mcjJet is a script for Daz Studio

that lets you create steam and smoke effects

on april 27th 2013 it was updated to support "burst mode" or if you will, the pixie dust effect

since this is a free script there's some limitations and quirks

for complicated and richer effects search the Daz3d.com store for the word "particles"

http://www.daz3d.com/i.x/search/searchsub/?_m=d&sstring=particle

and the vendor "Nerd3D"

http://www.daz3d.com/i.x/search/searchsub/?_m=d&sstring=nerd3d

Installation

the Zip file is found at the bottom of this page under the name mcjJet.zip

unzip it in your daz content folder

typically this means

C:\Program Files\DAZ\Studio\content\

or sometimes

C:\Users\YOURNAME\Documents\DAZ 3D\Studio\My Library\

you will also need some mcjBillboards figures which youcan obtain here:

https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts3/mcjbillboards

note : mcjJet distributed before Sept 18 2014 is only usable with the standard Billboards figure

The new mcjJet version should work with any figure ( like the mcjBillboards2 figure )

as long as each "bone" has its own material ( 90 materials for a 90-panels billboard figure )

mcjJet for DS 1, 2, 3 was not affected by this issue

As of Sept 18 2014 there's new billboard figures here :

https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts4/mcjbillboards2

Use

- Load a billboards figure ( Content/Figures/mcasual )

the billboard figures contains little textured planes which we will call "puffs"

- select a node in the scene which will be the location of the jet, or the "emitter"

in this example we'll select the blue cylinder,

( Create / Primitives / Cylinder / Height 1 meter / Diameter 1cm )

Launch the mcjJet Script found in Studio/Scripts/mcasual

lets go through the interface from the top left to the bottom right

- Billboard figure or group

lets you select which puffs figure will be used, in the event you loaded many billboards figures in your scene

( advanced users : mcjJet considers all objects labeled *billboards* as valid billboards figures

( you could create a null , rename it to "100billboards" and parent many objects to it )

you could load 5 50billboard figures to get 250-puffs effects

- Type of Jet

you can select the shape of the area which the puffs will be launched

- Jet width / diam in cm

here you can specify the width/height/diameter of that area

- Jet Spread Angle in Degrees

the puffs are projected according to the direction of the emitter, in our example, the blue cylinder points up, so the puffs go up.

but the direction of the puffs is allowed to deviate from this axis by an angle between 0 degrees and 180 degrees

- Puffs fade out at end of life

when this is check-marked, the puffs will appear with 100%opacity and just before they disappear they will have an opacity of 0%

- Loopable

mcjJet recycles the 50 puffs, if you check-mark 'loopable' each particle will always be shot from the same location.

So you can render animations with 50 or 100 or 200 frames that will loop with great accuracy

- Pre simulate

if this is not check-marked, the effect will start with one puff being emitted, then another ... until the 50 puffs are active. If you check-mark this, mcjJet

start the smoke effect with all 50 puffs in movement

- Delete all the puffs opacity keyframes

To get the fade-out effect, mcjJet animates the Opacity channel of the puffs, this is your chance to delete those keyframes.

- Scale of puff at birth , Scale of puff at extinction

the factor by which the puffs are inflated as they go through life. Note thet the standard puffs are 10cm in diameter

- Start frame, End frame

the range of frames where the effect is animated. Note that even if there's 50 puffs being animated, only one keyframe per frame is created, so it's not too cpu intensive

- Load settings, Save settings

lets you store and retrieve most of the settings in a text file

- Create animation

mcjJet creates the puffs animation according to those settings

Movin around

To avoid incomprehensible effects, the billboard figure root node should be left alone, not moving at all.

but the emitter node, the cylinder in our example, can move and produce very cool effects

NEW! Burst mode, pixie dust effect

On April 27th 2013 i updated the program to better support particle emission that

are a delay, followed by a burst of particles. after the burst, the particles

are given the time needed to fade away or shrink/expand

the burst mode is obtained by

not check-marking the "Loopable" check-box

not check-marking the "Pre-Simulate" check-box

NEW! Better handling of the settings

as of April 27th 2013 there's a button to restore the default parameters / settings

also, when you exit the script, your settings are saved. You get them back the next time you open the program

NEW! Automated Face the Camera option

this new version of mcjJet includes the Re-Orient billboards option

- no re-orientation

- face the camera straight on

- face the camera but standing vertically ( like a tree for example )

Known Quirk

Maybe not in all versions of Daz Studio, but at least in version 3, each time you run a hefty script like mcjJet,

the processing speed slows down, For some scripts the processing time can double for each script run.

One remedy i use is to set up some smoke effects, then save my scene, close daz studio, restart it, load the scene

and were're back to decent processing speed.