RF3 TUTORIALS -> DAEMONS -> SURFACE TENSION

This daemon increases the cohesion of the liquid skin. What this means is that the particles surrounding the fluid will be atracted to it, and what that mean is that is going to make ir rounder and is going to atract it self.... something like mercury
Ex.:

In real life at small scales surface tension effects are many times larger than air drag forces, so rain droplets are typically spherical.
Small insects can walk on water because their weight is not enough to break the surface tension.
At some clothes the surface tension of water will bridge the holes in between strands so the clothes does not get wet.

If you have a fluid with a cubical shape and you apply this daemon using a high strength value (1000 for the fluid of Vid2) then the fluid will acquire a spherical form like a water droplet.

Vid2: Behavior of high Surface tension Particle system affected vs a non one

Fig1: high Surface tension value

Fig2: Surface TEnsion Parameters

Vid3: Diference between Balanced and not Balanced Surface Tension values

The setup of the surface tension has only two values:

Strength: Strength of the surface tension.
By default its value is 5.

Range from 0 to 20 can be usefull to give fluid particles a more water-like behavior, helping low density particles zone not to spread away in alone particles when not balanced is on.

Although, the most outstanding use of the Surface tension is given when very high values are used (above 500).

Balanced: When using the balanced option, this force is better distributed across the liquid surface and you can produce different fluid effects. For example if you work with a single cube of fluid particles this will cause the cube to break into new, smaller balls.

TIPS :

Vid4: Simulationg two liquids interact

-This is not like viscosity but you can get similar effects

-By using high values of surface tension is easy to get a volume over a flat surface, the fluid will not spread

-High values can also be used to simulate liquids like water at very low scale, like a water droplet dripping of a glass.

-It does not work with dumb particles because Surface Tension uses the forces between particles to work with and dumb particles doesn´t have it.

- When working in balanced modeThis daemon is very useful for obtaining mercury-like effects.

-Its ability to apply an uniform surrounding force macthing the cover of our particles lets us to get a liquid inside a liquid aspect. Just play with others daemons like gravity, atractor or drag force to add a complete enviroment to your scene.