Water Tutorial

How to create a realistic looking water

First of all i want to show that i dont want to show THE way just A way to create a water map.
Water is one of the most difficult maps and you cant make one that you can use in all of your
scenes for best results you have to create one for every scene. Daytime Oceans and water surfaces
needs much more work then a ocean at night, i tryed to make a map that can be easy modifyed so you
can play for your own with the settings and i also add a modifyed daytime image.

Step 1: First fire up the Modeler create a plane(here we take 2km*2km) and hit tab and subdivide the Polygones.
Hit "q" and a surface.

Step 2: Now start Layout and put the object in it.

Step 3: go to Object "Properties->Geometry" and increase the "Display SubPatch Level" to 150 and the "Render SubPatch Level" to "300"
next under "Deform" and add a Displacement Map and add the following settings:

Layout Type: Procedual
Layer Opacity: 7000%
Displacement Axis: Y

Procedual Type: turbulence
Texture Value: 3,155
Frequencies: 10
Contrast:12%
Small Power: 0,4

Scale: x/y/z 500m/500m/500m

Step 4: Now on to the map..open the "Surface Editor" and add a Texture in the Color slot.

add 2 Gradients:

Next add a Bump texture map; here i added 3 layers:

now some basic settings:

diffuse: 100%

Specularity: 80%
Glossiney: 100%

Reflect: 0%

Bump: 100%

At last i added 2 shaders a "Fast Frensel" and a "Thin Film" if you make a daytime ocean you should
add a "Real frensel"

Fast Frensel settings:

reflectivity: 70%
Specular: 60%

Thin Film settings:

Primary Wavelenght (nm): 441
Angle Variation (nm): 5

Color Mixing: Blend with 5%

At last you have to add a enviroment use SkyGen or Sky tracer or just add an image, in that scene i used SkyGen.

A little tip in the end..you can add a Null Obj. and put it as referance object under the Texture Displacement to animate the water.

If you play a bit with the settings you can get some nice results.

written by Stefan Brock ecko
If you have any questions feel free to e-mail me Stefan@noir.org