness is one of many presets. Others: tint, hue,
// contrast, saturate, desaturate, greyscale/grayscale, blackAndWhite,
// negative, sepia, technicolor, polaroid, kodachrome, browni, vintage,
// colorTone, night, predator, lsd, reset. Direct access via
// `colorMatrix.matrix` (20-element array) and `colorMatrix.alpha` (blend
// between original and transformed).
const colorMatrix = new ColorMatrixFilter();
colorMatrix.brightness(1.5, false);
colorMatrix.contrast(0.5, true); // multiply stacks on top of existing matrix
colorMatrix.alpha = 0.7; // blend at 70% strength

// Displacement — scale is a number or PointData
const displacementTexture = await Assets.load("displacement_map.png");
const displacementSprite = new Sprite(displacementTexture);
const displacement = new DisplacementFilter({
  sprite: displacementSprite,
  scale: { x: 20, y: 10 },
});

// Noise — seed is an arbitrary number that determines the noise pattern; same seed reproduces the same pattern
const noise = new NoiseFilter({ noise: 0.5, seed: Math.random() });

sprite.filters = [blur, colorMatrix];