Mattistic Plume parameter overview (AE version)

The following list gives a basic description of the available parameters of the Mattistic Plume plugin for After Effects organized by category.

General

  • License status: Opens a window to view the license status and activate a license (requires an internet connection).
  • Use GPU: When enabled the plugin will try to use the graphics card to greatly accelerate rendering (requires CUDA or OpenCL).
  • Blend method: When replace source is enabled the source is completely replaced by the image output of the plugin including the alpha channel. Can be used to apply the plugin to a solid and compositing it manually.
  • voxel resolution: Affects how many voxels are generated which determines how detailed the end result will be. Every step doubles the amount of voxels. Higher values lead to longer render times.
  • samples/voxel: How many samples to take for every voxel a camera ray passes through. Increasing this can help reduce sampling artifacts.
  • dim. X/Y/Z: World dimensions of the volume before scaling.

Time

  • step: A scaling factor for the speed of the animation.
  • offset: An offset in frames for the starting point of the animation.

Camera

  • motion blur: The amount of directional blur applied to fast movement. This is not true motion blur but an approximation applied as a 2D effect.
  • exposure: A scaling factor for the brightness of the rendered image.
  • white balance: The temperature in K that is considered white. Higher values add more red/orange tones to the image while lower values add more blue.

World

  • scale: Scale of the world.
  • offset X/Y/Z: World offset of the volume.

Shadow

  • color: The color of the shadow cast by the smoke on the ground plane.
  • density: The density of the shadow.

Indirect light

  • ambient color: The color of the ambient light uniformly illuminating the volume. Fast but inaccurate.
  • ambient scale: A scaling factor for the amount of ambient light the volume receives.
  • scatter samples: The number of samples to take to simulate light bouncing around inside the volume (aka multiple scattering). Slow but accurate.

Smoke

  • color: The color of the smoke when illuminated by a white light.
  • absorption: A scaling factor for how quickly light is absorbed by the smoke as it shines through it.
  • density: Scales the density of the smoke. This also impacts the brightness of the flames as some smoke is needed for the flames to be visible.
  • diffuse: The density of a diffuse layer around the plume.

Fire

  • heat: Scales the temperature of the fire. This influences both the brightness and the color of the flames. The actual brightness also depends on the smoke density and fire brightness parameters.
  • brightness: Scales the brightness of the fire. The actual brightness also depends on the smoke density and fire heat parameters.
  • saturation: The amount by which high values of the flames are desaturated.
  • transition: The exponent of the transition towards the surface of the flame. Higher values lead to thinner flame surfaces.
  • dissipation: The exponent of the transition away from the surface of the flame. Higher values lead to thinner flame surfaces.

Shape

  • rotate: World rotation of the volume around an upward pointing axis.
  • length: The length of the plume.
  • bend: The curvature of the plume.
  • knee: The point along the plume, from the bottom up, that marks the center of the curvature.

Look

  • random seed: An initial value for the random number generator used to generate the turbulence and fuel variation.
  • base radius: The radius of the plume at its base.
  • top radius: The radius of the plume at its top.
  • spread: The amount by which the puffs of smoke spread out from the center of the plume.
  • motion: The speed by which the puffs of smoke rotate around themselves in the shape of a ring.
  • fade in: Reduces the density of the plume near the base.
  • fade out: Fades out the plume towards the top.