How are effects and generators different?

Shaders in Lightform Creator come in two flavors - effects and generators.

Effects utilize the Lightform device's scan data (colors, disparity, normals, edges, and distance to edges) to create context-aware graphics.

Generators on the other hand don't use any of the scan data and are purely procedurally generated. They'll be projected in the same way regardless of what the user is projecting onto.