If 2025 belonged to anyone it was the KPop Demon Hunters. The animated movie became Netflix's most unexpected hit, becoming the streaming channel's most-watched hit. Art for the series was recognised at the Concept Art Awards 2025, made it to the cover of TIME magazine and has already inspired a KPop Demon Hunters art book.
Unsurprisingly every detail of the movie has been studied by artists. And that's not just the characters and environment art, but also its effects. One VFX artist took time out to recreate the weapons trail effect from the movie using Blender, one the tools in our guide to the best animation software.
Procedural weapon trail effect from Kpop Demon Hunters from r/blender
As posted on Reddit above, Mqleh created a procedural weapon trail effect in which colourful sparkles follow the blade of Mira's gokdo, the traditional Korean polearm, or moon sword, that she uses in the movie.
The VFX artist created the effect using Blender's geometry nodes and shader nodes and so far worked for a few hours over the span of two to three days.
Keep a look out on mqleh's YouTube and Instagram profiles because he said he might make a tutorial in the future. First, he plans to add more effects soon like the disintegration when demons get hit.
In the meantime, see our roundup of Blender tutorials for tips on getting started in the software. You might also want one of the best laptops for animation.
