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ProximityEffect.js

v3.0.0-a4

Bulk modify CSS properties on elements based on mouse pointer or other arbitrary element proximity. Very customisable, definitely overdeveloped. A fun pet project originally from the Flash days, remade in JS as a practice project. Version 3 has had an API makeover and is a little more flexible. More importantly, it can be a LOT more flexible in the future, and shouldn't see any more drastic changes to the syntax (he says naively).

View live demos

Roadmap

  • (for 3.0) Fix up code. Stable API. Better documentation.
  • (for 3.1) Multiple-value CSS properties.
  • (for 3.2) Per-property parameters.
  • (for 3.3) Multi-point animations.

Installation

Vanilla

Latest ES6+ version is in src, ES5/minified versions are in dist. Download your version of choice and embed in your HTML:

<script src="ProximityEffect.min.js"></script>

CDN

<script src="https://unpkg.com/proximity-effect"></script>

Use

Add some content to affect

In your <body> content add some elements you want to affect:

<div>
   <div class="foo">...</div>
   <div class="foo">...</div>
   <div class="foo">...</div>
   ...
</div>

You could also generate some elements programmatically.

Set-up

Remaining set-up should be done after content has loaded. Start by defining your list of elements to animate, and params object to control the animation.

Elements

ProximityEffect needs a NodeList containing all the elements to include. You can use any suitable DOM method for this, e.g.:

let elements = document.querySelectorAll("*.foo");

Params

Next, define the effect parameters in an object. All parameters are optional, but without setting at least a value for threshold or runoff you won't see anything. Nearly all parameters can also be accessed as properties after instantiation.

Parameter Type Details
attack and decay Number Sets the rate of change when approaching (attack) or receding (decay), giving an effect of inertia. 1 is full speed, 0 is no movement (effectively disabling the animation). Default is 1.
invert Boolean Reverse the keyframes array, effectively swapping near and far distances. Default is false.
threshold Number The minimum distance (from element's mathematical centre) before effect starts, in pixels. Can be any positive number, default is 0.
runoff Number The distance over which styles are interpolated, in pixels. Default is 0.
direction String The coordinates axis/axes to use for distance calculations. Can be "both", "horizontal" or "vertical". Default is "both".
offsetX and offsetY Number Global horizontal (offsetX) and vertical (offsetY) centre-point offset. Default is 0. Stacks with individual element offsets.
jitter, jitterX and jitterY Number Random offset per element, in pixels. jitter affects both X and Y values, while jitterX and jitterY affect only their respective axis. All three values stack. Default is 0.
jitterMethod String Random generation method for jitter values. Accepts "uniform" or "gaussian". Default is "uniform".
FPS Number or Falsy If set to a positive number, will attempt to refresh any effects at the specified frame rate. Effect updates cannot be displayed quicker than your screen's refresh rate, but internal calculations can take place more quickly. Specifying any value that is not a positive number, or no value at all, will clear the FPS property and attempt to refresh at the screen's refresh rate.
primeDistances Boolean If true, will initialise all distances to 0, so the effect will appear to spring into its starting position. Can only be set as part of the params object during instantiation - it cannot be accessed as a property.

For example:

let params = {
   attack:     0.8,
   decay:      0.7,
   threshold: 40,
   runoff:   100,
   jitter:    35
}

Create a new ProximityEffect instance

Next, create a ProximityEffect instance, feeding in the list of elements and the effect parameters:

let myEffect = new ProximityEffect(elements, params);

The params object is optional - individual properties on the ProximityEffect instance can also be set after-the-fact, e.g.:

myEffect.runoff = 250;
myEffect.invert = true;

Add style rules

Finally, add style rules to the ProximityEffect instance as you see fit. The addStyle() method is used for this:

ProximityEffect.addStyle (property, keyframes, [params]);

Here's how the arguments break down:

Argument Type Description
property String or Object Defines the CSS property that will be modified. This can be a string that is the name of a pre-defined CSS property, or can be an object defining a property of your own. [details to come]
keyframes Array An array defining the start and end values of this property when animated. Only the first and last values of the array are read currently; eventually more fine-grained animations will be possible. Values can be either a number specifying the value, or can be an object defining additional parameters. [details to come]
params Object Currently unused.

ProximityEffect comes pre-defined with most permitted functions of the transform and filter style rules. It currently only supports custom properties with single numerical values in them, so rgb() and the like can't be used yet.

For example:

myEffect.addStyle('opacity', [100, 50]);
myEffect.addStyle('scale',   [  1,  2]);
myEffect.addStyle('blur',    [  0, 10]);

Here are some example of defining custom properties:

myEffect.addStyle({rule: 'left', unit: 'em'}, [100, 50]);
myEffect.addStyle({rule: 'transform', func: 'perspective', unit: 'px'},  [100, 50]);

The values array can also contain objects with a value key and other optional properties, including a scatter value:

myEffect.addStyle('translateX', [0, {value: 50, scatter: 15}]);
myEffect.addStyle({rule: 'padding', unit: 'px'}, [{value: 20, scatter: 30}, {value: 100, scatter: 50}]);

API

Full details on the API are forthcoming, for now there is only an unfinished page on the wiki.

License:

This software is provided under the Mozilla Public License 2.0. You can freely use the code in your own projects, using any license, without limitation, but if you modify the code base those changes must be pushed back under the same MPL2 license. Any copyright/credits must be left intact.