Sunrise is a particle based scenario which attaches a particle system to each user in the tracking bar. Using just the particle SOP and metaball force fields did not yield enough control over the movement of the particles and so, due to the lack of advanced particle tools (like POPs), we had to come up with an alternative approach to mimic the look & feel of a swarm. After testing various approaches, it turned out that it is possible to approximate swarm-like motions by applying noise fields, various rotations and well timed scaling effects to a simple sphere. While it’s not actual flocking, the overall effect works very well and the movements are reminiscent of a fish-swarm. In order to achieve the trailing effect, a GPU based version of the trail SOP was created in addition to some feedback TOP based trails. This served to create nice long trails without much of a performance impact. By lifting and lowering their arms, the users were able to scale the particle system which followed them as they moved. When a user left the tracking bar, the attached particles quickly shot off-screen leaving visibly long trails – an effect extremely popular with the younger audience, who were jumping in and out of the tracking bar with abandon.
Client: Deutsche Telekom AG
Concept and realization: q~bus Mediatektur GmbH
