Deriving Particle Products - A Complete Guide
by Ruckiteer
This tutorial is about DERIVING particle derivables only. If you want to learn how to create new particle effects from scratch, you should look at the awesome tutorial by oOKabbyOo: Particles for Dummies [Create Mode Edition]
I’ll be using the following two products to demonstrate how derivable particle products can be derived:
There are two types of particle derivables in IMVU catalog.
Type I:
You can find all the details about the particle rules and the particle texture names used within the Debug 02 tab in create mode. (we will see what Debug 02 is later). Product 1 above is an example of this kind of particle derivable. If the derivable is of this type, you can change the particle texture as well are add/edit particle rules and change the way the derived particle effect works.
Type II:
The second kind of derivable particles, hides particle rules and you can NOT figure out the particle texture names by looking at the Debug 02 tab. Product 2 is an example of this type of particle derivable. Only change that you can do with this sort of particle products is to change the particle texture used.
Tip: it is important to realize that there can only be a single particle texture in any one product. If you have a product with a particle effect and if you derive from it, you can NOT add a second particle texture to the derived product. You can of course replace the particle texture with something new, but can not have two of them simultaneously.
STEP 1 - Determine the particle derivable type
As I’ve explained above, depending on the type of the particle derivable, there are limitations on what you can do while deriving.
First, open create mode and derive from the product you want.
Select debug tab
Select Debug 02 sub-tab
See if you can find a ParticleEffect item in the list
If you can find a ParticleEffect item then the derivable product is of Type I, else it is of Type II. Yeah simple as that!
(Following image shows the Debug 02 tab for Product 1. Note that it has the ParticleEffect item as it is a derivable particle product of Type I. If you derive from Product 2 you won’t see this ParticleEffect item in Debug 02 tab)
STEP 2 - Determine the particle derivable type
If the product you derived from is of Type II, and if the particle creator wanted you to derive from their product, they would have provided details about how to derive the product in their product page. Go to their product page, and look specifically for the particle texture name. (for example in all my derivable particle products including the Product 2 above, I have instructions on how to derive and the particle texture name to use in product description). When you find out what the particle texture name is, move to STEP 3.
If your product you derived from is of Type I, you can yourself find out what the particle texture file name is... Now that you have opened Debug 02 tab, and look for a TextureFileName item under ParticleEffect item. The filename that is given here is the name of the particle texture file that you should use.
STEP 3 - Change particle texture
Now you know the name that you should be using for your particle texture, you can simply add a file with that name to your product folder. Then this new texture will replace the texture file that was used in the derivable product.
To do this, you first click on the folder icon at the top bar of Create Mode.
Next add the particle texture to product folder and make sure you name it exactly the same as the particle texture name you found in STEP 2. (in my example, we found it to be “particle.png”, hence I called the texture “particle.png”)
Now go back to create mode and click on Apply Changes.
And that’s it. You have your own particle product made. Save it and upload to catalog!
(not so) Advanced Stuff
If the derivable particle product is of Type I, change the rules, add more rules and even change the particle texture name (for whatever reason). How you do such things is out of the scope of this tutorial, you should read oOKabbyOo’s tutorial: Particles for Dummies [Create Mode Edition].
If the derivable is of Type II, you are out of luck for the moment, all you can do is to change the particle texture. But stay tuned... I’ll be writing a tutorial on that pretty soon.