Make your cover move to your song. Start with existing artwork and a separate audio file, then choose how the sound changes the picture. In this example, the cover grows on the kicks and a red-cyan fringe opens on the hi-hats. Press play to see and hear the finished 12-second video.

Example file: 720 × 720, 12 seconds, 30 fps, H.264 with AAC. The composition was exported at 1080 × 1080 and compressed for this page. Press play to hear the passage. The picture does not start on its own.

Choosing a tool first? Compare music visualizer software for Mac by artwork, template-video, modular and live-performance workflows.

What you need

  • Your artwork. This example uses a square image at 1080 × 1080.
  • One separate WAV, MP3, or supported AAC M4A file for this tutorial. Artfkt can also retain supported video sound or detach it as an independent audio track.
  • Artfkt for an Apple Silicon Mac running macOS 13 or later, or a 64-bit Windows 10 or 11 PC.

Artfkt is US$29 with the launch offer (regularly US$39), paid once. The purchase links in this guide apply the launch code.

Buy Artfkt for the desktop workflow below. The free browser demo lets you explore effects and procedural motion, but does not include audio-driven motion. For an experiment without audio, try the animated poster walkthrough.

Using live sound instead? Artfkt for Mac and Windows also listens to computer audio on macOS 14.2 or later or Windows, or to a physical or virtual input device on either platform. You can make artwork respond to that input and record a running show with its configured Master audio. This is a separate workflow: ordinary timeline export does not replay live-only assignments. See the live-performance FAQ.

You do not need to know the song’s tempo for Energy or Hits. Those signals respond to the audio. BPM entry is only needed for the optional manually aligned Beat Grid example later in this guide.

The 12-second practice passage is an original synthesized WAV: low kicks and high hi-hats make the two responses easy to compare. Its tempo is 110 BPM. Your own music may contain several instruments in each frequency band.

1. Bring in the artwork and soundtrack

Create a square composition with Instagram Square (1080 × 1080) and place your cover so it fills the frame.

Open Animate → Sound input. Use Composition audio as the sound source and choose Import soundtrack. For the practice passage, choose Match composition to passage to make the composition twelve seconds long. Close Sound input when you are ready to assign the controls below.

Select Animate below the canvas to enable motion. Importing a soundtrack does not start playback for you.

2. Make the cover move

Select the cover layer. In Animate → Properties, select Scale and set Property motion to Sound. Open Fine-tune response and set:

Control Value
Audio signal Energy
Frequency band Low
Response Tight
Amount 8%

With Scale starting at 100%, an Amount of 8% gives a 100%–108% range. The range summary shows the endpoints; change the start value too if your cover uses a different initial scale.

Press Play. In the practice passage, the low-band energy comes mainly from the kick, so the cover grows on each kick and settles afterward. The Low band measures a range of frequencies; it does not separate the drums from the rest of a mixed song.

3. Add a second response

Add Film Grain, followed by RGB Split, to the cover. In Film Grain’s FX card, open More actions and turn Motion: Film Grain off to keep its texture still. Set RGB Split’s Angle to 0°; under Animate → Properties, select RGB Split → Angle and choose Manual so it stays fixed.

Select RGB Split → Amount under Properties and set Property motion to Sound. Open Fine-tune response and set:

Control Value
Audio signal Energy
Frequency band High
Response Tight
Amount: Range start / end 0 / 0.02

Play the passage and compare a kick with a hi-hat. Scale follows the low band while the fringe follows the high band. Keep the range small enough that your cover remains readable at its destination size. Each target uses one motion source at a time.

Film Grain reference

These settings provide the still texture in the example. Keep Film Grain’s Motion off and Variation rate at 0 so its controls do not follow the composition’s time driver or shimmer independently of the music.

Control Value
Grain size 0.35%
Clump 0.35
Strength 0.22
Chroma 0.12
Shadow weighting 0.35
Variation rate 0 Hz
Seed 11

4. Preview and export with sound

Watch the passage before exporting. Check that the artwork stays readable on louder moments and that both controls return toward their starting values between hits. Save the project if you want to return to its layers, settings, and soundtrack later.

