Field Lines

Field Lines draws the magnetic field of an object as nested loops of glowing lines, arcing out from one pole and back into the other, the shape iron filings take around a bar magnet. Small particles slide back and forth along the lines, trapped in the field like the radiation belts around the Earth.

How it works

The lines follow the exact shape of a magnet's field: each one leaves the surface near a pole, swings out to its widest at the equator and comes back down at the opposite pole. Several shells of lines sit inside one another, and the lines are brightest at their feet, where the field is strongest, fading toward the top of each arc. The particles bounce between two turning points on their line, slowing to a stop at each end, while drifting slowly around the axis, some one way and some the other. The whole field can tilt and twist.

Settings

• Shells and Lines Per Shell: how many nested layers, and how many lines in each.
• Extent: how far the outermost loops reach.
• Twist: winds the lines around the axis like a twisted rope.
• Tilt: leans the magnetic axis.
• Particle Count and Particle Size: the trapped particles.
• Color (at the feet) and Apex Color (at the top of each arc).

Use it for

Sci-fi planets, energy cores, physics explainers. Put it around Earth for a magnetosphere, or compare the Magnetic Bottle particles.