FINALE Fireworks User Guide

Chrysanthemum, Kamuro, Diadem, Brocade, Willow, and Dahlia
Launch
FINALE Fireworks User Guide
The Launch tab defines the attributes of the shell’s launch. .
Name
Cone angle
Attribute
Slider (degrees)
A shell’s cone angle is the angle across which successive launches are randomly distributed. The center of the
angle is straight up. As you increase the cone angle value, the cone widens symmetrically around the center.
N O T E
The adjustments that you make to the cone angle won’t affect on firework that you’re currently
editing. The setting is applied after you’ve saved your firework and added a new instance to the
scene.
Cone height
Slider (scaler; 1.0 = natural height)
By default, the height (or distance) of a shell’s trajectory is determined by the velocity with which it’s
launched, and velocity is directly related to the mortar’s caliber (and some other physical properties).
The Cone height slider lets you adjust the shell’s velocity (and so its height). If you set the slider to 1.0, you
get the velocity/height that’s determined by the caliber. Values greater than 1.0 produce greater heights, as
much as twice as high as the natural caliber height. Values less than 1.0 reduce the height. If you set the
value to 0.0, the firework won’t lift off at all.
Keep in mind that you’re increasing and decreasing the shell’s velocity. The duration of its trajectory will be
the same regardless of this slider’s value. Thus, you can adjust the cone height without “invalidating” the
shell’s prefire setting.
Randomness
Slider (Fraction; 0.0 = autocompute)
The velocity with which a shell is launched is set naturally by its caliber. The Randomness slider lets you add
some randomness to the velocity. As you increase the slider’s value, the range of velocities widens, but
they’re always less than the natural velocity that’s set by the shell’s caliber. For example, let’s say you’re
creating firework that launches a shell with an initial velocity of 400 ft/sec. If you set the Randomness to
0.01, the shells will always emerge with (nearly) the same initial velocity (400 ft/sec). If you set the value to
0.5, a shell could emerge with an initial velocity that’s somewhere between 200 and 400 ft/sec.
A value of 0.0 tells FINALE to select a physically reasonable—but fairly small—range of velocities.
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