In Export, choose Animation → MP4, select the full 12-second range, and leave Include audio on. That option is available for MP4 and WebM when the composition has audio. Open the finished file to check its picture and sound.

MP4/AAC and WebM/Opus encoding depend on the device. If your Mac cannot encode the selected format with audio, try another supported format or export silently. Audio-driven visuals still work in a silent export. A GIF can contain animation but no sound; a still image captures one moment.

Explore one audio choice at a time

The following clips have sound and keep Scale off, so only RGB Split Amount changes. The range stays 0–0.02. They help you choose a response for your own artwork after you have made the main example.

Energy or Hits

Energy follows the power in the selected band. Hits responds to detected onsets. In this comparison, the first six seconds use Energy and the next six use Hits. Both halves repeat the same passage with Low band and Tight response (attack 0.005 seconds, release 0.1 seconds). Only the signal changes.

With sound. 0–6 seconds Energy; 6–12 seconds Hits. The same six-second passage repeats. Low band and Tight response stay fixed.

Low or High

Keep Energy and Tight, then change only the frequency band. In this practice passage, Low responds mainly to kicks and High mainly to hi-hats. With a full song, vocals and other instruments can contribute to either band.

With sound. 0–6 seconds Low; 6–12 seconds High. The same six-second passage repeats. Energy and Tight response stay fixed.

A manually aligned Beat Grid

Use Beat Grid when you want a regular pulse at a tempo you choose. In Timeline settings, set Tempo (BPM) to 110 for the practice passage. In Sound input, set First beat in track (seconds) to 0. You can drag the first-beat marker or enter its time. For your own music, enter the tempo and align the first beat yourself; Artfkt does not detect tempo automatically.

Choose Beat Pulse for RGB Split Amount. It sets Audio signal to Beat grid, Beat subdivision to 1, attack to 0, and release to 0.15. The Response menu shows Custom. The picture pulses on every quarter note, including beats 2 and 4 where this passage has no kick.

With sound. Amount follows the quarter-note grid, including the beats without a kick.

For a softer response, try Smooth or Bloom instead of Tight on an Energy or Hits target. These settings shape how quickly movement arrives and settles; they do not change the song’s tempo.

If the result is not what you expected

  • Nothing moves: check that a soundtrack is loaded, Animate is selected below the canvas, the intended property uses Sound, and playback is running. Check each control under Animate → Properties.
  • Both targets move together: check their frequency bands. A mixed song can have energy in several bands at once, so try each target separately before combining them.
  • The cover jumps or becomes hard to read: bring Scale’s end closer to 100%, reduce Amount’s range end, or try a slower response. Judge your own artwork rather than treating these ranges as universal settings.
  • The exported file has no sound: use a supported MP4 or WebM export with composition audio and Include audio on. Preview mute does not decide whether export includes audio. GIFs and still images never include sound.

Make a vertical version

Choose TikTok, Instagram Reels / Stories, or YouTube Shorts (1080 × 1920) and reframe your artwork for the taller canvas. The example below uses the same Scale and Amount assignments and exports with Include audio off. Keep it on when you want a supported video file containing the song.

Silent 720 × 1280 file from the 1080 × 1920 composition. Same Scale and Amount assignments as the square hero.

For Spotify Canvas, use the separate guide’s dimensions, duration, and upload guidance. Its loop does not start in sync with song playback; avoid relying on a hard hit landing on the same beat every time.

Bring your own image and song

Try a short passage from your own track. Start with Scale or Amount alone, listen to what drives it, and add the second response when it helps the piece. The album cover ideas article offers starting points for the still artwork; this workflow gives that artwork motion.

The cover is an abstract oil-in-water photograph released CC0 on PxHere. The source page does not name a creator. The passage was synthesized for this article. The stills and videos were rendered with Artfkt’s production engine and export session, then compressed for the page.

See One Cover, Two Promo Videos for a complete square-and-vertical example with editable starting projects.