[Kakarutsu]

Boy, where do I start. I’m trying to do a simple project for class and I’ve had every problem in the book. Not only do my files not load on occasion, I’m very often dumped out of PI3. The render program doesn’t want to render my background file in the final version and sometimes there’s a mysterious force object in the final render that I never put into the project. The motion blur looks terrible and the program doesn’t burn a clean alpha channel. On other occasions, my file locks and I no longer see any particles. Even when an export does work, the aspect ratio is messed up. I’ve worked with Particular for some time and I find it’s a much better program. I feel like I made a mistake buying PI3 and all I’m trying to do is a simple little student project. (I’m not a newb — I just have high standards and I prefer a program that doesn’t crash incessantly.) I can’t believe this is used professionally.

[Kakarutsu]

I know for sure that you can do this with the 3D modeling and particle program XSI from Softimage, wchi gives you a “stick to layer” function. Particular is difficult because I don’t believe you have a lot of control over one particle for an extended period of time … and that’s what you need to make them move from one shape to another.

You might be able to generate somewhat of a similar effect in particular by creating a reference alpha layer that shows the shapes (white on black) morphing from one to another. The problem with particular is that it uses this information as a generation point for particles, not a target point for ones that already exist.

Good luck with your project. I’d like to know how you figure it out.