Navier-Stokes Fluid Dynamics
Above is a video of a particle system driven by fluid dynamics that I developed in conjunction with my dear-old Dominican friend Manny Fernandez. The physics of this application is simulated using Navier-Stokes equations.
The Navier-Stokes equations are really quite groovy because they describe the physical properties behind fluid substances, from water and air currents to the motion of stars swirling inside a galaxy. Navier-Stokes is also used as the basis for weather forecasts. If you are interested in this learning more about this physics trickery, Jos Stam gave a great GDC talk about it.
The particle system application is coded in C++ and uses OpenGL/GLUT to render 40,000 particles. Given the vast amount of particles, we decided to take a multi-threaded approach to fork the work into several threads, with each thread handling a block of particles.
The source code is available for those who are interested. It’s public domain goodness.
[ Source Code ]
