Retro TV Template: How to Make Your Lyric Video Play on a Vintage CRT
The Retro TV template is one of those Epitrite templates that nobody else has. It puts your background video inside a vintage CRT screen, drops the whole thing in a misty forest, runs your lyrics single-word brat-style on the screen with scanlines and a slow CRT roll bar, and blankets the world outside the tube in warm film grain.
The result feels like found footage someone stumbled into. Used right, it's the most distinctive lyric video you'll ship this year.
What the Retro TV Template Is
A 9:16 frame where:
- The visible background is a forest scene with a vintage TV in it.
- Your uploaded video plays inside the TV screen (or a phosphor-glow gradient if you don't upload one).
- Lyrics render inside the screen, single-word brat-style reveals, with scanlines and CRT roll.
- A warm vintage tint and film grain blanket the forest scene outside the screen.
- The whole forest+TV asset ping-pongs as a 16-second seamless loop, so longer songs never visibly repeat.
It's deliberately one of the more cinematic templates in Epitrite. Less "social-first" than Brat or Magazine Cover, more "I want this to feel like a moment."
Genres It Hits Best
The Retro TV template is built for songs that already feel a little nostalgic, a little slow, a little intentional:
- Alt-pop — the Lana / Mitski / boygenius lane
- Indie — anything with reverb-heavy guitars or hazy production
- Dream pop — Beach House, Cigarettes After Sex energy
- Bedroom pop — Clairo, Beabadoobee, lo-fi recording aesthetic
- Slowcore / sadcore — drawn-out vocals, sparse instrumentation
- Alt R&B — Steve Lacy, Frank Ocean lane
It doesn't hit on:
- High-BPM EDM or house (mismatch with the slow CRT roll)
- Trap or hyperpop (too aggressive for the warm grain)
- Country (genre mismatch with the dream-tape aesthetic)
How to Use It (Step by Step)
- Open Epitrite and create a new project.
- Upload your audio (MP3, WAV, AAC, or FLAC).
- Paste your lyrics or hit AI transcribe.
- Pick the Retro TV template from the template picker. The preview will show the forest+TV chrome.
- Upload a background video — this plays inside the CRT screen. Footage with movement (clouds, water, blurred lights, grainy 16mm-style clips) hits hardest.
- Sync — beat sync is automatic. The single-word reveals pulse with the song.
- Preview, then export at 9:16 for TikTok / Reels / Shorts.
That's the full workflow. 4-7 minutes from upload to export.
What to Upload Inside the CRT
The video that plays inside the screen makes or breaks the template.
Hits hardest:
- Slow-motion footage (water, fabric, clouds, hair)
- Grainy 16mm or VHS-style clips
- Blurred city lights at night
- Beach / sunset / nature footage
- Footage with one dominant color (lets the warm tint do work)
Falls flat:
- High-detail, high-action clips (the screen is small in the frame, action gets lost)
- Clips with their own text overlays (clashes with the lyrics on top)
- Bright daylight footage (fights the warm vintage tint)
- Static images (the template is built around movement)
Settings You Can Tweak
The Retro TV template ships with sensible defaults but a few knobs are worth knowing:
- Inner video on/off — defaults to on. If off, the screen falls back to a phosphor-glow gradient. Some songs hit harder with the gradient than with footage; try both.
- Outer grain — film grain on the world outside the screen. Default on. Turn off if you want a cleaner look.
- Warm tint opacity — the warm vintage tint over the forest. Default 10%. Push to 20% for a more nostalgic feel; drop to 0% for a cooler vibe.
- Lyric blur (brat blur) — soft blur on the brat-style word reveals. Default 1.5px. Push to 3-4px for dreamier vocals; drop to 0 for sharper lyrics.
Pacing the Lyrics
The Retro TV uses single-word reveals (one word at a time, brat-style). Default word delay is 300ms.
- Slower songs (under 90 BPM) — push word delay to 400-500ms so words breathe on screen.
- Mid-tempo (90-120 BPM) — leave at 300ms.
- Faster (over 120 BPM) — drop to 200ms so words don't pile up.
If lyrics are landing late or early, you can hand-edit timing per word in the lyric panel.
Pairing It With a Spotify Canvas
The Retro TV template is one of the strongest Canvas options because it's intentionally low-action and the loop feels intentional. Workflow:
- Make the full lyric video first (3-minute version).
- Duplicate the project, trim to 8 seconds for Canvas (Spotify's spec).
- Pick a section that lands a single lyric phrase cleanly inside the loop.
- Export at 1080×1920, MP4, under 8MB.
Common Questions
Does the Retro TV template work in 16:9?
The chrome asset is built for 9:16. You can export 16:9 but the forest+TV will be cropped. For 16:9, the Magazine Cover or Blueprint Plan templates fit better.
Can I change the forest background?
Not in the current version — the chrome asset is the template's identity. If you want a different scene, the Magazine Cover and Album Art Story templates give you that flexibility.
Why does my screen look dark when I don't upload a video?
That's the phosphor-glow fallback. It's intentional, but most users prefer to upload a video. Even a 5-second loop of waves or a candle flame works.
Can I turn off the scanlines?
The scanlines are part of the screen-effect layer and currently render with the CRT chrome. They're part of the template's signature look.
What aspect ratio is the template designed for?
Vertical 9:16, optimized for TikTok, Reels, YouTube Shorts.
Takeaway
The Retro TV template is for the song that wants to feel like it was found, not made. Slow, intentional, a little melancholy. Upload your audio, drop in a moody video, hit export.
Try the Retro TV template free — no watermark, no upgrade required, every template on the free tier.
