Sprite particle lifespan problem

[boyang-ma]

Hello,

First I apologize if this has been asked before. I found some threads have solutions but they won't work on my mac.

I'm trying to render a group of cloud with sprite particles. I created a volume particle, set lifespan to random 5-10, added scale X&Y PP, use ramp on a RGB PP and Opacity PP, set particle type to sprite. So far everything works fine. But as soon as I used the sprite wizard to select my png cloud file, the particle lifespan mode was locked to live forever. Could someone help me to figure out how to unlock this? I've tried to add an expression "particleShape1.lifespanPP = 1;", but this doesn't work.

I did this on maya2011 and 2012(educational), both have the same problem. I'm not sure if this is a bug or I did something wrong.

Thank you.

Boyang

[chartt]

The sprite wizard is buggy and causing weird things to happen = your scene getting screwed up is a good example.

Try and load the scene before you applied the sprite wizard.

Then turn the particle system into  sprites - assign a shader with a file color/transparency.  Don't use jpgs.  You need alphas.

Does the sim work - all-be-it static sprites?