Tutorials
Particles
Make a fountain of sparks with the Particles behavior: how many, how fast, which way, and how they fall and fade.
This page is also a lesson inside Phoenix: choose and start Particles, and Phoenix points at each control as you go. It takes about 6 minutes.
To follow along here instead, download the starting document, particles.fla, and open it with .
The Particles behavior sends out copies of an instance that are born, fly, fall, spin and fade: sparks, snow, bubbles, confetti. It plays the same every time, so it renders the same as it previews.
1. Select the spark
Press V for the Selection tool and click the spark on the stage.
2. Open the Behaviors panel
Choose Window > Behaviors if it is not showing. It lists what is on the selection and the settings of each.
3. Add Particles
Click Add Behavior and choose Particles.
4. Play it
Press Enter, or click the play button in the timeline header. Sparks shoot up, slow, and fall back as they shrink and fade.
5. A taller fountain
Set Speed to 500 and Spread to 20. The sparks go higher in a narrower jet.
6. More of them
Set Born per second to 80 and Life to 3 seconds.
7. Snow instead
For snow, set Direction to 90 (down), Born across to 1280, Gravity to 0 and Turbulence to 30, and move the spark to the top of the stage.
The spark itself is not drawn now, only its particles: choose to select it, and set Y to 20 on the Properties panel.
What you did
You made a fountain with one instance and one behavior. A movie clip or a graphic with a loop works as a particle too: each one plays its loop from when it is born.
Effector after Particles changes them by where they are: brighten those near a point, say.
For everything this tutorial touches on, see Behaviors.