The GPU particle system — emitters, effectors, and renderers — and how to wire a working chain.

Particles in Auragen are a GPU simulation built from four kinds of operator. The Particle System node is the hub: emitters feed it particles, effectors push them around, and renderers draw them.

Press Tab in the node graph and open the Particles tab.

The minimum chain

Three operators and the Output node:

Emitter ──────────────► Particle System ──► Output
Point Renderer ───────►

Wire the Emitter output of an emitter into the system's Emitter port, and the Renderer output of a renderer into its Renderer port. Then wire the system's Output to the Output node.

A Particle System with only an emitter, or only a renderer, produces nothing at all — no error and no black frame, just an empty result. One of each is the minimum. This is the single most common reason a particle patch looks broken.

Effectors are optional. With none, you get a static cloud.

How effectors attach

The effector wires into the system, not the other way round.

Chain several by wiring each effector's Effectors Out into the next one's Effectors In, and only the last one into the system's Effectors port. Chain order is evaluation order, so moving an effector along the chain changes the result.

Every effector also has a Field Image input and a shared field block — Field, Field Shape, Field Size, Falloff, Invert Field, Field Follows Mouse — that limits where it acts.

Particle System

The hub. Key parameters: Particle Count, Lifetime, Die Rate, Speed, Multi-Renderer Mode, Sub-Particle Spread, Origin Influence.

Its second output, Particles, is an emitter payload. Wire it into another Particle System's Emitter port to spawn particles from particles.

Origin Influence (−1 to 1, default 0) aims new particles relative to where they were born. Positive values send them towards the origin point, negative values send them away, and 0 leaves the direction random.

Emitters

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Emitter	—	Spawns inside a sphere, box, or point volume.	Shape, Radius, Position X/Y/Z
Mesh Emitter	Surface	Spawns on a wired surface's geometry, or a model loaded from a file.	3D Model, Spawn Mode, Fit To Mesh (1:1), Size
Image Emitter	Image	Brightness and alpha set the spawn density, and the pixel sets the particle colour. Optical flow makes the cloud ride video motion.	Plane Size, Emit From, Threshold, Use Image Color, Optical Flow

On Mesh Emitter, Size does nothing while Fit To Mesh (1:1) is on with a wired surface. Turn Fit To Mesh off to make Size a scale again.

Effectors

Motion and force

Operator	What it does	Key parameters
Curl Noise Effector	Divergence-free curl noise flow — the default organic drift.	Strength, Scale, Speed
Turbulence Effector	Multi-octave noise force with a roughness control.	Strength, Scale, Gain
Quantized Motion Effector	Motion snapped to a 90° or 45° lattice, re-rolled at a rate you set.	Speed, Switch Rate, Directions, Axes
Gravity / Wind Effector	Constant acceleration, optionally scaled by particle mass.	X, Y, Z, Mass Influence
Wind Effector	Directional push with noise-based gusting.	Direction X/Y/Z, Strength, Gust Spread
Drag Effector	Damps velocity. The standard partner for any force effector.	Amount

Shaping

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Attractor Effector	—	Point pull or push with radial falloff; can follow the cursor.	Strength, Radius, Follow Mouse
Points Effector	—	Up to eight independent attract or repel points in one node.	Active Points, Strength, Radius
Vortex Effector	—	Tornado swirl with inward pull and axial lift.	Swirl Strength, Inward Pull, Lift, Radius
Twist Effector	—	Rotation rate that grows along the axis, so a column corkscrews.	Twist Rate, Radius
Spring Effector	—	Tethers each particle to its own spawn point.	Stiffness, Dampening
Mesh Attract Effector	Mesh	Condenses the cloud onto a wired surface or model.	3D Model, Strength, Radius, Stickiness
Image Form Effector	Image	Particles climb the image's brightness and settle on bright areas, forming the picture.	Strength, Plane Size, Flatten To Plane
Field Flow Effector	Flow Texture	Reads the texture's red and green channels as an XY velocity field.	Strength, Plane Size
Fluid Effector	Video / Motion	A fluid solver whose velocity field carries the particles; wired video injects motion as force.	Velocity Scale, Sim Resolution, Vorticity, Video Force

Events and collision

Operator	What it does	Key parameters
Explode Effector	A radial impulse fired in a short window after spawn.	Strength, Burst Window
Shockwave Effector	An expanding spherical wave front that repeats.	Strength, Travel Speed, Wave Width, Repeat Period
Soft Collision Effector	Density repulsion so particles pack instead of collapsing.	Strength, Spacing, Grid Range
Primitive Collision Effector	Bounce off a plane, sphere, or box collider.	Shape, Size, Bounciness, Friction
Kill Box Effector	Kills particles in a region; they respawn at the emitter.	Field, Field Shape, Field Size, Invert Field

Colour

Colorize Effector tints each particle from a gradient driven by an attribute. A wired Gradient texture overrides the built-in stop editor. Parameters: Attribute, Cycles, Ramp Offset, Colour Blend.

