Particles

Rendering

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Section contents

After a model has been saved with save ani in the general menu of GIG, the animation can be rendered with render ani or with 'giganibatch'. During the rendering process, the particles will be simulated for each frame that is rendered. 

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Animation scroll bar

Display the current frame using a scroll bar, then the frame can be dragged using the mouse. The input boxes at each end of the animation scroll bar display animation frame numbers.

play
Use playto view the animation without simulating the particle systems

reset simulation
Deletes all emitted particles from the active particle systems.

Rendering particle systems

Particles systems can be rendered like any other GIG model, including the calculation of reflections, refractions, and shadows.
Attributes are assigned in the same way as with other GIG models. It is also possible to assign maps to a particle system.
2D texture maps
2D texture maps are projected from the converted model onto the particle-emitters during a conversion. Texture map coordinates are the same for all particles emitted from the same emitter.

3D texture maps
3D texture maps are mapped in the normal way, as a 3D solid texture.

blur maps
To create blurring effects for moving particles, two maps are available which can be used as intensity maps in the diffuse and transparency intensity input boxes.
For the diffuse intensity, enter: difblur.
For the transparency intensity, enter: transblur. 
Intensity map difblur         transblur         transblur

See also
motion blur

time maps
To change the attributes of particles during their lifetime, use the map curve button in the attributes menu. Enter 'hue' for the timecurve map name. On the diffuse color attribute, enter: 'hsvmap(hue, 0.9, 0.9)'. This will create a hsvmap with the hue parameter animated according to the timecurve with name 'hue' in the animation menu. The color of the particles will now change according to their 'age' ( the number of frames that they are alive).
head-to-tail maps
To give particles a different color for their head (front) and their tail (back), two maps are available: mhead and mtail. 
Intensity map mhead

To create particlemaps with different colors for the head and tail, enter:
mhead*color(?, ?, ?) + mtail*color(?, ?, ?)
in the diffuse color input box. For the question marks, fill in the desired RGB values. The first color will be the color for the head, the second color for the tail.

Example
mhead*green + mtail*blue
This will create a particlemap with green heads and blue tails.

Example:
mhead*color(0.9, 0.2, 0.2) + mtail*color(0.8, 0.9, 0.2)
This will create a particlemap with red heads and yellow tails.

radius map
An intensity map which varies from the center to the edge of a particle is available: mradius(). 
Intensity map mradius()

Example:
mradius()*red + (1-mradius())*yellow
This will create a particlemap with red center and a yellow edge.

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