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This extension can render very fast particle effects like water, dust and fire. Each particle (pixel) is given an X and Y speed, instability value (the higher this is the more randomly the X and Y speed will change) and similar values for the colour. I can display thousands of pixels at full FPS (but my PC is running at 2.8GHz!)
http://www.aquadasoft.com/ParticleEffect.mfx
Excellent!
In case you got confused put this file in your extensions folder.
Then you can add the object inside the MMF insert object dialog
Updated it so that each particle can have a lifetime, after which it will be destroyed.
Here's an example of generating smoke like when a soldering iron is used. If it lags for you, try changing the value "30" in the repeat while left mouse key is pressed event to something lower.
www.aquadasoft.com/solder.mfa
This is great.
Will there be some docs for it? Looks ripe for some "preset" potential ;)
I found a crash situation and will get the file to you Jam.
This is a really helpful extension, good job Jam! With gravity and collision detection and possibly hardware acceleration, this object could possibly be powerful enough to make the classic game and my personal favorite, Falling Sand.
http://fallingsandgame.com/sand/index.html
---EDIT---
I have also been experiencing some random crashes, mainly when changing the x and y speeds.
Changing the X and Y speeds?
Changing the X and Y speeds.
http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/untitled.jpg
This is awesome!! It runs so fast! I've used it for a snow effect, and there's no slowdown at all!!
It'd be nice if you could add:
- Gravity
- Ability to change the details for each particle by its Particle ID
- Colisions (although I should imagine this would eat into the speed. Maybe you could do a Move-Safely-esque system where it runs a fastloop for each particle, temporarily resizing its bounding box to the position of that particle so you can do a 'Is Particle Object overlapping Obstacle' condition, and then using the loop ID to do an action like "Particle 'loopid("Particle Object")' has collision" to register the colision and perhaps delete the particle, or change its behaviour in some way.)
EG:
On Particle Loop
+Particle Object is Overlapping Backdrop
--- Particle Object: Destroy particle 'loopID("Particle Object")'
I dunno how much these would impact speed though. Colisions definitely would.
I think I am going to revamp it so instead of one action with loads of parameters, it is actions to set the parameters and an action to add particles. What do you think?
How about both?
One would be a general setup, and then, you could modify various parameters as needed without all the click-through.
Be neat if instead of just dots, you could import an image or an animation. Because right now, it wouldn't be good for a fire effect.
I think the idea of separating that giant action into smaller ones but also keeping that too for a quick setup is a good idea. If it isn't incredibly hard or CPU intensive, I think we would all appreciate collision handling.
Seperated it all out and added some functionality for controlling the pixels after they have been created. The old examples will no longer work, I will make some new ones.
if anything, it'd also help you get away with using much fewer objectsQuote:
Originally Posted by LazyCoder
I can't do that- it's not the way the object works (and the lack of images is the reason the object works so fast).
The Particle Spray object can only use objects anyway, so that is what that object is made for. Jam, whats the word on collisions?
New build has collision detection and everything.. uploaded it. Will get the water example I just showed a few people up too.
Thats amazing!! This is a great extension! :)
Thanks! :)
I can't seem to get it to work. The animate action works as an update event correct? Everytime I put in this event I get a crash.
Crash? That isn't good- try redownloading the extension or send me the MFA file so I can debug it.
Fantastic! Now it works. Again, great job Jam
---EDIT---
How do you compare individual particle positions? I started an ID loop the number of particles times and I used the select particle ID action, but what should I use for events to test for collision. I couldn't get particle effect collides with particle effect or particle effect is overlapping particle effect to work within the ID loop.
http://www.clickteam.com/CTforum/showflat.php3?Cat=&Board=upload&Number=161919&page =&view=&sb=&o=&vc=1Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandon
The colision system seems to have problems in scrolling apps?
It's late, but I'll post an MFA another day if you can't reproduce the problem.
Pkeod, thanks for that example, its really cool! But using that method, I can not achieve the effect I am trying to create as well as with this extension. On another note, since this is a graphic extension, will it be hardware accelerated?
This is SWEET! Let's test this puppy and get 'er debugged.
It is very enjoyable to experiment with as it stands, but there are some bugs to squash.
I will be looking forward to cool effects from users. We could literally create libraries of effects by using behaviors with this. I am glad it has Alertable Values and Strings.
This is really ripe for creativity and it should really stand out in games and media.
Seems like an excellent extension, however could anybody post a demo file or explain how to get started with it? I'm having trouble figuring out the proper method to get any particles displayed on the screen.
Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thank you.
So... how would you get it to spray ALL AROUND, instead of just in one direction?
EDIT: Oh and what does 'Enable Condition (slower)' do?
How do you get it to spray at all? I'm sure that it isn't that difficult, but I've been experimenting in the event editor for a few days, and still cannot get any results from it.
I look forward to using this awesome extension!
Couple of quick points on usage:
The particles only show up in the area that the extension covers. That's probably obvious.
You have to have an Always --> Animate particles, or nothing will happen.
Directional speed is different from using ordinary directions or degrees.
Right and left are x plus or x minus. Down and up are y plus or y minus. A combination of the two creates diagonals. Particles moving to the upper left corner of the frame would be: x = -2, y = -2, where two represents the speed.
See if that works for you.
Hmmm... I tried Always --> Animate Particles, and still get no particles. Is there anything you have to set at the start of the frame?
I tried the "Add Particles" action, and even messed with speed and lifetime settings. I would actually have to see an example in the event editor to understand it better.
Thank you for the help!
Okay, I put Add Particles in the Always condition and and now things are happening! :cool:
The example is down. Could someone reupload it?
It was an old version of the object- it wouldn't work anyway.
Well it'd still be nice to see the power of the extension before getting to learn it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jam
I can make an example tomorrow when I get back home.
BM
Would still like to see some examples of this, please.
Tom / Doc4
ThisQuote:
Originally Posted by Doc4