Week 09+10
From Activation and Velocity to Collision Driven Dynamic Destruction
During this phase of the project, I shifted direction from velocity-driven activation to collider-driven destruction, with the guidance of my project supervisor and partly inspired by procedural setups from Johannes Tiner. By adapting the method — replacing linear colliders with animated expanding spheres — I created a dynamic radial impact zone that produced realistic bulging, cracking, and peeling effects across the fractured ground surface. This change better supports the narrative of a photon beam impact while offering a far more art-directable and physically intuitive destruction workflow.
Building on techniques inspired by Johannes Tiner’s procedural collider setups, I reimagined my ground destruction workflow to better match the narrative of a photon beam impact.
Instead of using a simple animated line to drive collider attributes, I expanded the concept by introducing animated spheres, creating a dynamic radial impact zone.
This approach allowed for natural cracking, bulging, and peeling effects as the ground reacts outward from the beam's point of contact.
By pivoting away from attribute-based activation and velocity injection, and moving toward a physically-driven collider interaction system, the setup now feels far more organic, controllable, and believable — ideal for depicting energy-based impacts and shockwave propagation in destruction FX.
However, the implementation of these expanding sphere colliders presented its own set of challenges. Achieving the desired pace and timing for the ground destruction proved particularly tricky. Initially, the animation of the spheres required meticulous attention to detail. Overly exaggerated and rapid movements of the collider resulted in it passing through the fractured surface with minimal interaction, failing to impart the necessary energy to the pieces. This led to an inaccurate destruction look that deviated significantly from the reference shot.
Careful refinement of the sphere's animation, focusing on a more controlled and nuanced expansion, was essential to achieve the realistic and impactful destruction we ultimately sought. After tweaking the animation and fine tuning the movement, I was able to achieve better collider based destruction movement of the fracture pieces upon the impact timing. Apart from that, seeing that the ground broke in two distinct ways in the reference shot – first with cracks, and then with a more powerful, explosive burst – I realized that using just one destruction method might not capture the full visual impact. To better represent this, I decided to create a separate system specifically for the explosive part of the destruction. This second system uses the 'active' state and the 'velocity' (speed) of the broken pieces to simulate that rapid, outward explosion. By handling the initial cracking with the expanding spheres and the more energetic explosion with this separate setup, I gained more control over each stage. This allowed me to create a more realistic and visually compelling destruction sequence that better matched the effect of a strong beam hitting the ground.