The Fireplace effect turns a screen into an animated hearth — flickering flames, glowing logs, drifting smoke, and the occasional spark — for a warm, ambient backdrop behind a call, stream, or a quiet corner of a room. It's built for atmosphere rather than task lighting, so it runs well dimmed down in the background rather than as your main light source.
Before you start
- A screen you're comfortable leaving lit for a while. A monitor, tablet, or TV works well since the effect is meant to sit in view rather than face a camera.
- A darker room, if you want the glow to read clearly. Like any screen-based ambient effect, it competes with bright room lighting rather than adding to it.
Set it up
- Open the Fireplace effect.
- Choose a Fireplace style: Classic, Campfire, Modern gas, or Embers.
- Set Fire intensity and Flame height to size the fire to your screen — higher values spawn more flame particles and push them higher.
- Adjust Color warmth to shift the flame color from pale to deep amber.
- Set Brightness to control overall output — this is the main dial if the effect looks too dim or too washed out.
- Select Go Fullscreen for an unobstructed view. The controls fade out after five seconds without mouse movement.
You'll know it worked when flames are rising and flickering continuously, smoke drifts upward, and small embers glow steadily near the base of the fire.
What each control does
| Control | Range | Default | What it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brightness | 10–100 | 80 | Overall output of the whole scene — flames, embers, smoke, sparks, and the log glow all dim or brighten together. |
| Color swatch | — | Orange (#ff6b35) | Tints the soft background glow around the fire only. It does not recolor the flames — that's Color warmth's job. |
| Fireplace style | Classic, Campfire, Modern gas, Embers | Classic | The overall look: Classic and Campfire show two crossed logs with a brick or open-air background; Modern gas swaps the logs for a plain burner bar and narrows the flame spread; Embers shows a single settled log bed with a slower flame budget. |
| Fire intensity | 1–100 | 72 | How many flame particles spawn per second, and (with Flying sparks on) how often sparks appear. Higher looks busier and fuller, not just bigger. |
| Flame height | 1–100 | 64 | How high flames climb and how high smoke starts. The effect holds a minimum flame height internally, so the bottom of the slider won't shrink the fire below a certain point. |
| Flame movement | 1–100 | 48 | Speed of the flicker and sway — low is a calm, steady fire; high is lively and restless. |
| Color warmth | 1–100 | 72 | The flame's own color, from pale yellow at low values to deep amber at high values. |
| Flying sparks | On/off | On | Adds or removes the flying ember sparks entirely. With it off, no sparks spawn no matter how high Fire intensity is set. |
Common setups
- Cozy call backdrop. Classic style, Fire intensity 55–65, Flame height 55–65, Color warmth 75+, Brightness 55–65. Warm and steady without drawing attention.
- Roaring campfire feel. Campfire style, Fire intensity 85–100, Flame movement 70+, Flying sparks on. Busy, lively, and good for a stream backdrop.
- Minimal office ambiance. Modern gas style, Fire intensity 30–40, Flame movement 20–30, Flying sparks off. Cleaner and quieter, with less smoke and no logs.
- Late-night wind-down. Embers style, Brightness 30–40, Fire intensity 20–30, Flame movement 15–25. A low, settled glow rather than an active fire.
Troubleshooting
Flame height doesn't shrink the fire past a certain point. The effect enforces a minimum flame height internally, so dragging the slider into its lowest range stops making a visible difference once you're below roughly a fifth of the way up. Raise it back up if you want the height slider to have an effect again.
There are no logs, just a bar. That's the Modern gas style — it replaces logs with a plain burner shape by design. Switch to Classic, Campfire, or Embers for visible logs.
Flying sparks rarely appear even with the toggle on. Spark frequency scales with Fire intensity, so at low intensity they're genuinely rare rather than broken. Raise Fire intensity to see them more often.
Changing the color swatch barely changes anything. That's expected — the swatch only tints the background glow behind the fire, not the flames. Use Color warmth to actually change the color of the fire itself.
The screen looks hazy or smoky no matter what I change. Smoke opacity scales with Brightness, and Classic, Campfire, and Embers all emit smoke continuously with no dedicated smoke control. Lower Brightness slightly, or switch to Modern gas, which emits noticeably less smoke.
Next steps
For a different kind of ambient backdrop, try Aurora for flowing color instead of fire, or Ocean Waves for a calmer, water-based mood.