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Fancy Bullets
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  • Load from File...
  • Save to File...
  • Default .aur Render Settings
  • Fire/Smoke .aur Fast Render
  • Fire/Smoke from FumeFX
  • Fire/Smoke .vdb from Houdini
  • Liquid .vdb from Houdini
  • Fire/Smoke .vdb from Maya Fluids
  • Fire
  • Fuel Fire
  • Gasoline Explosion
  • Explosion
  • Large Smoke
  • Candle
  • Clouds
  • Cold Smoke

 

Parameters

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Mode | rendMode – Specifies the method for visualizing the grid content.

Volumetric – Visualizes the content as a standard 3ds Max atmospheric. This method is used mostly for fire and smoke.
Volumetric Geometry – This method requires V-Ray. It produces the same result as the Volumetric option by using procedural geometry made up from multiple transparent layers. Used when rendering fire/smoke for exporting deep images and render elements such as normals, velocity, multi matte, etc. which would not be available in Volumetric mode. For more information on which render elements are supported in Volumetric and Volumetric Geometry mode, see V-Ray Render Elements Support.

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Approximate and Approximate+Shadows options for the Scattering parameter in the Smoke color window are not supported in Volumetric Geometry mode.

For a complete list of the supported Render Elements in both Volumetric and Volumetric Geometry mode, please check the V-Ray Render Elements Support page.

Volumetric Heat Haze – This method requires V-Ray. It produces the same result as the Volumetric Geometry option, and also adds a heat haze effect when used with the Heat Haze parameter. Note that you might need to increase the Max depth of a VRayMtl with refraction in case it intersects with the Heat Haze shader.

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ImplicitSurface
ImplicitSurface
 Isosurface – This method requires V-Ray. It produces a procedural isosurface without polygons at render time using the Isosurface Level option. Compared to the Mesh mode, the result is always smooth but will take longer to render. In case in Mesh mode your mesh is too jagged and edgy, and smoothing it out is too slow or impossible, this means you should switch to Isosurface mode instead. 
Mesh – The content is converted into a standard 3ds Max mesh using the options in the Mesh Smoothing section. This mode is mostly used for liquids but can also be applied to thick smoke using a scatter material or to plumes of smoke to create effects such as large underwater bubbles.
Ocean Mesh – The grid content is extended to a flat area, fitting the camera's view.  In most cases, this mode is used with a displacement texture such as the Phoenix FD Ocean Texture.
Cap Mesh – Only the upper liquid surface is rendered. This mode can be used for swimming pools and other placid liquid surfaces.
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ImplicitSurface

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The ocean surface can be generated only when the liquid touches the sides and the bottom of the grid, which act as a container for the liquid. The detail of the mesh extension around the simulator depends on the camera resolution - for each pixel of the viewport or the rendered image, one or several polygons are generated, depending on the Ocean Subdivisions option.

Also note that if you use a material with fog color for the ocean mesh, and you have particles submerged below the ocean surface which you render using a Particle Shader, you need to also place a geometry that would serve as a bottom, or you could get flickering and darker rendering of the particles. For more info, see the Render as Geometry option of the Particle Shader.

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 Cutter Geom | usegizmo, gizmo – When enabled, rendering will occur only inside the selected geometric object's volume. Note that the Cutter Geom will not work when the render Mode is set to Volumetric Geometry.

Invert Cutter | invgizmo – When enabled, rendering will occur only outside of the render cutter. This is not the same as a cutter with inverted geometry because any rays that do not intersect the cutter will be shaded as well. 

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If using a Render Cutter for a liquid pouring into a glass or otherwise contained into another refractive object, you may need to set the Mode to Isosurface. By default, the mode is set to Mesh which may produce artifacts in the rendered image.

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SurfChannel
Surface Channel | sarg –  Specifies the channel that will define the surface of the fluid. It is used for solid rendering and displacement.

Texture - the values of a custom texture will define the mesh surface. You can see how this works in this How-to video.
Liquid - the Liquid channel will define the liquid surface. Liquid is typically in the range 0-1 for Liquid simulations.
Smoke - the Smoke channel will define the liquid surface. Smoke is typically in the range of 0-1 for Fire / Smoke simulations.
Speed - the Speed channel will define the liquid surface. Speed channel output has to be enabled for this to work. Speed is calculated as the length of the velocity vector for each voxel.  
Fuel - the Fuel channel will define the liquid surface. Fuel channel output has to be enabled for this to work. 
Viscosity - the Viscosity channel will define the liquid surface. Viscosity channel output has to be enabled for this to work.

Texture | stex – If the Surface channel is set to Texture, this slot specifies the texture. In Mesh, Ocean Mesh, Cap Mesh and Isosurface render modes, the selected map will completely replace the cache files that have been loaded, if any. For more information on texture mapping in Phoenix, please check the Texture mapping, moving textures with fire/smoke/liquid, and TexUVW page.

