Question How to blend particles into one shape?

Hi guys,

I'm currently trying to deconstruct an effect (white/grey smoke trails) from Treadnauts for learning purposes and curiosity:



Those smoke trails give me a hard time right now. I don't understand how you can achieve this kind of effect. I've already asked in another forum where someone said the trails consists of particles with a special shader.

I can also see that the trail consists of particles since the shape of the trail seems to be very dynamic. But what I cannot wrap my head around is how the particles blend into each other so nicely. It actually looks almost like it's one solid shape with a gradient going on.

I've tried to create this smooth blending by using a lot of particles but then the shape turns more and more into a line. Creating a shader would help me give a particle a gradient, but how would this "communicate" with the other particles? I feel like the solution is really simple, but I just cannot see it.

Any hints are welcome!

 

Thanks for your answer! How do I create the nodes you posted in the screenshot? I guess they are custom made? I haven't used Shader Graph for too long yet