Creating particle animations

Particles are used in various 3D applications for special effects such as smoke, dust, explosions, fluid, fire, and rain. It is much more difficult to build and manage a complete particle system rather than construct other simple scene objects. In fact, OSG provides a large number of classes in the osgParticle library to enable customization of complex particle systems, most of which may be extended and overridden using inheritance, if user-defined algorithms are needed.

The particle class, osgParticle::Particle, represents the atomic particle unit. It is often used as a design template before the simulation loop starts, and copied and regenerated by the particle system in run-time to render massive particles.

The particle system class, osgParticle::ParticleSystem, manages the creation, updating, rendering, and destruction of all particles. It is derived from osg::Drawable, so it can accept different rendering attributes and modes, just like normal drawables...