sprites, types, and loading?

hi. i'm making particles w/mini b3d. i have a "type" called particle, and the particle has a sprite field. it is loaded like this:

Field sprite=LoadSprite("fire.png")

The problem with this is that everytime I generate a new particle (Local p:particle=new particle), I believe that the type re-loads fire.png from the harddrive. Thus with around 50 particles, I am experiencing significant slowdown.

Anyone have tips or know a way around loading this way?
Thanks!

Try
global sprite=LoadSprite("fire.png")
in your type. I think it will work but don't have Blitz here to be sure.

Everytime you create a new type you are loading the image from the harddrive.
Just have a global in your type which loads the image, then do a

field sprite = copyimage(Global_sprite)

.
Redundant post

.

thanks guys. and could anyone tell me what the commands are for doing the same w/a mesh and texture?

oh duh its probably copymesh...but also i just checked. copyimage doesn't exist?

global particle_tex = loadtexture("blah.jpg")

Sprite = createsprite()
entitytexture sprite , particle_tex

this way, you only load the texture once.

thanks...i'm having a huge memory leak though. to free the memory...do i just do FreeEntity sprite ? or sprite = null ? GC looks like it hasn't been cleaning something up lately. I can post code later if need be.