Vortex Simulation

The simulator works by using vortex particles to drive the motion of the fluid. Each vortex has an axis around which the flow moves, and a radius of its area of effect. Larger vortices affect more particles but smaller ones can create more detailed features. Putting many vortices together makes a convincing realistic flow. There is no bounding box in the vortex simulator, you can have particles or vortices anywhere in your scene without any performance issues.

There are two main ways to control the motion of the fluid. The first is to use a global force to give the fluid a push in one direction, then use the Initialize SlipstreamVX node to initialize vortices from the flow of a particle emitter.

The other way in SlipstreamVX to guide the motion of the fluid is by placing fans in the scene. A fan works by producing a steady acceleration in one direction, which you can use to create effects like jets or air, explosions, or fire.

Another main feature of the simulator is the turbulence model. When a vortex collides with a surface that's plugged into the obstacle port of the simulator, the contact creates new vortices, giving a wake of turbulent motion that follows the point of surface contact. This produces interesting, realistic interactions between fluid and solid.

Creating a Scene

To create an simple ICE tree that has all the necessary SlipstreamVX nodes, select an object and use the custom commands "Emit SlipstreamVX Fluids" from the ICE Create submenu in the Simulate menu. This will create a particle emitter from the object you have selected and an initialize and simulate node hooked up in a default state.

Note: The simple configuration hide some of the more advanced features of the simulator.

For help on a particular parameter of the ICE nodes, see the next section.