Particle playground and property mapping? Please help.

[Steve Roberts]

Did you try Googling “particle playground” and “tutorial” together? There should be some tuts there. Roland K did one for the COW.

The RGB map is an image or movie that you design. The value of a color (e.g. R) at a specific position on the map affects the chosen property (e.g. size) of a particle when it is at that same position.

So, if you want particles travelling left-to-right across the screen to get bigger as they move, the property map should be an image (or precomped layer) that has a black-to-red linear ramp applied: black on the left, red on the right. As the particle passes through the black zone, it is small, then as the R value increases as it moves to the right, it gets bigger.

If you want the particles to get bigger then smaller, the ramp should be radial: red in the center, black around the edges. As the particles travel left-to-right, they travel through the black, then red, then black.

If the particles are static, using a movie as a property map can cause them to change properties based on the colour of the movie in the property map.

It’s all numerical. When a particle is at position (x,y), it reads the map’s RGB value at that position (x,y) then multiplies the chosen property value by that number, with or without another factor you set.

Recall that white has high values for R, G and B.
You must precompose a layer that has had an effect applied if you want to use it as a layer map.
Particle Playground particles do not exist in 3D space.
A layer map can be a movie.
To make a grid, set the cannon velocity to 0.
As for the persistent and ephemeral stuff, I’d have to check the manual for that.

Does that help?

[Roland R. kahlenberg]

The Fun in Particle Playground tutorial is missing.
That one covers the creation of property mappers.
Cheers
RoRK
broadcastGEMs
customizable animated backdrops with Adobe After Effects project files

[Kathlyn Lindeboom]

Thanks for the heads up. It probably dropped it’s metas — I’ll see if I can find it and fix it.

Kathlyn Lindeboom
The Mistress of Mmmooooo!

[Kathlyn Lindeboom]

Thanks for letting me know it was “missing.” — Of course, it was still there. Sometimes the metas get lost and we have to go find them and help them home. Maybe too much drinking or something. :-0

You can find it by clicking on the After Effects COW title banner or click here to go directly to it.

Couldn’t pass up the dancing cow.

Kathlyn Lindeboom
The Mistress of Mmmooooo!

[Gizmo1990]

Thanks for all the help guys. I’m finally beginning to find my feet with particles.

Thanks especially to Steve Roberts for taking the time the explain some of the processes involved. 🙂