Broadening The Stars

The other day someone told me they really liked my blog - except for those "incredibly annoying posts where I talk about my particle effects." Ok, I can understand that. But I am running a particle effects business that I love and I am going to do it anyway!

---BEGIN ADVERT---
One of my most popular particle products is a rather simple one: StarMaker. It's a device you can install on your property that emits rather nice spiky-looking stars. They don't move, but instead they just appear and then slowly fade out within a 5m radius. The effect is quite eerie when you walk through a 3D field of such stars.

I thought that was the end of the story for StarMaker. But it wasn't. A visitor to the store last week asked the staff whether we had a bigger version of StarMaker, suitable for covering a large area. We did not. But my trusty staff wrote up the request and passed it on to me. After a little bit of programming and a lot experimentation, I completed building "StarMaker Wide."

It's very similar to the original StarMaker, but covers a massive radius of 60m, which is suitable for coverage of many areas and events. Like its predecessor, StarMaker Wide emits stationary stars – but it has to be seen to be believed. Large stars appear close up, while those more distant appear smaller and seen to wink in and out. It's much more effective than the original, if you have a space large enough to use it.

But that's not all: we've made StarMaker Wide available in several starry colors: Red, Green, Blue, Ice Blue, White, Purple, Fuschia, Yellow, Pink and MultiColor, which continuously emits a range of different colors. Finally, if you cannot decide which color is best for you, StarMaker Wide Universal can be set to any of the above colors at a mere touch. Set your parcel's mood by color as required.

All available now at Electric Pixels!
---END ADVERT---

Ok, I agree with you. That was a blatent advert. Sorry. At least I marked it as such. We'll resume normal blogging in the next post. But it really is a wonderful product! Really!

Augh, I can't help myself. See you next time!

Burning After Alexis

Alexis Lange is not only a friend of mine, but also a Battlestar Galactica pilot based in Eleggua (call sign "Panther".) Last week she came to me looking for a way to make her flyer more realistic, specifically by adding a massive rocket plume.

Easy, I thought. Just build a particle emitter that shoots out the right mix of shapes and colors to visually appear as a plume. Then paste it on the a**-end of the flyer. I quickly constructed a disc-shaped "Afterburner" emitter that could fit well within the thrust tubes of the powerful flyer, shooting out white-yellow flames.

It was going fine until I dropped by the Eleggua airfield (which is itself hundreds of meters in the air) and gave Alexis the Afterburner prototype for testing. The device worked perfectly, and even synchronized with the flyer's start and stop chat commands.

The trouble began when I suggested that Alexia link the Afterburner to the flyer so that she could fly off and not leave the emitter behind on the deck! However, it turns out that the permissions on the flyer were no-Modify, meaning she cannot link any objects to it, including the Afterburner.

I was about to abandon hope of getting this done easily, short of begging the flyer's maker to somehow include the Afterburner, when I had an idea.

Instead of attaching the emitter to the flyer, I realized we could attach it to Alexis! Yes, while she's sitting in the cockpit, the emitter goes off as designed, but the plume still appears as intended. Flames blast out from her spine backwards and appear to come from the flyer's engines. With some simple adjustments, I'll be able to make a rocket plume Alexis can wear in any vehicle.

In fact, I think I'll be making an entire line of wearable aircraft effects including explosions, smoke trails, rat-tat-tat or what ever else seems appropriate or just plain cool. There will be no need to equip every vehicle with effects - just bring them with you instead! Thanks for the inspiration, Alexis!

Two things were very important for me on this adventure:

• There are always more ways to solve a problem than you think at first. Never give up - just keep trying, even ideas that are, well, crazy at first! You may bump into the answer.
• No matter how bad the situation, you can usually find a way to make something good out of it. Learn something, change something, change your self!

And Alexis, one thing to remember about the Afterburner - be very, very careful where you are when you say the word, "start"!

Particles in Bloom

I had an idea to use particles to create life-like vegetation, and it seems to have turned out rather well. After some experimentation and a lot of photoshopping, I first built an effect that emits grass! Once triggered, grass flows slowly away from the emitter as shown in the photo.

This emitter has some interesting properties. First, you can raise or lower the height of your grass merely by moving the emitter up or down. As with all of my installable effects, the emitter is MOD so that you can blend it into your site, or even make it completely transparent.

I really wanted to create a wavy field of grass, much like you would see on the prairies. But unfortunately, that's not how particles work. You can't easily make individual particles change shape - you can just make them move and stretch - but not wave. However, I had another idea! It came to me as I watched the grass particles slowly flow away from the emitter. If you place several Grass emitters separated by say 10m or so, their grass particles inter-weave together and create a bizarre flowing carpet of grass. Not exactly waving grass, but pretty close and very fun to stand within.

Once Grass was made it was straightforward to create two additional effects: Flowers, which emits a selection of wildflowers, and Sunflowers, which emits.... oh you can guess that one!

All three of these new particle effects are now available at the Electric Pixels Particle Shop in Caso Milo.

Does anyone have any suggestions or requests for other types of vegetation?