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Blocker Question
Having trouble with a Blocker showing layers below.
My layers from back to front are: a snow emitter, a wall (with window to see the snow outside), some kids and a Christmas tree. I put an area emitter of a star-like effect in front of (on top of) the tree, adjusting its rectangular size to fit the tree at its widest point (the bottom of the tree). I then put a Blocker on each side of the tree adjusted in a triangular shape to confine the stars to just the tree, but all layers below the Blocker layer stay black whether or not I checked the Blocker’s Properties to show the layers below. I’ve tried putting the blocker on the same layer as the stars emitter and also on its own layer on top (in front) of the stars emitter. Same results. Am I missing something?
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3 Replies
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Blockers will only show either the bg image/movie that’s on a layer, or the background color of the project. They don’t show particles.
Does that explain it?
Alan.
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Not totally. There are no particle layers that are supposed to show beneath the overlying blocker layer.
The foremost layer is the animated (.tif files) Christmas tree with the starry particle emitter over the tree and the two flanking blockers (to block the stars that extend beyond the edge of the tree). The two layers below the tree/stars/blocker layer are animated .tif files of kids partially behind the tree and the wall behind them. The blockers do not allow the kids and the wall layers to show regardless of whether the “show layers below” option is checked or not.
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I understand now.
Blockers can only “something” from a single layer: the layer they’re on unless you check the “use layers below…” option. If that option is checked, the first layer below the blocker’s layer (including the layer the blocker is on) is checked for a bg image, and as soon as one is found, that’s the image used.
So there’s no way to do what you want.
The “use layers below…” blocker property was intended for situations where you have a single bg image but multiple layers above it.
Alan.
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