Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 6
Working with Particles
Blender includes a powerful particle-generation system. Particles enable you to simulate the behavior of large
collections of small objects. Dust clouds, falling snow, spilled beans, and other such granular phenomena can be
handled well using dynamic particles with Newtonian physics. Blender also includes boids simulation for emu-
lating the behavior of large collections of living organisms such as bird flocks, insect swarms, and fish schools.
Finally, particles are the basis of Blender's hair-simulation functionality.
In this chapter, you will learn to
• Work with emitter particles
• Work with boids
• Create hair effects with particles
Introducing Emitter Particles
InCG,thebehaviorofverysmallthingsactingingroupsisanimateddifferentlyfromthewayordinary-sizedob-
jectsareanimated.Manyprograms,includingBlender,dealwiththesekindsofeffectsbyusing
particles
.Asyou
can imagine, effects such as smoke, dust, orgranules ofsome substance are often best handled with particles, but
as you will see in this chapter, the potential of particles extends beyond these uses. Whether something is “very
small” depends on the perspective you want to take in the animation. A bird, for example, is clearly big enough
to warrant being animated in a traditional way in certain cases. A flock of birds, on the other hand, behaves in a
way that may be better simulated by using a particle system, as demonstrated later in this chapter.
Blender's particle functionality enables you to define groups of particles called
particle systems
by setting
how they animate and render. You can create multiple particle systems with different parameters and have them
interact inavariety ofways.Therearetwofundamentally differentwaysinwhichparticles areusuallyused.The
particles used for simulating tiny moving objects such as dust, raindrops, insects, or the like are called
dynamic
particles
. In Blender 2.6, dynamic particles are emitted from a Mesh object, so they are referred to as emitter
particles.(Usersofpre-2.5Blenderparticleswillrememberreactorparticlesasanothertypeofdynamicparticles.
Unfortunately, reactor particles remain on the to-do list of features that have not yet been re-integrated into the
updatedBlenderversions.)Theotheruseofparticlesistosimulatelong,slenderobjectssuchashairorgrassthat
are anchored to a surface. In Blender, these types of particles are called hair particles.