Colorize Effector does nothing until the renderer's Color Mode is set to Colorize Effector. The Mesh Renderer has no such option — it takes colour from its material instead.

Pair Explode with Spring for a firework that snaps back. Pair any force effector with Drag to stop it running away.

Renderers

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Point Renderer	Sprite Sheet	Flat discs, or sprite-sheet cells when wired, with shadows and four colour modes.	Point Size, Color Mode, Additive, Echo
Sprite Renderer	Sprite Sheet	The same pipeline, built around animated sprite sheets.	Sheet Columns, Sheet Rows, Animation FPS, Playback
Mesh Renderer	Material, Mesh	Instances real geometry per particle, so materials, lights, and environment all apply.	Instance Shape, Mesh Size, Max Instances, Align To Velocity
Point Geometry Renderer	Material	The lightweight sibling of Mesh Renderer — sphere or box only, with a much higher instance budget.	Point Size, Shape, Subdivision, Max Instances
Connection Renderer	—	Draws distance-faded lines between neighbouring particles. Stack it alongside a Point Renderer.	Links / Particle, Max Distance, Thickness, Color
Trail Renderer	—	Real per-particle position history drawn as ribbons with genuine thickness.	Trail Length, Thickness, Taper, Fade, Dash

Echo on the Point and Sprite renderers is a full-screen smear with no thickness and no knowledge of particle paths. For real ribbons use the Trail Renderer.

Hologram

Hologram is a self-contained operator with its own camera, lights, and material. It renders an instanced-sphere hologram from a wired Mesh and is not part of the system hub — it needs no emitter and no renderer. Parameters: Particle Count, Sphere Size, 3D Model, Camera Mode, Base Color, Wireframe.

Troubleshooting

Nothing appears. Check for at least one emitter and one renderer on the Particle System. That is the gate.

Align To Velocity looks broken — Random Rotation is applied afterwards and wins. Turn it off. Particles slower than the minimum speed also hold their unrotated orientation.

The Kill Box appears to have no parameters — its kill region is the shared field block. Turn Field on and set Field Shape and Field Size.

Particles in Auragen are a GPU simulation built from four kinds of operator. The Particle System node is the hub: emitters feed it particles, effectors push them around, and renderers draw them.

Press Tab in the node graph and open the Particles tab.

The minimum chain

Three operators and the Output node:

Emitter ──────────────► Particle System ──► Output
Point Renderer ───────►

Effectors are optional. With none, you get a static cloud.

How effectors attach

The effector wires into the system, not the other way round.

Particle System

The hub. Key parameters: Particle Count, Lifetime, Die Rate, Speed, Multi-Renderer Mode, Sub-Particle Spread, Origin Influence.

Its second output, Particles, is an emitter payload. Wire it into another Particle System's Emitter port to spawn particles from particles.

Emitters

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Emitter	—	Spawns inside a sphere, box, or point volume.	Shape, Radius, Position X/Y/Z
Mesh Emitter	Surface	Spawns on a wired surface's geometry, or a model loaded from a file.	3D Model, Spawn Mode, Fit To Mesh (1:1), Size
Image Emitter	Image	Brightness and alpha set the spawn density, and the pixel sets the particle colour. Optical flow makes the cloud ride video motion.	Plane Size, Emit From, Threshold, Use Image Color, Optical Flow

On Mesh Emitter, Size does nothing while Fit To Mesh (1:1) is on with a wired surface. Turn Fit To Mesh off to make Size a scale again.

