How can I create a candle flame?

Tips by Torgeir Holm:

Take your basic candle-flame ellipsoid shape and add the following attributes:

        Fog Length: 0.10

    Texture: Ghost

        Fog length at T: 400
        T: 0.8

    Texture: FogTop

        Fog length at T: 200
        T: 0.5
        Noise Magnitude: 0

Place the axis so that the origin is in the tip of the flame and the bottom of the bounding box is 2/3 towards the bottom of the flame. With the Z axis pointing up.

    Texture: Fireball

        Color1: 255,255,100
        Color2: 200,030,000
        Noise: 0
        Reflect&Filter 1&2: 0

Place the axis so that the origin is in the bottom of the flame and the end of the Y axis is in the tip.

BTW: my object was about 60 units wide, and 150 units tall.

You can now add a child axis in the middle of your flame and make it a lightsource.

To animate this, make sure the Y axis points upward (do this before adding textures, as their placement is relative to the axis), and move the the object up along a wavy path with conform to path. Then move the path back dovn a mirror copy of itself, so that the flame stays in the same position. Makes a really nice and realistic candle-flame.

Tips by Mike Rivers:

If you have version 3.0 or higher, here's a free candle tip:

• Make a brushmap with a vertical gadient from the white (top) to black (bottom).
• Then make another brushmap that is solid white. Apply the gradient map to the candle as a 'reflectivity' map and appy the solid white map as a 'reflection' map. This makes the candle stick glow like a real lit candle.

Last Update: July 13, 1995
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