I'd like to create some special effect using only primitive types...

[Fex]

hi,
dont know why you dislike particles ( even in SOPs you have a simple particle
emiter)... if you want it the hard way create something like a point cloud
move the points by hand or use noise in a point SOP e.g., make all the different kinds of states you need for animation (like swirl to the right, explode first step..) then use a blend SOP to interpolate between the states.
Animate the blend weights and noise values of your states.

Use delete SOP with keep points flag on and then with copy SOP for every point a sphere a elephant whatever :)
its quite hard to mimic natural dynamics with such modelling techniques...
have fun :bounce:

[dmaas]

When faking "volumetric" effects like smoke and fire with surfaces, the shader is vitally important. You can make convincing smoke/clouds/fire with a couple of overlapping spheres if you put some work into the shader. (like making it fall off to transparent at the edges, and randomizing the colors a bit)

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