Defense Up Buff

HOW IT'S MADE

Defense Up Buff stacks 9 particle emitters, each with its own job. Techniques worth a look: glowing strokes traced along shapes, keyframed parameters and post filters (bloom and vignette).

It loops seamlessly every 1.6 s, and 8 of its layers fire in bursts, so it pulses instead of flowing evenly. Start times are staggered from 0 s to 0.46 s, so the layers arrive one after another. To change its colour, select "Shield Glow" in the studio and edit Colour A and Colour B. Size on the same layer sets how big its particles are. The colour swatches by the downloads recolour every layer at once.

Layers, in draw order

1. Floor Glow, Shield Glowparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.05 s. Colour: blue.
2. Shield Faceparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.2 s. Colour: blue.
3. Shield Linestroke / additiveA glowing line traced along a path. Its start and end are keyframed, so it writes itself on and off.
4. Shield Flashparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.42 s. It grows as it ages. Colour: white.
5. Rising Ringparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.42 s. Colour runs from white to blue over each life.
6. Ground Ringparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.42 s. It grows as it ages. Colour runs from white to pale blue over each life.
7. Chevrons Left, Chevrons Rightparticles / additive3 single particles at set times. They ease to a stop. Colour runs from white to blue over each life.
8. Steel Glintsparticles / additiveA stream of image sprites around a box outline, its rate keyframed over the loop. They swell and then shrink away. Colours range between white and pale blue.