What's new in particleIllusion 3.0.2

Version 3.0.2 was originally going to be just an update of the movie file support, but we decided to add several more features as well, and of course fixed several bugs. Here's a summary of all of the new features and changes in particleIllusion 3.0.2 (and pIllusionRender 3.0.5).

Note: None of the file formats have changed between 3.0.1a and 3.0.2, so you could run 3.0.1a again after using 3.0.2 if you absolutely needed to.  We recommend always using the latest version only though. (The only time we recommend running 3.0.1a is when you find a problem in 3.0.2 and want to see if the problem is new or existed in 3.0.1a.)

Major changes:

Updated Activation Procedure

Enhanced movie file support (loading)

• The loading of DV AVI files is now supported, and a larger number of codecs should be available as well.
• If an AVI contains an alpha channel (for transparency) it will be detected and used when loaded now.
• WMV and ASF files can be loaded

Enhanced movie file support (saving)

• AVIs can be saved with an alpha channel now, if the selected codec supports it.
• You can save WMV (Windows Media Video) files now.

Automatic Updates

A new "Check for Updates" function has been added to the "Help" menu, and "Check for new libraries" has been added to the library window context (r-click) menu.

Easier Rendering of Large Output Sizes

• If the output size (the stage size at the current zoom level) is too large to fit in the stage window, the stage window will be automatically maximized
• If the maximized stage window is still not large enough to fit your output size, then pIllusionRender will be called automatically

Scale Project

Quick Load Library Menu Submenus

pIllusionRender Changes

• New movie output settings (same as pIllusion)
• Can now use hardware acceleration

particleView

particleView (formerly called "ShowIEL") is now installed along with particleIllusion. New features:

• Emitter search feature
• full-screen mode
• Can hide the mouse cursor

Other Changes

There were many small changes made too, many of which will make using pIllusion easier.

• Don't Erase added to preview window context menu
• Holding down mouse button in preview window overrides "repeat"
• Combustion emitter library files (ELC files) can now be loaded.
• After Effects 7 and CS 3 (AE 8) data is supported in position data import / export. 
• The graph windows will now "autoscroll" the data values into view when a property is selected in the hierarchy.  The data point at frame 1 is used.
• Increased Max graph values from 2000 to 3000.
• Added a key shortcut for toggling motion blur: Ctrl+B. You can also access this from the "View" menu.
• Enabling a disabled emitter (by clicking its icon in the hierarchy) will no longer automatically enable any of its particle types that were disabled. In other words, particle types stay disabled until you manually enable them. (The enabled/disabled info is still not saved in project files though.)
• Holding the Shift key while launching particleIllusion will cause software rendering to be used for this launch only (as an alternative to using the "run with software rendering" link in the Start - Programs - particleIllusion 3.0 menu).
• When adjusting the reference point of a particle type, you can now drag the reference point.
• If stage zoom is not 100% when "Save Output" is clicked, will show a message and set it to 100% if wanted.
• Scroll position is now reset automatically when saving output.
• When zooming stage with mousewheel, when zoom is less than 50% will step by 5% instead of 10% for better control,
• Removed annoying messages that showed when Library Manager was closed. Now will only ask for confirmation if you click "Cancel" and the library has been modified.
• The OpenGL Preference "Don't use texture RAM for bg images" is now checked by default as this offers better performance on most modern cards.
• Default "Number of library backups" is now 6 instead of 10, default "Number of recent files" is now 8 instead of 4, and default stage size is 640x480 instead of 320x240.
• Default stage sizes list contains many more sizes now, including most common NTSC, PAL, and HD resolutions and their square pixel equivalents.

One feature that was removed in 3.0.2 is the "preserve audio from layer" feature.  Although we hate to remove features, this feature had limited usefulness, and didn't work very well. 
   

Bug Fixes

The following bugs were present in 3.0.1a (and possibly earlier versions too) and have been fixed in 3.0.2:

• Could crash at startup if "image" was used in preview window when last closed.
• The DPI info was wrong in some image files written (PNG for instance).
• Crashed when removing bg image from some projects
• The "Where used" check for particle shapes did not work correctly for super emitters.
• The "Use next key color" count didn't reset in the preview window when the mouse was clicked, so colors would change every time.
• The import position data "start at frame 0" dialog would always use "yes" so would always subtract 1 from the frame numbers.
• During playback, toggling off bg movie display (with bg icon) would crash when playback was stopped.
• The "separate fields" (deinterlace) options (in the layer "background images" dialog) would only work for images, not movies.  Also, it might not deinterlace the alpha channel correctly.
• Also, it would not deinterlace while saving output at all.  Now it will but only if the project settings fields options are "off".
• Library backup files were saved with version 2 (IEL) header, and thumbnails were not saved (which means that if you used a backup library file, you would need to create all of the thumbs again).
• Would sometimes crash when trying to find missing image on project load
• Fixed "run with software rendering" logic -- it was supposed to just use software rendering for that one run of the app, then switch back to hardware rendering the next time you run it, but it permanently changed it to software mode and you had to change it back to use hardware acceleration in the OpenGL preferences. Now it switches to software for only that single run.
• Sometimes at startup the left window pane (divider between stage window and preview/library windows) would move to the left some amount, requiring manual readjustment.
• Blocker that uses image from a lower layer doesn't update unless blocker or its points move.
• Dragging all position data keys (by holding Ctrl when clicking and dragging a position key in the graph window) could cause a crash as the first and second data points overlapped.
• Sometimes when selecting a library to load (with "load library") the preview of the emitter thumbnail images would not show.  (Emitters_07_04 is one example)
• OpenGL accumulation buffer was being setup wrong, so some cards (ATI usually) would not create the accumulation buffer, which resulted in "high-quality motion blur" being disabled.
• In Super emitters, when a free emitter that contained "single" particles died and was reused, the previous "single" particle was still present, so eventually more and more "single" particles would accumulate for each free emitter.
• Position data export now includes the correct source width and height instead of using 1 x 1 (AE doesn't appear to use this info).
• Scroll (s) and Zoom (z) modes can now be toggled off without having to click, and the cursor changes immediately.
• In preview, emitters that used "attached" particles and non-zero preload could have those particles drawn at seemingly random angles.
• "Attached" particles with non-zero preload would draw incorrectly when first added to the stage.
• "Attached" particles with non-zero preload would draw incorrectly when emitter angle animated and frame was scrubbed or playback repeat occurred.
• Circle/Ellipse emitters that had non-zero preload would show particles in center of circle/ellipse ("pulsing dots circle 01" in emitters_05_05 lib)
• "Emit at points" emitters and non-zero preload would get the "next point" value goofed up after preload, so the emit at points pattern would be wrong ("pulsing dots circle 01" in emitters_05_05 lib on stage only).
• would crash when the mask image for an emitter was not found when loading a project file if the "find file" dialog was moved.
• The "find file" dialog for a missing mask image file would allow all file choices, not just alpha channel image formats.
• When mask image file was not found and removed, masking would not be turned off (even though the image was removed) usually resulting in no particles.
• When pIllusion was not foreground app, was always using black as bg color.
• When loading project with particles that "get color from layer" and bg images can not be found (and are found by the user), the particles would get the color from the wrong part of the image.
• When switching between large and small toolbar buttons, the frame number controls would position incorrectly.
• Deleting the first folder in the Library Manager would cause the library to become corrupted.