VHS Tracking Noise
When a VHS tape's head loses alignment, horizontal noise bands and jitter ripple across the picture. Home video from the late 1970s onward left this distinctive worn-tape look, now a common nostalgic effect.
Spot it
- 01Horizontal noise bands
- 02Wavering bent lines
- 03Washed, faded color
Why it happens
Rows of the image are shifted horizontally by a time-varying wobble, bands of bright noise are overlaid near the bottom, and color is softened and desaturated.
Recreate it in Pixio
Image edit prompt“Give this image a worn VHS tape look: horizontal tracking noise bands near the bottom, wavy horizontal jitter on scanlines, softened smeared color, slightly washed saturation, fine scanlines and analog static, a faint red-blue color fringe. Keep the original subject and composition.”
Open PixioUpload your image and pick an image-edit model.