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particleIllusion for AE FAQ

particleIllusion general FAQ

Installation/Activation FAQ

particleIllusion 3.0 FAQ

particleIllusion SE FAQ

Windows versions FAQ

Mac OS X versions FAQ

Motion Emitters FAQ

Pro Emitters FAQ

 

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particleIllusion SE FAQ

Can particleIllusion SE render HD output?
It depends on your desktop resolution. If your desktop is larger than 1280 x 720, you can render HD 720p output with SE. If your desktop is larger than 1920 x 1080, you can also render HD 1080 output.

How many effects can particleIllusion SE do?
There is no limit to the number of effects you can produce with particleIllusion SE. There are already over 2000 "emitters" (effects) included with the program, and we release a new free library of more every month. Each of these should be considered a "preset", and they can be customized to create subtle variations or completely new emitters. Although not as powerful as particleIllusion 3.0 (which has over 2800 emitters available), SE is still very powerful and flexible.

What are the differences between SE and 3.0?
particleIllusion SE is based on the particleIllusion 2.0 engine, so SE doesn't have all of the newer features that are in particleIllusion 3.0 (super emitters, forces, "get color from layer", etc.).

Besides that, what the SE version doesn't have are several features found in particleIllusion 3.0 that more advanced users may need. particleIllusion SE has the following limits:

- Output resolution limited to slightly smaller than desktop resolution
- No Super Emitters
- No Force objects
- More limited particle color options (no "get color from layer" for instance)
- Single Layer only
- No layer offset/angle
- No layer transparency
- No blockers
- No import/export of position data
- Motion blur settings are fixed -- only on/off
- No stage size presets
- Only supports BMP, JPG, TGA image formats*
- No shape image export
- Maximum shape import size 256x256
- No "Replace Emitter" function
- No numeric entry for data or frame
- No reference graphs*

* Note: Mac OS X version of SE contains reference graphs, and supports different (and more) file formats

Since particleIllusion SE can only do 1 layer, and I need to add many layers of effects to my project, how can it be useful?
Layers in particleIllusion can contain a background image, image sequence, or movie, and as many particle emitters as you want. Therefore in SE you can add as many emitters (effects) as you want, all on a single layer. What you can't do is have multiple layers of footage with alpha channels inside particleIllusion SE -- but of course you can layer multiple particleIllusion renders in your compositing or video editing application.

How do I change the emitters in the Library window? I've downloaded all of the additional emitters but they don't show up in the library window.
The library window only shows the currently-loaded library. To load another library, r-click (ctrl-click on Mac) and choose 'Load Library' and locate your library files and select one.