Particle Direction?

Hi.

How can I alter the location where a particle is being shot from?, currently it appears to be the Z axis.

Thanks.

There was a thread on this very subject recently; search this forum for "particle" and you should be able to find it. Most folks don't bother trying to offset the system; they include an invisible prim and place it where they want. But evidently there is a way to do what you're asking, or something like it, and it's mentioned in that thread.

[edit]On second thought, that was about the location along the axis, not the direction. But it's still probably a good idea to read the thread.

wasent that something about how to have a flame over a candle.. I think it is about 1 month old, but search 'candle' should give the needed hit..

I will follow the habit of not answering the question but here is the link to a thread on the subject: /54/ae/255682/1.html

Hmm thats more setting an offset, I want to change the direction completely.

It's a vehicle so more prims wont work.

You can't do that
You can change inner and outer angle in a cone but the cone will have it's axis on the Z axis.
Firing is along the Z axis when both angles are set to zero, PI/2 is perpendicular to the Z axis ( particles will be fired to all sides in a plane when both angles are set to PI/2). Any way you cant change that the particle emitter has it's offset at the prims center coordinates.

I've always wondered if setting a PSYS_SRC_OMEGA, waiting for the particles to be pointing in the right direction, then setting particles with zero PSYS_SRC_OMEGA again might work. Old notes I remember (from the Particle Lab I believe) claimed that the emitter's rotation doesn't reset even if the particle system is changed or turned off. I've never messed around with it enough to find out though, and frankly it's a little scary (I'd rather it NOT work).

OK three posible solutions, once again it depends on the effect you want.

1) The easy one, rotate the prim so the z axis points in the direction you want, gives you the best effect but is not always possible, depending on the build.

2) You can apply something to PSYS_SRC_ACCEL they will still start on the z- axis but then the acceleration will be applied

3) you can target them with PSYS_SRC_TARGET_KEY to make them move to a target, once again the will still start on the z- axis before chaning direction

If you can do it number one is the best answer.

Not true PSYS_SRC_BURST_RADIUS will start the particles away from the centre.

It is still the center of the prim we are talking about, right?

Yes it is, but you can set how far away from the centre the particles appear.

The only really good solution here I think is to rotate the prim, particles always go along the z axis.