Voxel Cone Shading

Light particles using voxel cone shading.

Method #

This node calculates lighting on particles using Voxel Cone Shading. This allows for soft shadows to be calculated that also take into account particle transparency. This effect must first voxelise the particles, which requires a limited spatial area denoted by a Bounding Box that can be connected via the Bounds Node. With no bounding box connected, an internal bounding box is used. Only particles within that area of space are included in the effect. The size of the spatial area also effects its resolution and visual result: large areas of space will reduce the precision of the effect.

At least one Light Node must be connected to the Light Node input in order for this effect to operate. Multiple lights can be connected and they will be evaluated sequentially to generate the shading result.

It is more efficient in terms of performance to use a single Voxel Cone Shading node with multiple light nodes connected, than multiple Voxel Cone Shading nodes each with one light node connected.

Parameters

Attributes

These properties control the core behaviours of the node.

Parameter	Details
Density Scale	Scale how much light is absorbed per voxel.

Inputs

Name	Description	Typical Input
Bounds Node	Adds an area in which the shading can apply.	Bounding Box
Light Node	Control which light nodes affect the particle shading. A light node is required for the shading to run.	Light
Affected Emitters	Choose which particle emitters can be affected by the affector.	Primitive Emitter
Transform Modifiers	Apply the transforms of another node to this node.	Null
Target Node	Modifiy the rotations of the node to always direct the z axis towards the input.	Null
Local Transform Override	Apply the transforms of another node to this node, relative to its parent.	Null