Taking a cue from Andrew Kramer’s tutorial showing how to make a shockwave effect using Fractal Noise, Daniel Brodesky creates something similar, only swapping out Trapcode Particular for the base of the effect.

Daniel shows how you can use Particular in After Effects to create the start of the shockwave effect.

Why use a particle generator for the base of shockwave effect?

Using something like Trapcode Particular in place of fractal noise can lead you to some more creative possibilities. Think of what effects can be achieved if you used a custom sprite for the particle shape? What if you layer particle types and direction?

Particular will also offer the opportunity to layer the effect with more details, designing the final result by adding more particles to places in the original.