custom water

[shadowkiller]

How do i make a custom water material? I have all the bump/normal maps and things, i just need to know how to assemble it all and import it. A tut would really help.

 

[Raeven0]

Well, I've been making an Authoring a Water Material tutorial for some time now. Would have been done a long time ago if the guy I had assigned to taking screenshots of my water would get around to doing it (I don't have a video card that supports reflections, y'see).

This is the basic shell of a water VMT, though...

// rae/raewater01.vmt
"Water"
{
   "Water_DX60"
   {
      "$fallbackmaterial" "rae/raewater01_cheap"
   }
   "$abovewater" 1
   "%compilewater" 1

   "$bottommaterial" "rae/raewater01_beneath"

   "$surfaceprop" "water"
}

// rae/raewater01_beneath.vmt
"Water"
{
   "Water_DX60"
   {
      "$fallbackmaterial" "rae/raewater01_beneath_cheap"
   }
   "$abovewater" 0
   "%compilewater" 1

   "$surfaceprop" "water"
}

There are additional variables that control how much reflection and refraction is performed, and the color of those effects, but without a slave who's willing to work I couldn't tell you what they do.

 

[ChoGGi]

i could do the water screenshots for you (least i can do for your very useful tutorials).
email me at [email protected] if you want me to.

 

[shadowkiller]

What im actually trying to do is import the farcry water into hl2. I have all the textures and everything. I just need to know how to put it all together.

 

[Limpet]

You'll have to get it to tga then follow reaven's instructions for the vmt.

 

[shadowkiller]

I have have the top and bottom textures but what im wondering is, is it possible to use the mip maps and bumpmaps that farcry uses? Farcry uses what seems to be animated normal maps. They have many different ones and when showed one after the other (like a video) They form an animated normal map. Same with the bumpmaps.

 

[Raeven0]

The default water bump/normalmap is animated.

On a kinda-related note, can anyone here tell me the difference between a normalmap and a bumpmap? Every resource I can find either uses them interchangeably or picks one at random and makes no mention of the other.

 

[ChoGGi]

see if this helps
http://members.shaw.ca/jimht03/normal.html

 

[Dante]

actually, farcry uses low level shaders to get that water effect.

 

[Raeven0]

see if this helps
http://members.shaw.ca/jimht03/normal.html

Quite so, thanks. Am I to assume that normalmaps, being the most advanced form, are for the most advanced cards, with bumpmaps being for lesser cards?

 

[Sanada]

I too didn't know the difference between bumpmap and normalmap. I always thought they're were the same or very similar. That link pretty much explained it though.

Bumpmapping, as far as I know, was available in DirectX 8+. Maybe 8.1, I dunno. That'd mean a Geforce 2/4 MX wouldn't be able to render it.