Implementing simple particle system

In this recipe, we will implement a simple particle system. Particle systems are a special category of objects that enable us to simulate fuzzy effects in computer graphics; for example, fire or smoke. In this recipe, we will implement a simple particle system that emits particles at the specified rate from an oriented emitter. In this recipe, we will assign particles with a basic fire color map without texture, to give the effect of fire.

Getting started

The code for this recipe is contained in the Chapter5/SimpleParticles directory. All of the work for particle simulation is carried out in the vertex shader.

How to do it…

Let us start this recipe by following these simple steps:

1. Create a vertex shader without any per-vertex attribute. The vertex shader generates the current particle position and outputs a smooth color to the fragment shader for use as the current fragment color.

   #version 330 core  
   smooth out vec4 vSmoothColor;
   uniform mat4 MVP;
   uniform float...