ℹ️Notice: This repository is in pre-alpha and in active development. The main functionality is usable but expect errors, bugs or unexpected behavior.

🌠 PyParticle Renderer

PyParticle is a python based particle simulation framework that allows easy experimentation with particle physics. Built with Taichi and powered by GPU-accelerated ray tracing, PyParticle is designed for students, educators, researchers, and curious minds who want to explore physical simulations without touching a graphics pipeline.

🎯 You focus on particles. PyParticle handles the pixels.

What is PyParticle?

PyParticle is an educational rendering framework that:

• 💡 Renders particle-based simulations in real-time using path tracing
• 🎮 Lets you explore scenes interactively (mouse + WASD controlled camera)
• 🧪 Allows you to create custom simulations just by overwriting particle initialization and update logic
• 🎥 Captures screenshots and videos at the press of a button

Features

• 🧱 Real-time ray-traced particle renderer
• 🔧 CPU or GPU rendering support via Taichi
• 🖱️ Interactive camera (mouse + keyboard)
• 💡 Directional lighting, floor plane, and material shading
• 📷 Screenshot + video capture
• 🎓 Clean architecture - ideal for teaching or experimentation

Getting Started

Prerequisites

Install Taichi and NumPy:

pip install taichi numpy

Run the Example Scene

python main.py --scene_name HelloWorld

This runs SceneHelloWorld, which drops a grid of red particles into a simulated gravity field with floor collisions.

Create Your Own Scene

Define a new class in scene_youridea.py like this:

from rendering.scene import Scene

class SceneYourIdea(Scene):
def initialize_particles(self):
  # Initialize particles however you like
  pass

  def update_particles(self, dt):
    # Animate or simulate particles here
    pass

Then run it with:

python main.py --scene_name YourIdea

🛣️ Roadmap

• Raytraced rendering of spherical particles
• Modular system to overwrite particle behavior and initialization
• Simulation on GPU, CUDA, Vulkan
• Improve particle API
  • Define volumes filled with particles for initialization
  • Support multiple particle types per scene
  • Allow other particle shapes
  • API to add static colliders to scene
  • Provide acceleration data structures for particle neighbor search
• Improve Rendering
  • Add more materials (Parameterizable for diffusion, scattering etc.)
  • Improve efficiency
  • Mitigate video capture overhead
  • Support for headless rendering
  • Add variable render quality options
• Testing & QA
  • Unit tests
  • CI Setup
• Documentation
  • API Reference
  • Setup Guide
• Deployment
  • Deploy to PyPi

License

Free and licenced under the MIT License

Acknowledgments

Built with ❤️ and Taichi.