Volumetric HELP

[Schumacher]

What would be the best way to create a volumetric cloud contained within a glass tube?

For a little more clarity, I'm working on a Sci-Fi scene that has glass canisters that contain this mysterious blue energy light...or gas. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

[richpr]

Depends if you want the gas animated or not.... You could end up with hypervoxels... Although I don't know the ins & outs of that... but I have seen them used for many cloud effects...

Another simple one is to have the canister made of 2 more layers... the outer layer is glass and transparent, inside could be another polygon layer which has the 'gas' underneath...

It also depends how many canisters you want to use etc. If you have lots of transparencies etc. your rendering time could be long... As usual there are many ways to skin a canister ;)

[Schumacher]

I think I probably would want the gass to be animated (if not now possibly in the future). So, I think hypervoxels is the way to go but I'm not sure how to accomplish that effect.....

[richpr]

From the manual...

"HyperVoxels and Transparent Surfaces
Because volumetrics are ray-traced, to see a HyperVoxel behind a transparent surface, you must ray trace transparent surfaces. You can do this by simply activating the Ray Trace Transparency option on the Render Options panel. However, this is not necessary if the Refraction Index of the object’s transparent surface (Surface Editor) is set greater than 1.0 (even 1.001) and Ray Trace Refraction on the Render Options panel is enabled."

See the examples that are in that part of the manual...

Check out the smoke tutorial @ Hypervoxels Smoke (http://www.newtek.com/products/lightwave/tutorials/specialfx/hypervoxels_smoke/hypervoxels_smoke.html).

[richpr]

See the section from the manual here (http://www.newtek.com/freestuff/lwhelp/content/015_volumetrics/007_volumetrics_hv.htm)

[Schumacher]

Thanks....I'll let you know how it turns out...