What is wrong with my water?

http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8...shaderscd8.jpg
Shot at 2007-08-04

Here is my shader info, using kornman's bitmaps. It is the vindication_shader from flyin rooster

template: water_pool
material_name: liquid_thin_water
bump: water (the bump map type)
reflection_map: water (cube map)
refraction_map: none.. :/
lightmap_translucency_map:lightmap_translucency

It will not animate, and has those weird lights on it's edges.

By the way, I know that is not the proper way to do the geometry for water, but regardless, it is not animating or rippling correctly.

Could be two possibilities:

A) You UVWed your surface incorrectly

B) Your shader is messed up somehow


That's all I can think of, atm.

I am pretty sure this type of water is meant to be flat. In any case, make sure that in bump_map_index, you make it have an identity function spanning from 0 to 16 with a time of .5 seconds.

Aha, I didn't UVW it properly, because water is weird. Ok, I fixed the shader, made a flat surface and all. I have two problems:

1) The water is VERY dark
2) it only reflects the sky cubemap (and when i look closely, i can actually see the cube's corners)
3)The ripples are extremely small, almost unnoticeable.

Your ripple scales are set too high.

Remember to UVW any surface correctly.

You may have the UVW spanned out a large distance, if so, you have to fix that in 3ds Max. If not, it's just setting the scaling right in your shader.

The water may be dark because of what's underneath it, remember - water is a transparent property. Adding a fog plane underneath may add some color.

And of course, the only reflection that water does in Halo 2 is cubemap reflections. At least the water that you're using.

What is/where can I find the "ripple scale", or is it just have to do with UVW.

sewage.


Having UNUSED checked in the bitmap wouldn't do this?

i have no idea what you just said or talked about. And all of my bitmaps have UNUSED unchecked, so, yeah..

... just experiment Jngrow. You really don't seem to be trying whatever you can possible. I barely have enough time to be on the forums for long. It seems you're quite dependant upon help. Just test. Test, and test again.

It's called scale. X_scale... y_scale... that usually affects your ripple. Gah, you should know that from testing/tutorials. :P


And Korn, your Unused property wouldn't affect how it looks in game. It just affects whether the texture makes it in or not. Or how the map compiles. Map compiling likes to crash if there's a bitmap with the unused setting checked.

did you set your water plane to +media in 3ds max?