2009

4 In Particle View, Add a Keep Apart operator on page 2894 to Event 01.
Keep Apart is a fairly calculation-intensive operator.
5 Go to frame 100 by clicking the right end of the time slider track.
There is a delay as the system calculates all particle motion between
frames 0 and 100. This is necessary because Particle Flow is a
history-dependent system. At the same time, the actions in the system
highlight briefly in Particle View as they're executed at each frame.
6 Go to frame 50 by clicking the center of the time slider track.
There is a another delay as the system calculates all particle motion
between frames 0 and 50.
7 In Particle View, drag a Cache operator from the depot to Event 01. Insert
it anywhere in the event.
When you release the mouse button, there is a delay as the Cache operator
automatically caches particle motion from the start of the animation to
the current frame. Meanwhile, each action highlights briefly at each
frame.
8 Go to frame 20 or so.
The only operators that highlight are Cache (very fast) and Display; there
is no delay for calculation. All frames between 0 and 50 have been cached.
9 Go to frame 100.
The delay this time is a result of caching particle motion for frames 50
to 100.
10 Jump to different frames, and drag the time slider.
All particle motion is now cached, so no delays occur. But if you change
a setting's value, the Cache operator automatically recalculates and stores
the particle motion.
11 Go to frame 100, and then, in Particle View, click the Keep Apart operator
and use the keyboard to change the Falloff Zone value to 8.0.
By default, the Cache operator automatically updates the cache when
you change any parameters it stores. Thus, when you change the Falloff
Zone value at frame 100, it recalculates and recaches the entire animation.
Next, you'll briefly explore how manual caching works.
12 Click the Cache operator and set Update to Manually.
The Cache operator no longer updates the stored data automatically when
you change a parameter.
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