Render

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render

The Render Panel controls how particles appear when they are rendered.

Obs

Cycles supports only Object and Collection render types.

Common Settings

Scale

Todo.

Scale Randomness

Todo.

Material

Set which of the object’s materials is used to shade the particles.

Coordinates System

Use a different object’s coordinates to determine the birth of particles.

Show Emitter

When disabled, the emitter is no longer rendered. Activate the button Emitter to also render the mesh.

Render As

None

When set to None, particles are not rendered. This is useful if you are using the particles to duplicate objects.

Halo

Halos are rendered as glowing dots or a little cloud of light. Although they are not really lights because they do not cast light into the scene like a light object. They are called Halos because you can see them, but they do not have any substance.

Path

The Path visualization needs a Hair particle system or Keyed particles.

B-Spline

Interpolate hair using B-splines. This may be an option for you if you want to use low Render values. You loose a bit of control but gain smoother paths.

Steps

Set the number of subdivisions of the rendered paths (the value is a power of 2). You should set this value carefully, because if you increase the render value by two you need four times more memory to render. Also the rendering is faster if you use low render values (sometimes drastically). But how low you can go with this value depends on the waviness of the hair (the value is a power of 2). This means 0 steps give 1 subdivision, 1 give 2 subdivisions, 2 –> 4, 3 –> 8, 4 –> 16, … n –> n².

Timing

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render ‣ Timing

Type:

Hair

Absolute Path Time

Path timing is in absolute frames.

End

End time of the practical path.

Random

Give the path length a random variation.

Object

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render ‣ Object

Instance Object

The specified object is instanced in place of each particle.

Global Coordinates

Use object’s global coordinates for instancing.

Object Rotation

Use the rotation of the object.

Object Scale

Use the size of the object.

Collection

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render ‣ Collection

Instance Collection

The objects that belong to a collection are instanced sequentially in the place of the particles.

Whole Collection

Use the whole group at once, instead of one of its elements, the group being displayed in place of each particle.

Pick Random

The objects in the group are selected in a random order, and only one object is displayed in place of a particle. Please note that this mechanism fully replaces old Blender particles system using parentage and Instancing Vertices to replace particles with actual geometry. This method is fully deprecated and does not work anymore.

Global Coordinates

Use object’s global coordinates for instancing.

Object Rotation

Use the rotation of the objects.

Object Scale

Use the size of the objects.

Use Count

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render ‣ Collection ‣ Use Count

Use objects multiple times in the same groups. Specify the order and number of times to repeat each object with the list view that appears. You can duplicate an object in the list with the + button, or remove a duplicate with the - button.

Extra

Reference

Panel:

Particle System ‣ Render ‣ Extra

Parents Particles

Render also parent particles if child particles are used. Children have a lot of different deformation options, so the straight parents would stand between their curly children. So by default Parents are not rendered if you activate Children. See Children.

Unborn

Render particles before they are born.

Dead

Render particles after they have died. This is very useful if particles die in a collision Die on hit, so you can cover objects with particles.