CompuServe Messages

Grant, & John, It has been fun watching (and helping 😉 ) this topic drift! What "he" (me!) wanted was simply to achieve the most realistic appearance of being underwater. I found that applying the "Essence Caustic texture" (remember I'm using Imagine 3.0 not LightWave) directly to objects was less convincing than it could be for three reasons. First the texture just applies a specified color to an object. By applying white at about 20% you can lighten the object's original color, but NOT in the same way adding additional light would. And second, the texture is "stuck to" the object. So while it changes through time it also moves along with the object. In life the changing underwater light patterns are stationary and moving underwater objects move through them. This is a subtile one, but I'm very picky! 😉 Finally if you are not VERY careful with the texture placement and axis size the caustic effect will start showing up where it should not – like on the bottom of the objects! By applying the caustic texture (now affecting transparency rather than color) to a "light shield" and lighting the whole scene through it, ALL these problems are eliminated. It works wonderfully, at the expense of having to go full trace. 🙁 This is the tip John gave me during a earlier discussion about the SQ DSV episode about the minisub race. In that episode there were shots that showed the sub, the bottom, AND the underside of the surface. All lit and looking right! With this as inspiration I was determined to create the same level of accuracy on my effect. Although I have not yet played with color, specularity, and lighting of the "light shield" so that it also looks like the underside of the surface (any hints John? 😉 ) I plan to!