2022. 8. 31.
I made a school of jack swimming in the deep blue water in this small project. By creating this scene, I want to achieve three goals:
- A water shader applicable to all underwater scene
- A workflow to model, texture, and animate fish
- The shoaling activity of a fish school
A water shader was the most difficult to achieve. To do that, I followed many different underwater tutorials. One element of the underwater environment is visibility. The way an object is seen needs to be affected by the distance (between the camera and the object) and the visibility (an intrinsic property of the water). Another element I found very appealing is seeing the wave actions at the surface from underwater. My water shader was finally able to achieve all of these elements.
I also established a workflow to create fish. So far, the workflow works for ‘simple fish’ – fish that only moves by waving the body without additional movement on their fins. Many fishes fall into this category – jack, sardine, and tuna. But it will not work for other fishes, such as spade fish.
I achieved the shoaling activity of the fish by using a particle system following boid kinetics. I found it tedious to make everything right, but if I keep the scene short, it is not a big deal.
These are the three main elements of creating this scene. If you want specific information on how to do each, you can drop me a message.