Adobe AFTER EFFECTS 5.5 Help Manual page 351

Adobe After Effects Help
Using Help | Contents |
Creating Particle Effects (PB
only)
Creating Particle Effects (PB only)
Use the Particle Playground effect to create animations in which a large number of similar
objects must be animated independently, such as a swarm of bees. Particle effects
simulate the physical interactions between objects in the real world. For example, if you
want to create a snowfall effect, you normally have to animate many individual snowflake
layers manually, hoping that you animated each layer's motion path realistically.
By changing Particle Playground options, you can control whether a single snowflake you
create results in a gentle dusting of snow or a driving blizzard. The built-in physics,
including gravity, ensure realistic movement. Using Particle Playground's detailed level of
control over particles, you can even make the snowflakes stick to a surface.
Note: Because of the complexity of Particle Playground, you may experience long compu-
tation, preview, and render times.
Snowflakes created using Particle Playground
Overview of Particle Playground workflow (PB only)
Start by creating a stream or plane of particles, or by "exploding" an existing layer into
particles. Once you have a layer of particles, you can control their properties, such as
speed, size, and color. However, the effects available in Particle Playground go beyond the
obvious. For example, you can replace the default dot particles with the footage from an
existing layer, which is how you create an entire snowstorm from a single snowflake layer.
You can also use text characters as particles. For example, you can shoot words across the
screen, or you can create a sea of text in which a few letters change color, revealing a
message.
General workflow for creating particle effects:
1 Select the layer on which you want particles to exist, or create a new solid layer.
2 Choose Effect > Simulation > Particle Playground. The layer becomes an invisible layer
in which only the particles will be visible. Animating the layer in the Timeline window
animates the entire layer of particles.
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Creating Particle Effects (PB only)
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