Ember Fern
a feathered fractal growing from the corner

What you see on every new tab

Ember Fern grows a glowing, feathery fan out of the bottom-left corner of the New Tab page. Long fronds split into angled side plumes and fine hair-like strands, with black gaps between them, and they are darkest at the root and palest at the outer tips.

When a tab opens the fern grows: a bright, ragged front sweeps out from the corner, quickly at first and then slowing, until after about 26 seconds it has passed the far corner of the screen. From then on the fern keeps creeping outward and folding slowly, like smoke caught in feathers.

• Growing front: The edge of the growth glows as it travels, so you see the tips light up as they push out.
• Five colour schemes: Ember red-orange, white-hot, blush pink, cream and cobalt blue. Each holds for about 26 seconds and then blends into the next over 8 seconds, so a full round takes just under three minutes.
• Pale edges: Each frond is brightest where it meets the black gaps and deeper in colour at its core, which gives the feathered look.
• Slow breath: The whole picture brightens and dims by a few percent on a cycle of about 18 seconds, and the fine strands flicker gently.
• Bigger toward the edge: Shapes widen with distance from the corner, so the fan looks the same at every scale, like a fractal.

One fragment shader paints the fern with no images: layers of simplex noise, folded into each other and laid out in log-polar coordinates around a point just off the bottom-left corner, so features stretch out along rays from the corner.

What it reacts to

• Mouse: A soft warm glow follows your cursor, lighting the fronds beneath it more than the gaps.
• Click: Clicking the page sends a bright ring outward along the fronds from the corner to the far edge.
• Music: With music sync on, bass lifts the brightness by up to about a third, treble makes the strands flicker harder, and a strong kick sends the same bright ring out along the fronds.
• Night: After dusk Ember Fern paints its own night instead of using the indigo veil: about a third dimmer with deeper blacks. The Day/Night button in the Themes panel can force either.

Free or Pro?Pro

Ambient New Tab is free to install, with five free themes. Ember Fern is a Pro theme. Pro is $5.99 a month or $39.99 a year, cancel anytime, or $59 once for Pro Forever, and it unlocks every Pro theme, music sync, and every new theme as we release it. You can preview Ember Fern full screen before you buy: open the Themes panel and rest your mouse on it. Changed your mind? 14-day refund, no questions.

How to get it

1. Add Ambient New Tab to Chrome.
2. Open a new tab and click the Themes pill in the bottom-right corner.
3. Pick Ember Fern. Done.

Questions

Why does the fern start small every time I open a tab?

The growth is part of the theme. Each new tab replays it: a glowing front leaves the bottom-left corner and reaches past the far corner in about 26 seconds, fast at first and slow at the end. The small previews in the Themes panel skip this and show the fern fully grown.

Is Ember Fern free?

It is a Pro theme. Pro is $5.99 a month or $39.99 a year, cancel anytime, or $59 once for Pro Forever. It unlocks every Pro theme, music sync, and every new theme as it is released.

Does the fern shader lower its quality on a slow computer?

Yes. If frames take longer than about 1/27 of a second for around 60 frames in a row, the theme draws the fern into a smaller image and stretches it to fit, stepping down as far as half resolution. Faster machines keep it at full resolution.

Does it cover the whole screen?

Yes, once grown. The fronds fan from the bottom-left corner all the way to the top-right, with black gaps between them. Roots near the corner are darker and the outer tips brighter, so the clock and search box sit over a mix of glowing plumes and dark space.

Does it work on my phone?

No. It's a desktop browser extension for Chrome on Windows, macOS, Linux and ChromeOS. If you're reading this on a phone, send yourself the link.

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