The split screen and panels look
Published 28 September 2026.
The split screen look divides the frame into two to six live panels, like a comic page or a multi-camera edit. Panels open, slide, resize and swap on the beat, each with its own small animation. It's built for contrast: the problem beside the solution, before beside after, many small panels resolving into one big one.
Where the look comes from
Splitting the screen is almost as old as film. Lois Weber's 1913 silent short Suspense used a split screen to show several places at once, and it's now in the US National Film Registry. The idea came back in style in the 1960s: Turner Classic Movies notes that John Frankenheimer used it in Grand Prix (1966), and Norman Jewison, having seen the technique at the 1964 World's Fair, built The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) around it.
Why does it still work? Because two images side by side invite a comparison, and the viewer makes it for you.
What's in this reel
- Panels that split, resize and collapse back into one.
- A sliding divider between a before and an after.
- A grid of 17 tiles that cascades down into a single panel.
- Screenshots cropped and panned inside panels, with a cursor click.
- Small panels that ping as each crawler visit lands.
Brands it suits, and ones it doesn't
It suits apps with several things worth showing at once, marketplaces with two sides, comparison and before-and-after stories, and products that connect one thing to another. On a vertical phone screen the panels stack, so it still reads at 9:16.
It's too busy for a product with one simple idea, and for luxury brands that want a single calm image per frame; the luxury editorial or typographic kinetic poem looks give that idea more room.
Music that pairs with it
- Funk / disco (the reel above): panels change on the off-beats, and the slap bass keeps it cheerful.
- House for a confident, big-room feel.
- Afrobeats for consumer apps and marketplaces with a young audience.
- UK garage for lifestyle and social apps.
Make one like this
Start from this reel and yours keeps its look, its scene order, its pacing and its kind of music. The words, facts, colours and logo are yours, only facts you've approved go on screen, and nothing from Hilyt carries over. It's priced like any other reel: the Short is £9, the Reel £29 and the Bundle, cut for 16:9, 9:16 and 4:5, £49.
No website yet? Start from your logo and a few facts, then pick this look on the style step.
Sources
All checked on 28 September 2026.
- EDIT Media: Suspense (Lois Weber, 1913)
- Criterion: The 2020 National Film Registry inductees
- Turner Classic Movies: The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)