Here’s a flashback for you - I followed your R14(?) tutorial on how to emit Thinking Particles along a spline. The Xpresso was challenging but I managed to get it to work as advertised (credit to the teacher).
However I found a couple of surprises. First, I can’t seem to be able to control the rate the particles are emitted, or how fast they move along the spline (seems like these are related parameters). I twiddled all the controls I could find in the PStorm node, but none seemed to have an effect. The only control I found was turning them on or off via the LIFE slider. Otherwise, they seem to operate on autopilot.
The bigger problem is when I assembled several of these emitters into a single scene via XRef, I discovered that only one emitter worked at a time. That is, whoever got there first seemed to turn off all the others. I thought this might be related to “Use all segments” in the Spline node, but that didn’t make any difference. This is absolutely a project killer as everything depends on multiple streams of particles coursing around each other. Might have 15 or so before it’s done.
Models and assembly scene are here:
NOTE: Two variations on the light pulses - the middle one uses splines, the outer two use a torus form. The spline version is preferred and the torus will be replaced.
It might be overkill to use Thinking Particles in this instance, and perhaps Standard Particles would work fine, I just couldn’t find anyone who had trained those to follow a spline. Perhaps there’s a new secret button?
As an alternative, I experimented with using a Cloner to send glowing objects (i.e. area lights) down a spline but could not find a way to control them beyond the 100% offset slider. Looping the offset can simulate a continuous stream, but I need the pulse to travel down the spline at the start. So I’d have to duplicate the Cloner for each effect, one to initiate and one to continue. And that’s too complicated. So it’s particles or nothing - seems to me.
Thanks.