Invert Liquid Volume | solidbelow – By default, grid values above 0.5 are assumed to be liquid, and values below 0.5 are assumed empty. When enabled, the convention switches to the opposite such that values above 0.5 are assumed empty, and values below 0.5 are assumed to be liquid.  

Isosurface Level | surflevel - Allows you to specify a threshold value for the generation of the liquid surface. Grid cells below this value will be ignored. By default, the Isosurface Level is set to 0.5 and should only be modified if there is flickering in the generated geometry. Isosurface Level is used only in Isosurface, Mesh, Ocean Mesh and Cap Mesh Modes.

Isosurf. Sampler | sampler – Determines the blending method between adjacent grid voxels. Used to balance between rendering speed and quality. This parameter is only used when Mode is set to Isosurface.

Box – Displays voxels as cubes. There is no blending between neighbor voxels. This is the fastest mode.
Linear – Linear blending occurs between neighbor voxels to smooth out the fluid's look. Sometimes this mode may unveil the grid-like structure of the fluid. Up to 20-30% faster than the Spherical option.
Spherical – Uses special weight-based sampling for the smoothest looking fluid. With increasing resolution, the visual advantage of this method over the Linear method becomes less noticeable.

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The proper value for the Isosurface Level parameter depends on the numerical range of the surface channel. For example, Phoenix liquids are kept in the range of 0 to 1. A value of 0 means there is no liquid in a certain voxel, and a value of 1 means the cell is 100% full of liquid. Values in between indicate a certain mixture of air and liquid. For such cache files, an Isosurface Level value of 0.5 is best for visualizing the surface between the air and liquid. Imported caches from Houdini, on the other hand, use positive and negative values to indicate whether a voxel is inside or outside the liquid volume, so a correct "halfway" Isosurface Level value would be 0.0. Please check the Grid Channel Ranges page for information about other grid channels.

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Smoothness  |  smoothmesh – Specifies – Specifies the number of smoothing passes. The higher the value, the smoother the result, but the mesh will require more time to calculate. Used when Mode is set to Mesh, Ocean Mesh, or Cap Mesh to reduce the roughness of the mesh. 

Smooth Normals | smooth_normals – Smooths the normals of the mesh in order to get an even smoother looking result, even if the mesh is with low resolution. However when the Ocean displacement is used to add fine details the smoothing of normals should not diminish that and can be turned off.

Always – The mesh normals will be smoothed always.

When displacement is off – The mesh normals will be smoothed only when the Ocean displacement is off.

Never – The mesh normals will not be smoothed.

Use Liquid Particles | useprt – Enables particle-based smoothing of the mesh. It requires Liquid particles to be simulated and exported to the cache files. This method overcomes the limitations of the basic smoothing without particles, which can flicker in animation and cause small formations in the mesh to shrink.

Particle Size | prtsz – Used to make the liquid thicker or thinner. Works only when Use Liquid Particles is enabled. This parameter specifies the distance from the mesh surface to the particle centers.

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Motion blur

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To render your simulation with Motion Blur, you need to enable Velocity channel export from the Output rollout of your simulator.

When rendering liquids, the Motion blur of the mesh is obtained by shifting each vertex along the velocity by the shutter time. If rendering a Liquid simulation with secondary particle effects such as Foam, Splashes or Mist, you would also have to enable Velocity export for each particle system under the Output rollout → Output Particles section.

Multiplier | mbmult – Specifies a multiplier that affects the strength of the motion blur. This value can be a negative number. 

Prevent Self Intersection | mbself – In all Mesh modes, some motion blurred vertices might penetrate the opposite side of the geometry. When enabled, this option prevents such situations. The self-intersection analysis is expensive, so enable this parameter only when an intersection is obvious.

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Phoenix meshes are motion blurred in a different way than regular transforming and deforming geometries. When rendering regular meshes with motion blur, the entire mesh is moved along its transformation path back and forward in time, and so each individual vertex of the mesh follows this path. However, for each rendered frame, a new Phoenix mesh must be built from the voxel grid, and so it usually has a different number of vertices than the previous and the next frame. Because of this, individual vertices can not be traced back or forward in time between frames. Instead, motion blur of fluid meshes uses the velocity of vertices which is recorded by the simulation, and moves each vertex back and forward in time along the vertex velocity. This is why the generated liquid mesh does not support frame sub-sampling for motion blur. This may cause a mismatch between the liquid and transforming/deforming objects in your scene that interact with it. The fluid mesh is generated from data at the exact rendered frame and fluid data for the preceding or following frames is not used, unlike regular deforming meshes. As a consequence, the liquid and the objects in your scene would synchronize best if those objects do not use additional geometry samples for motion blur.

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The Grid Channel Smoothing controls allow you to smooth the Grid Channels loaded from cache files for preview and rendering.

You can smooth the Velocity Grid Channel stored in the simulated caches in case the motion blurred edges are looking jagged.

The recommended values for the smoothest result are all zeroes for the Threshold, Similarity and Random Variation options - this will produce strongest smoothing, evenly applied over the entire Grid, without adding any random variation.

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