Emitting particles from 2D image?

#1

Hey guys,

Playing around with particles in Nuke, seems to work really well in 3D camera solves with 3D geo but I’m wondering if I can get it to work off 2D planes (cards)?

I want this character who walks into the shot to disappear in a cloud of particles. The camera is mounted steady on a tripod.

I’ve started rotoing out the character’s body (at this point just the head) to see if I can emit particles from it.

I attached the roto to a card then attached the card to a particle emitter. Can’t figure out how to emit particles just from the roto’ed out portion. I want the particles to look like they’re coming off the character, like he gives them off.

Do I need to map out a 3D environment in ModelBuilder?

Is Nuke enough or do I need something like Houdini?

#2

So quick update. I did manage to tie a particle emitter to the card with particles emitting from the faces.

Unfortunately the rate of emission was cranked up to 5,000 just to see anything.

Might have to use Houdini although I don’t even know where to start with that. Can Houdini take a 2D file from Nuke and emit particles from it?