Effectors

Motion and force

Operator	What it does	Key parameters
Curl Noise Effector	Divergence-free curl noise flow — the default organic drift.	Strength, Scale, Speed
Turbulence Effector	Multi-octave noise force with a roughness control.	Strength, Scale, Gain
Quantized Motion Effector	Motion snapped to a 90° or 45° lattice, re-rolled at a rate you set.	Speed, Switch Rate, Directions, Axes
Gravity / Wind Effector	Constant acceleration, optionally scaled by particle mass.	X, Y, Z, Mass Influence
Wind Effector	Directional push with noise-based gusting.	Direction X/Y/Z, Strength, Gust Spread
Drag Effector	Damps velocity. The standard partner for any force effector.	Amount

Shaping

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Attractor Effector	—	Point pull or push with radial falloff; can follow the cursor.	Strength, Radius, Follow Mouse
Points Effector	—	Up to eight independent attract or repel points in one node.	Active Points, Strength, Radius
Vortex Effector	—	Tornado swirl with inward pull and axial lift.	Swirl Strength, Inward Pull, Lift, Radius
Twist Effector	—	Rotation rate that grows along the axis, so a column corkscrews.	Twist Rate, Radius
Spring Effector	—	Tethers each particle to its own spawn point.	Stiffness, Dampening
Mesh Attract Effector	Mesh	Condenses the cloud onto a wired surface or model.	3D Model, Strength, Radius, Stickiness
Image Form Effector	Image	Particles climb the image's brightness and settle on bright areas, forming the picture.	Strength, Plane Size, Flatten To Plane
Field Flow Effector	Flow Texture	Reads the texture's red and green channels as an XY velocity field.	Strength, Plane Size
Fluid Effector	Video / Motion	A fluid solver whose velocity field carries the particles; wired video injects motion as force.	Velocity Scale, Sim Resolution, Vorticity, Video Force

Events and collision

Operator	What it does	Key parameters
Explode Effector	A radial impulse fired in a short window after spawn.	Strength, Burst Window
Shockwave Effector	An expanding spherical wave front that repeats.	Strength, Travel Speed, Wave Width, Repeat Period
Soft Collision Effector	Density repulsion so particles pack instead of collapsing.	Strength, Spacing, Grid Range
Primitive Collision Effector	Bounce off a plane, sphere, or box collider.	Shape, Size, Bounciness, Friction
Kill Box Effector	Kills particles in a region; they respawn at the emitter.	Field, Field Shape, Field Size, Invert Field

Colour

Colorize Effector does nothing until the renderer's Color Mode is set to Colorize Effector. The Mesh Renderer has no such option — it takes colour from its material instead.

Pair Explode with Spring for a firework that snaps back. Pair any force effector with Drag to stop it running away.

Renderers

Operator	Extra input	What it does	Key parameters
Point Renderer	Sprite Sheet	Flat discs, or sprite-sheet cells when wired, with shadows and four colour modes.	Point Size, Color Mode, Additive, Echo
Sprite Renderer	Sprite Sheet	The same pipeline, built around animated sprite sheets.	Sheet Columns, Sheet Rows, Animation FPS, Playback
Mesh Renderer	Material, Mesh	Instances real geometry per particle, so materials, lights, and environment all apply.	Instance Shape, Mesh Size, Max Instances, Align To Velocity
Point Geometry Renderer	Material	The lightweight sibling of Mesh Renderer — sphere or box only, with a much higher instance budget.	Point Size, Shape, Subdivision, Max Instances
Connection Renderer	—	Draws distance-faded lines between neighbouring particles. Stack it alongside a Point Renderer.	Links / Particle, Max Distance, Thickness, Color
Trail Renderer	—	Real per-particle position history drawn as ribbons with genuine thickness.	Trail Length, Thickness, Taper, Fade, Dash

Echo on the Point and Sprite renderers is a full-screen smear with no thickness and no knowledge of particle paths. For real ribbons use the Trail Renderer.

Hologram

Troubleshooting

Nothing appears. Check for at least one emitter and one renderer on the Particle System. That is the gate.

Align To Velocity looks broken — Random Rotation is applied afterwards and wins. Turn it off. Particles slower than the minimum speed also hold their unrotated orientation.

The Kill Box appears to have no parameters — its kill region is the shared field block. Turn Field on and set Field Shape and Field Size.

Particles

The minimum chain

How effectors attach

Particle System

Emitters

Effectors

Motion and force

Shaping

Events and collision

Colour

Renderers

Hologram

Troubleshooting

Cloners

Surfaces

Output Node

On this page

Particles

The minimum chain

How effectors attach

Particle System

Emitters

Effectors

Motion and force

Shaping

Events and collision

Colour

Renderers

Hologram

Troubleshooting

Cloners

Surfaces

Output Node

On this page