Further Research

I have been doing some more research into different methods of creating water for 3D.

I have recently been looking at different companies that have created water visual effects and seeing what they use. Most of the research has come up with in-house software that they have made and created but a few other names of software did come up.

The first was Maya fluids which I have already had to rule out. The second was some software called Flowline. This has been created by a company called Scanline VFX which again have not released it for public use but does very much the same as Maya fluids as you can use it for smoke, clouds, fire and water.

Lastly, Realflow has come up time and time again. This is definitely something I would like to look into as method as it could save a lot of rendering time compared to the use of Maya fluids.

I have also been thinking about 2D methods. Mainly overlaying the 3D animation with some 2D to make it look like its splashing and rippling around the animals.

A good source of research was "the making of Lost and Found" by Studio AKA. They use water as a large part of the story as the boy rows the whole ocean to take this penguin back to his home. It was interesting to see the early tests they did with the 2D waves and how they had decided against against them because they needed "a space you could move around in". This is very much what our film needs too. Our film is largely set in or around the river but it needs to have that 3D feel because the audience need to feel the strength of the river and feel that depth, which could take much longer to achieve and blend with, in 2D

Whilst looking into different methods, I remembered that one look that they were trying to achieve with the film was toon shading. It needs to be thought about more in depth but, if toon shading was to be used, most of the methods I have been talking about would be useless. Most of the methods use there own shaders to give the realistic water effect but if it was to be toon shaded, these shader could no longer be used and it would not look like convincing water.

If this was to happen, the only method I would be left with is to draw 2D over the 3D animation. This would allow me to use a plane or something similar that could be toon shaded with the ripples and splashes drawn onto of the rendered clip.