Hey people. I am really new with Houdini and I have a question.

I made a simple particle system. I like the look of it. Now I want to render it as fine homogenize dust. When I try to render just the particles I get harsh dots with space between them which have the motion of a dust but they dont look like it.

I tried looking tutorials and there is a lot of information which is overwhelming for someone new like me. I don't understand half of the terminology they are talking.


Thank you!

You should be looking at using a Volume and not particles for a fine looking dust.

Rob

Yes ,You should use volumes.
I using this solutions on my dust projects :

I Create a volume base dust effect with PyroFX (Billowy Smoke).
Then I generate some particles with same source of the Pyro .
At the next step I use POPs Advect by Volumes tool for moving particles according to volume simulation.

and finally I render both Particles and Volume to achieve Dust Effect :wink:

Thank you so much for the replays guys but I am am still confused.

I am uploading my scene, its fairly simple, I just want small “push” from you so I can see how do you combine the pyro smoke with the particles for nice dust render..

I have the set up for the particles on the scene.

Thank you again!

Ok , I made a simple project about advect particles by volume for you ,To achieve best result you should increase number of the particles and use Motion Blur for them ,Also you should render volume and particles in the different file and merge them with some color correction in the Compositing :wink:

There is some important note about making perfect dust effect :

1. Turbulence shape and motion of the particles ,you can use pyro(smoke) to achieve this motion.

2. Scale of the particles should be very very small .

3. Number of the particles should be very very numerous.

NOTE : PScale and Number of Particles has opposite relation !

4. Motion Blur is good solution for prevent render particles as ugly points.

5. Use some many lights with different intensity to create sharp shadows.

6. Perfect rendering setup , for example using large number for pixel samples.