Gausss hog contrail

[Echo Ranger 449]

I'm trying to give the gauss hog some h3-like effects. I'm working on the contrail right now.

Problems?
I want the contrail to look more "electric". You know that if an electric bolt was forced to move in a straight line, there would be a few wavy lines bending out and in from the main stream? It's like how the energy sword has sparks that dance between the two blades. I used a fuel rod contrail to try to get that, but I'd like to see if I could get a part of the contrail to kind of rotate...or circle around the main contrail in a sine-like pattern as the contrail moves forward.
I couldn't figure out how to use the "secondary map" section to do that, so I'm trying elsewhere in the tag.
Anyways, here is what I have so far.

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Ok, so I've added an energy smoke point physics. Now the cone angle for the point velocity makes sense. The point velocity is set to 0 to 1. I'm going to change that, as well as the 90 degree cone angle.
Oh, I forgot to explain the color transitions:
1.) white for a transition of 0.1
2.) purple-ish blue for a transition of 0.175
3.) yellow for a transition of 0.125
4.) dark orange for a transition of 0.125
Width gets slightly smaller: part 1 = 0.25, part 2 = 0.15, part 3 = 0.1, part 4 = 0.075
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I've switched to a vacuum particle and I still get what I want. However, I want the movement to occur faster. Increasing the point velocity velocity only increases how far out the electric arcs spread out perpendicular to the projectile. I need to speed up the animation. I'll see what I can do.


Here's what I've noticed: point generation rate seems to dictate how much "stuff" is in your contrail...I think it's also the same as the density.
The "texture animation u"s seems to be something like the speed of the higher the value, the faster the contrail's bitmap flows (though I know the actual speed is dictated by the projectile).

Edit: I'm going to see if I can try an effect on the projectile instead of trying to get the electric look with a contrail.
I think my colors are too dark. I'll work on it later.

Edit: Well I rechecked it with a real h3 gauss, and I've decided to do a different approach. This time half of the contrail uses the assault rifle "smoke" contrail. The second half uses the fuel rod contrail. I did this by duplicating the same contrail and nulling out the alpha (for the contrail #1) for the later stages. I also nulled out the alpha for the earlier stages of the second contrail.

Here's what I got. Tell me what you think.
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(I just posted the video, please wait for it to process)

Edit:I've just update it again. I think I'm satisfied enough to move on to the more fun and significant parts: the effects.

[Inferno]

Looks cool i guess. I prefer the standard white contrail myself though. This looks way to "OMG LAZORZ CANNON PURPLE WHITE YELLOW!!!" to me.

[Echo Ranger 449]

Yeah I varied the colors too much (too dark). The color transition is correct though. my newer version looks a heck of a lot better. I'll record it now.

[Heathen]

No, it should be shorter and less smokey. Its a minimac cannon.

[Echo Ranger 449]

I watched it in slow-mo on my xbox. What I'll do is make a blue version of the sentinel beam bitmap and just use the contrail color properties to make the assault rifle contrail yellowish and slightly-brown. I'll also have a grey version of the fuel rod contrail bitmap run straight through both contrails (it will be the smoke whisps that cover the surface of the contrail.

[Bad Waffle]

i like it, i dont think it matters that its not accurate

[The_Wraith]

Railguns really shouldn't have any contrail at all...

[Heathen]

all it should have is a motion blur from the hot projectile.

[Echo Ranger 449]

If that's true, and the Halo 3 Gauss shouldn't have a mistake, then that's Bungie's error. However, I'm still basing it off of their projectile (I know the firing effects aren't matched yet).

I did my final version and I'm FINALLY content with the contrail. It consists of a fuel rod "smoke" contrail, an initial blue beam contrail, and a final "smog-like" contrail. The smoke contrail begins shortly before the blue beam ends.

Here's a preview:

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The smoke beam is hard to see in the video, but it kind of waves up and down a bit (sine wave) on the main contrail's surface.

[Inferno]

I like the new one its much nicer looking. Gj

[Echo Ranger 449]

Thanks! I'm thinking it looks a little too blue... Perhaps. However, when I adjust the bitmap for the blue beam, I used the theatre on halo 3 to stop time and get a close up on the contrail. The real one may be more sky blue (with a slightly higher red tint), but it should be right. I found out the contrail never really switches colors. It just shoots the blue beam and it's the smoke (a yellowish-smog-like color) that replaces the beam almost instantaneously. There is however, a hazy stream of thin gray smoke that flows along the surface. So I think I got those effects right.

[Heathen]

Looks good, but if your looking for h3, then thats wrong.

[Echo Ranger 449]

Actually, if you play a gauss contrail in slow mo, then no, it's right. However, if I got the timing wrong or if the timing ratio is wrong, or anything else, you should state what it is. Initially I was using a youtube video to do it, but I found my xbox to be much more reliable. I know the initial contrail was a bit too blue, I fixed that last night; if there is anything else, please state it, because I think I finally nailed it.