Re: --Need Help with Particles Emitters-- Update 2004-06-08 - By nickjsky
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Hi Turk,
The Particle Emitter can be difficult to get the right results from.
It is also limited in that there is no built in way to make the
particle shapes always face the camera (you have to use a plugin like
DGC's Anything Grows or Zmorphic's Particle Sprite). And,
ironically, you can't animate the settings in the Emitter master
object. Also the Particle Shader does not work properly to color
each particle according to it's own age (it ends up coloring all
particles according to the age of the very first particle).
Nevertheless, you can get good results if you play with it long
enough. I spent about three hours and came up with the following
formula for a pretty good fire hose water stream:
PARTICLE EMITTER
SYSTEM:
Max = 1000
Frequency = 200 +/- 0.00
Lifetime = 2.5 +/- 0.50
Velocity = 40 +/- 1.00
Size = 0.5 +/- 0.00
Shape = Sphere
EMIT:
Emit Area = X=0, Y=0, Z=0
Emit Angle = 0.00 +/- 0.02
Emit Type = Free
ENV:
Air Friction = 30.00
Gravity = Z = -9.00
I'll explain these settings. Most importantly, the Emit Type has to
be "Free". If it is "Bound", the particles are locked to the
orientation and position of the emitter. With "Free", each particle
is independent of the emitter as soon it is created. The shape is
set to "Sphere" because all the other particle shapes are flat and on
edge to the camera when viewed from the side.
The Frequency and the Size are set to +/- zero so that the particles
emit at a smooth and constant rate, yet the Velocity is set to +/- 1
so that the particles start pulling away from each other just like a
water stream would. For the same reason, the Emit Area is 0,0,0 and
the Angle is zero degrees so the particles come straight out of a
single point, but I put in a +/- 0.02 degree variance so the stream
starts widening slightly over the distance it travels.
For the shader of this water stream, you can use some fairly
complicated methods to enhance the realism, but I used something
simple that still looks OK. My shader is:
COLOR = Value = 21
HIGHLIGHT = Value = 8
SHININESS = Value = 0
BUMP = None
TRANSPARENCY = Value = 79
REFRACTION = None
GLOW = None
The last step which really improves the appearance of the particle
stream is to scale the Particle Emitter in the Z-Axis to 225% (X and
Y remain 100%). This stretches all the sphere particles into
ellipsoid particles, but it does not stretch the length of the stream
since the Emit Type is "Free". Now, point the emitter in the
direction you want, and let 'er rip--I mean render the animation.
You can even move the stream back and forth in the animation.
Hope this helps.
--Nick
-- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ------
>
>
> Yes I trying to make a Stream of Water with the Particle
>Emitter. But I haven't mastered the Particle Emitter yet.
>
>Thanks,
>Turk
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