Particle Systems

For the Alpha/Previs, I had created a basic particle setup which utilized two emitters, one for dust, and one for dirt particles. This is for the scene where the tree is ripped from the ground. Today, I spent the entire day improving the setup to enhance the look of the scenes and make sure that the tree being ripped out looks like it has force behind it, and will look awesome.

I started off by adding more instances of dirt particles, and creating a new rock/dirt texture for them. I then went in and spent a lot of time tweaking the amount of particles, the area of effect, and colors and transparencies so that everything would act the way we want it to.

Then I moved onto the ground. If a tree is being ripped from the Earth, you would expect the ground to be pulled up with the tree, so I create an additional plane just underneath the ground. I shattered it to create broken pieces, and then animated the pieces to rotate towards the tree and pull upwards out of the ground as the tree lifts.

Through a combination of the two, the scenes have gained a lot of value, showing the strength of Behemoth as he rips out the tree from the ground.

Here is a before and after comparison to get an idea of what was created today.

Before-  a flat shot, showing the roots pulling out

After - dust, debris, ground breaks round out the shot