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Creating a glowing energy over an object
by Nikolay Gachev, Worldwide-FX 28/01/2005
This tutorial explains how to create the effect of glowing energy over an object. As a basic scene I used SpaceFighters scene, that comes with LW example scenes. I replaced one of the space fighters (nearer to the camera) with another LW example object - LowCountFighterv2.
User level
 Competent LightWave user.
Tools used
Hypervoxels - Surface Editor
Surf Mixer.
Materials needed
Spacefighters.lws scene from LightWave 7 content (classic content in LightWave 8) and LowCountFighterv2.lwo from the same content, Objects/Space directory.
End Results

 
Step 1. Getting started

 

First of all, let's load up the SpaceFighters scene and replace the second SpaceFighter with the LowCountFighterv2 object we've chosen, from the same Space directory.

Next, we'll continue by creating two HyperVoxel emitters - they will be the laser guns of the attacking fighter.

Set the parameters of the emitter as follows:

Birth rate - 0.1
Generate by frame
Generator size X/Y/Z - 100mm/100mm/1m
Particle limit - 5
Lifetime - 30 frames
Velocity Z - 100m
Parent motion - 0%

All other parameters retain their default values.

Set the current frame to 0, parent the emitter to SpaceFighter object and position it into the gun barrel.

 
 

Clone the emitter and place the copy into the second gun barrel.

Now your fighter is armed.

 
Step 2. Texture for the laser beams

 
Well, that's pretty easy. All settings you need for the particle's look are shown but not its texture, which is up to you. Don't forget to set the luminosity to 100% and use whatever colour you like. Of course, the texture could be improved, but it is not the point of this tutorial.

 
Step 3. Collision detection

 

Now we want to have the second fighter hit by the laser beams. The beams should disappear when they hit. A simple cheat will solve the problem.

With current frame still set to 0, create a collision object, parent it to the second fighter and set Mode to "erase" and Radius/Level to 2m. Place the Collision as shown on the picture below and create key here. Now the particles will disappear when they reach the collision.
 
 

Now it's time to create the effect of glowing energy. First of all, we will need a surface where the effect should be applied.

 
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