Greetings!

  Posting screen shots here can have problems as it seems to me there's a maximum file size allowed, but I don't know what that is, and when it doesn't post, there's no feedback about it. So try to make small file size jpg's.

  There was a Japanese web site some years ago with a tutorial to do very large waves. The demonstrantion pic was of a racing yacht pitching/rolling in large waves. The camera was really close to the waves and a lot of detail was in it. 

  The technique was by using a series of terrains.

 I don't have the address to this tutorial any more, but I'll try to locate it. However it was about 4 years ago, so there's a chance I won't be able to locate it. I may have made a PDF of it, though, because sometimes good tutorials are hard to find when you need them. Anyway....

...and if I remember it correctly, it went something like this...

  The basic technique was to use several terrains and several black-and-white pics. First thing would be to get a good graphics editor that can enable you to make image tiles. The reason is the terrain editor supports importing a picture. The terrain editor also works by treating what is white as tall, and what is black as short. The brighter white something is in the terrain editor, the higher it is. Also, by using an image tile, you could string together a whole bunch of terrains and make a seamless flow of waves.

  Anyway, the tutorial mentioned to make several of these tiled images, each image being a randomly placed collection of white circles on a black background. It could be circles or triangles or whatever shape you want the waves to be. Then put the image into a terrain. One image per terrain and make a bunch of these terrains. Then lay them out in your scene and texture them with a material.

  Because these are terrains, you can further use the terrain editor to add additional details. You could also copy a terrain object and place it right above the original object and apply a different material for added effect. The end result should be interesting, possibly more interesting than a water plane alone could do up close to the camera.

  All this takes a lot of experimentation and play to make it just right. First thing is to have patience, and if it's not coming out correctly, take a break from it and play around with it later on. I'll try to locate the tutorial, but I probably explained it better than the tutorial itself does.