I just recently downloaded the really GREAT new "Complex Water" mats (6 in total) by Chris Spears (see VUE Free Stuff) and playing around with the settings...

Here I've loaded one of them on a Procedural Terrain and could tweak out some very nice White Caps. Look's like ROUGH WATER ahead- or perhaps a SHOAL? (Tell the Captain- better get out the charts!)

On this Mat I tried adding a really strong BUMP to the water (around 5-6... well UP from the usual .250 or so) and this is using a FLAT water plane...

Got what looks like Spring Thaw on Lake Michigan. The soft ice in the water doesn't require an Ice Breaker- but keep the speed DOWN- don't want to damage your hull!

Here's how I made the Boat Wake- it's using one of those COOL TRICKS from another Vue Tutorial- its a Terrain placed under the boat's hull.

The SMART Water mat causes the Water Terrain to look "frothy"...

-BUT, I added one more component to the boat wake- its one of those Clouds I made in SWELL. Feel free to DOWNLOAD this and try it out. Works in any version of Vue!

(Hmmm- that WAS a clever name for the software- "SWELL". perhaps the software designer was ALSO thinking of WATER? I HAVE gotten some great Water Fall Effects from it too- and will show that in a future thread...)

Here's all there is to it. Just put the Cloud on a 2D plane and place it where you want it.

I've placed two in this scene- One behind the boat, and one around a rock object. Note that the SMART water only reacts to TERRAINS and NOT rocks (I suppose this COULD be modified some way in advanced settings?)

Here's what it looks like as a boat wake and a rock "wake".

The shoreline terrain shows how the SMART water mat reacts to the shallow shoreline...

(I've given the flat water a strong BUMP using the same bump that the sand is using.)

And here's a really CRANKED UP water BUMP- and using a Terrain for a boat wake as well as the flat SWELL Cloud plane...

(Got some pixelated noise on the bump- so will have to go back and tweak that again- this is NOT in the Chris Spears "Complex Water" mats.)

...And finally- here's a side shot of the Terrain boat wake and two SWELL Cloud Planes- one added on the back for more "Propeller Froth" (Cavitation) and one up near the bow to create a small bow wake-froth effect.

NOW that Cornucopia 3D is finally up and working- think I'll get RID of this FUNKY old boat and get some of Alain Gracia's very nice Sailing Ships- and some Light Houses- ...and make up a bunch of nice ocean scenes!

More great info! Would you please give us the settings you used to get PIC #1? Thanks :)

Excellent stuff, and thanks for sharing.

Here's all the MAIN settings, I think. What I did was just tweak the White Water part of Chris's water mat. The switch I made was using the "Complex Cracks" as both for COLOR production as well as TRANSPARENCY production.

The "Influence on Environment" was the other factor that causes the "sudsy water" to appear near the top of the waves.

BTW- Bryce users may recognize the "Complex Cracks" water effect. It was one of my favorite waters when using Bryce.
I've found that, over time, I can create nearly ALL of the Bryce material effects in Vue-- you just have to play around with the Advanced Material settings, filters, functions, etc.

One other area I have been increasingly playing with are the Global Transformation panels. ROTATION allows you to control the direction of the waves- when using a BUMP.

TURBULENCE- has some very interesting effects- both with Water as well as Clouds!

(These are NOT the settings for the above water, BTW)

I find Vue's Materials Editor a lot more easy to figure out than the one in Bryce- which always seemed like another PLANET to me...

Thanks :)....Still I never even come close to those kind of waves shown in pic 1. That includes using the "dunes" for waves....and all the above mentioned tactics. I find the dunes are too wavy....like a constant tsunami LOL ANd to boot you got the cloud/foam action exactly where it should be!

Hi, "... its one of those Clouds I made in SWELL." Could you please inform me what you ment by "Swell". If this is a peace of software, where can it be found? Hope to hear from you. Thanks and regards.

Attached Link: http://hellborn.scorpionshops.com/vue/index.php

I used the Vue 5 Infinite Function Editor to basically "tweak" Hellborn's original model he posted quite a while back. I basically just SIMPLIFIED his approach- mainly by just HACKING around on his waves...

(SEE LINK to get Hellborn's Waves...)

I found the very simple Noise Node of Cellular Patterns,
Chipped, (at the settings shown) gave me the kind of wave I was looking for. It could actually use a SECOND chipped pattern overtop-- on a SMALLER scale-- but it takes a lot longer to render (but looks very nice!)

This latest go-around is just Chris's Complex Water mats on top- that I have tweaked ---as shown above...

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12368&Form.ShowMessage=2415102

Here's the link to the SWELL Thread and where to get it...

...and my LATEST experiment- just a simple Blue Water (comes default with Vue) with the Frothy Stuff still on top (as shown further up)...

Looks very nice! But takes about THREE TIMES longer to render!

Hi, Thanks for the link. Regards

Great work. Some fine hints and tricks. Thanks a lot

Attached Link: http://www.ecn.purdue.edu/purpl/projects/fastclouds/frames

For people who have asked me about the SWELL software... It seems Purdue has taken down the free software- at least temporarily. Here is a link to the page- still shows examples as well as SWELL help documents... I assume that they will be putting it back up again after addressing a few small issues- but I don't know when- so just keep checking back...

I downloaded "Swell" just yesterday. I went to: http://dock.ecn.purdue.edu/purpl/projects/fastclouds/TXT.html then below the word "DOWNLOAD" click on [ZIP]. Hope this helps.