Lightning beam effect

[Hudo1979]

Hello have anyone did any lightning effect in bbabylonjs? such as lightning beam, chain lightning etc, can someone give me a push in the direction?

[chicagobob123]

You can apply the concept of lightning from other applications to Babylon. 

I looked at this for a small amount of time yesterday. What you need is a small glowing sphere white in the inside and blue on the outside I dont know how to do this. 

I checked this out but its not right http://www.babylonjs-playground.com/#1HECPU#52 .  

You need a direction and allowance for randomness in that direction. You use the random position to make the lightning bolt look real. You precreate the particles with 0 opcity. When its want a bolt to be shot you adjust the opacity position on the fly. 

lightning effect look this up via google. 

This has a generic version of what you need to do via math. 

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:IdgpUg97ajAJ:gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-generate-shockingly-good-2d-lightning-effects--gamedev-2681+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

[chicagobob123]

forgot. Sorry I am buried at work otherwise I would try to code up an example. 

If you remove the random positioning you can make an easy laser shot with particles. 

 

[V!nc3r]

If you're fear of maths, i think you can test the sprite system, with a nice texture (examples).

[aWeirdo]

Hi @Hudo1979

Very interesting question, 

I'm sure there are many ways of achieving this, it can probably be done with a shader,

but the particleSystem should also be able to achieve it

Edit:

 a quick proof of concept  :

http://www.babylonjs-playground.com/#Q1CAF#3

and with a start/stop interval & timeout for "life-like" lightning flashes..

http://www.babylonjs-playground.com/#Q1CAF#5

 

[Hudo1979]

Thank All!!

 

For all the wonderfull tips.

I just have some consideration, if I need lightning in a game, I probably for performance using a texture with lightning sprite?

 

The particle really looks cool, but is is difficult to like set emitter and target to draw the lightning

[chicagobob123]

Hudo 1979 , you have to consider several things. Do you want the effect to be seen as growing and reaching out or just a flash?

Do you want the effect to be somewhat random controlled by parameters. These are some of the artistic choices you need to decide before you 

derive a solution. 

[Hudo1979]

more or less I want it as a beam weapon effect, with a starting point and a targeting point, that have an animation that looks like a lightning.

[MarianG]

Here is done with sprite:

http://playground.babylonjs.com/#1IQ6A5#5

[Hudo1979]

@bulisor

 

Looks great! I will look more into it, thank you.