K_ScanLine

K_ScanLine is an Adobe After Effects plugin that generates procedural 3D terrain and renders it as animated contour lines.

Create mountains, hills, ridges, valleys and island-like forms without a 3D model or height map. The generated terrain responds to the active After Effects camera and includes scan animation, hidden-line control, multiple output modes and optional NVIDIA CUDA acceleration.

PLATFORM

• Windows only.
• Adobe After Effects .aex plugin.
• NVIDIA CUDA only for GPU rendering.

TESTED ENVIRONMENT

• Adobe After Effects 2025.
• 8 bpc, 16 bpc and 32 bpc float.

VERSION COMPATIBILITY

• Tested with After Effects 2025.
• Other After Effects versions may be compatible but are not verified.

MAIN FEATURES

• Procedural terrain presets and custom terrain controls.
• Camera-responsive animated contour lines.
• Linear, Radial and Height scan modes.
• Highlight, Reveal and Trail scan behaviors.
• Transparent, source-composite and solid-background output.

RENDERING BACKENDS

• CPU renderer.
• CUDA renderer.

The Renderer setting can be Auto, GPU or CPU. GPU rendering requires a compatible NVIDIA GPU and driver. If CUDA is unavailable, the plugin falls back to CPU rendering.

NOTES

• Apply the effect to a composition-sized 2D solid or adjustment layer for predictable results.
• The generated terrain does not interact with other After Effects 3D layers.
• GPU acceleration is CUDA-only. DirectX, Metal and non-NVIDIA GPU paths are not implemented.