Simulating Planetary Forces With Bifrost Graphs!

What does "float" even mean?

As someone deep into astrophysics, I couldn’t help but think past the usual idea of floating on water. In physics, floating usually comes down to forces balancing out. Gravity, electric fields, magnetic fields, whenever something is “floating,” it usually means the surrounding fields and forces are canceling out just right. It's the perfect balance in this world.

So for this project, I wanted to explore that idea in a more abstract way. I decided to simulate the interactions of gravitational fields between equidistant particles. I ventured outside my typical motion maker and animation in Maya and decided to use its bifrost procedural paradigm.

Autodesk Maya (Student/Paid)

Autodesk Maya is the perfect choice for physics-integrated simulation, as it offers much more control and flexibility over particles compared to traditional animation tools. With its Bifrost system, you can tweak forces, behaviors, and interactions at a granular level, making it ideal for visualizing complex physical concepts like buoyancy, gravity, and field interactions.

Below is a quick keybind cheatsheet. For all follwing steps

1. Move Mesh - W
2. Rotate Mesh - E
3. Scale Mesh - R
4. Escape Mode - Q
5. Find feature in Viewport - Ctrl + F
6. Find node in Bifrost - Tab
7. Duplicate - Ctrl D

I started by building a simple environment to give appropriate lighting and background.

Using the Rendering Channel, I installed an Arnold Skydome light and imported the nebula backround with an hdri file.

I kept the scene minimal helps the motion of the particles stand out.

Bifrost is the Special sauce of particle simulation, it can do literally anything in Maya! Below is a quick summary of Bifrost so you can navigate through it.

1. Open Bifrost

1. In Maya, go to Windows → Bifrost Graph Editor
2. Click New Graph

2. Create the emitter surface

1. Select the plane and middle-mouse drag it into the Bifrost Graph

→ This makes the plane available as geometry inside Bifrost

3. Emit particles

1. Click empty space in the graph
2. Press Tab to open node search
3. Search for an emit / source / points from mesh node
4. Connect the plane geometry into the source node

4. Simulate motion

1. Press Tab
2. Add a solver node (this controls time and simulation)
3. Connect the particle stream into the solver
4. Add forces (upward force + gravity) into the solver inputs

5. Adjust influence (motion control)

1. Reduce gravity strength
2. Add drag or damping
3. Optionally add light noise for drifting motion

Node explanations (quick reference)

Source

Creates particles. In this setup, it emits particles from the plane surface.

Solver

Runs the simulation over time. All motion, forces, and collisions are evaluated here.

Collider

Defines geometry particles can collide with. Used to stop particles from passing through surfaces like the ground.

Influence (Forces)

Controls how particles move. Examples include:

1. Upward force (floating effect)
2. Gravity (pulls particles down)
3. Drag or damping (softens motion)

For this simulation, I set the two planets to have same attraction influences, and hid a sphere mesh emitter in the center that would emit particles for the first 50 frames.

After running the initial simulation, I refined the particle behavior to better communicate the idea of floating.

1. Adjusted particle density and speed for clarity and visual balance
2. Tweaked forces to control how particles rise, hover, and fall
3. Added and adjusted influences and colliders to constrain particle movement
4. Used colliders to interact with the environment and prevent unwanted intersections
5. Refined motion to ensure smooth, readable, and natural-looking floating behavior

All parameters can be modified through the parameter window on the left side of the bifrost grapher

To best showcase the floating particle effect, I created a curve and added a motion constraint to the camera, making it follow the curved path.

Below is a quick summary of the two main rendering options in Maya

Rendering Options in Maya

Maya provides two main ways to render an animation:

Playblast

Playblast creates a quick, low-quality MP4 directly from the viewport. It’s ideal for:

1. Previewing motion and timing
2. Checking particle behavior and camera framing
3. Fast iteration without long render times

This is often what you see directly in the Maya viewport.

Arnold Renderer

The Arnold renderer produces high-quality, physically accurate results. Unlike Playblast, Arnold:

1. Uses proper lighting, shadows, and materials
2. Produces cleaner particles and smoother motion
3. Is best for final submissions and presentations

Through Arnold Renderer, you are given all frames in the formate of images. With a simple vide editing tool like Adobe After Effects or Davinci Resolve you can combine them all together.

Unfortunately, due to the inherit nature of particle simulations and my device's capabilities, I was unable to render a proper Arnold Rendered video.

This project explores floating through simple but effective simulation techniques. By combining a clean environment with a Bifrost particle system, the animation demonstrates buoyancy, motion, and gravity in a visually clear and minimalistic way.

I also experimented with other ideas—like magnetic floating and futuristic materials—but ultimately went with Bifrost graphs to play around with some physics concepts I’ve been wanting to visualize. It was a fun chance to blend science with art.

Next time, I’d love to take it further with shaders, atmosphere effects, and more cinematic shots to really bring the simulation to life!

Thanks for checking out my project!