"Fundamentals of Maya Dynamics: Particles and Fields" guides you through Maya's
particle and dynamics system, which is used to create effects such as sparks,
rain, smoke, fire, and dust. In addition, you will also learn dynamic fields
such as gravity, wind, turbulence, and drag, which can be applied to these
particles to create simulations that behave according to the laws of physics.
2-Disc Set
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User
Interface and Preferences for Dynamics
To make the process of working with dynamics easier and faster, we'll
set up our workspace so it is optimized for working with particles. |
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Working With the Particle Tool
Using the particle tool to create a blanket of particles or sketch
particles in your scene is easy when you need to place particles in
specific areas. |
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Creating Particle Emitters
This lesson focuses on the different types of emitters available to you
in the particle menu. We will also explore some of the attributes of the
emitter. |
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Adjusting Basic Properties of the Particle Shape Node
We'll explore various particle render types in the particle shape node,
as well as look at the difference between hardware and software rendered
particles. |
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Working With Cycle Emission
Need to create cycling or repeating animation of particles? This lesson
will teach you how to create particles that cycle over and over again,
so you only have to render a short number of frames. |
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Working With Volume Emitters
Volume emitters can offer a number of advantages over the other types of
emitters. Some of them are along with axis, around axis and away from
center. |
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Emitting From Surfaces
Using surfaces as particle emitters makes sense when you need the
particles to emit from the objects. An example would be a fizzy tablet
in water, and bubbles coming off of the tablet. |
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Fire
Ring (part1): Emitting From Curves
This lesson covers the use curves as particle emitters and also explores
how to use per-point emission rate settings for your curve. |
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Fire
Ring (part 2): Particle Shape Node Attributes
To make the little dots (particles) look like fire, we'll start to
explore some of the per-particle attributes and add opacity, color, and
adjust the particle render types. |
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Fire
Ring (part 3):Hardware Rendering Particles
This lesson will cover how to render your particles using the hardware
render buffer. This feature is a great reason to upgrade your graphics
card! |
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Re-Using Particle Shape Nodes With Different Emitters
This lesson will show you how to connect the particle shape node to
another emitter, saving you lots of time. |
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Colliding Particles With Surfaces
To make particles react with surfaces you have to make them collide.
This video explores collisions and the geo connector to control friction
and surface resilience. |
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Working With Particle Collision Events
This lesson will teach you how to create a scene with falling rain. The
rain will then react with the floor and the umbrella to make small
splashes. |
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Driving Particle Simulations With Texture Maps
Controlling particle color and emission with texture maps is a great
technique for controlling the look of particles. We'll use the Photoshop
Node to load textures. |
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Controlling Particle Emission with Texture Maps
Using the 3D paint tool to interactively paint where particles are
emitted from is useful, when creating an object that is damaged and is
emitting smoke. |
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Using
Sprites and Per Particle Attributes Related to Sprites
Getting a handle on sprites can be tricky, but this primer will show you
how to load your image and use per-particle attributes to control how
they look. |
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Using
Particle Conserve, Emitting Particles From Particles
To keep your particles from flying all over the place, lower the
conserve, which lets the particles loose energy over time. We'll set up
the particles to emit particles. |
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Getting Started With Particle Instancing
This lesson will teach you how to use particle instancing to create
geometry instances at the location of each particle. |
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Adding
Particle Instancing to a Plane That is Dropping Bombs
We'll look at building a simulation where the plane drops bombs that
then collide with the ground and emit streaks. |
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Using
the Sprite Wizard
A great tool to keep your workflow moving quickly with sprites is the
sprite wizard. This little plug-in will keep you from pulling your hair
out when working with sprites. |
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Using
the Air Field
The cool thing about the air field is the ability to control its shape
using a spread attribute. This can create focused ?beams? of air that
move your particles in the direction it is pointed. |
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Drag
Fields
This field is great to slow down the particles and simulate an increased
density for particles to move through. Like throwing a rock in the
water, and it slowing down when it hits the field. |
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Gravity Fields
Setting the magnitude on Gravity Fields is really the key when you would
like to create realistic simulations. |
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The
Amazing Newton Field
One of the coolest fields in the dynamics system, this field simulates
Newton's law of physics, which states that objects with larger masses
will attract objects with smaller masses. |
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Radial
Fields
Radial Field is used to push or pull particles in relation to the field. |
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Turbulence Fields
One of the most used fields, this field will create a 3D noise in your
scene that the particles will move through. |
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Using
the Uniform Field, Adjusting the Mass of the Particles
The uniform field is similar to gravity, but will factor in the mass of
the particles. This can be great when you want to vary the amount of
force on the particles. |
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Vortex
Fields
The vortex field will rotate the particles around the field. This can be
useful if you need to create star fields or rotating simulations. |
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Volume
Axis Fields
The great thing about this field is its ability to mimic other fields.
It can act like a volume emitter or a turbulence field, and use the
attributes of a volume emitter. |
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Expressions: Difference Between Runtime and Creation
This lesson will cover the process of writing and executing particle
expressions. |
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How
Goals Work
Using Goals is a common practice for shaping the particles. Think of the
bees forming an arrow right before they swarm a person. We'll show you
how to use goals and animate their properties. |
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Project: Creating a Volcano
We'll combine some of the lessons we covered to create a volcano
shooting out smoke, sparks and lava. This lesson talks about shaders for
blobby surfaces, sprites, and rendering. |
