Making Realistic Water in 3ds Max

on Aug 14th 2009 with 33 comments
Tutorial Details
This entry is part 7 of 14 in the Evan Schaible Session
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In this tutorial we will be looking in depth at the water space warp in 3D Studio Max. We will first dive into the theory of the space warp, and fish out all of the little details that most people only swim past. Then, after we’ve had our fill of theory, we will look at how to practically apply that theory in a realistic pool scene, and render in Maxwell Render for our final result.

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By

Rollover to read this author's bio or click through to see a full list of posts by this author.

Evan Schaible is a fluids/particle artist and technical director from Los Angeles. Being currently unemployed, he is looking for full time staff work, as well as honing his own skills by doing freelance technical direction, visual effects, and occasionally even motion graphics and visualization. He runs a training website that can be found at: www.ParticleFlow.net, and his blog can be found at: www.evanschaible.com.  

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  • Bobby

    Veeerry nice tutorial, thanks alot for this =D

    Oh, and ever so sorry to say this…..
    But I think I’m first xD

  • PatWeiss

    Hi Guys, i thing the discription is not what u should be:

    ‘Creating weaponry effectively in a next-gen workflow requires detailed knowledge of a variety of very specific skills and tools. In this, the first tutorial in the next-gen knife creation series, you will learn to build a high-poly knife model using 3ds Max.’

    I think the topic is about realistic water and the knife-thread is already here ;)

    So, just wanted to mention that!
    Thanks for that Tutorial, the same please for C4D :)

    Cheers Pat

  • http://craigps.co.nr Craigsnedeker

    Ahah! Must have been a mistake.

  • Hooper

    Hey it’s Evan! Cool!

    He made a tutorial for me over at his website about the helicopter dust landing using PFlow.

    Thanx again Evan!

  • http://www.evanschaible.com Evan Schaible

    Hey Hooper. Good to see you around.

    • Amila

      can u do this same tutorial for Maya?

      • http://kaleb-3d.com Kaleb Aylsworth

        I’ll ask some of the Maya authors if they would be up to it….or perhaps even Evan himself could give it a shot.

  • http://kaleb-3d.com Kaleb Aylsworth

    Hey sorry about the mix up everyone one! The correct description should be showing up now:)

    • PatWeiss

      Indeed, it is ;) Thanks. Just wanted to mention that. :) Have a nice day.

  • Amila C

    hay; can u do a tutorial for this to Maya?

  • http://www.evanschaible.com Evan Schaible

    I can give it a shot for Maya. But not promising anything as Max is my main app.

  • aaa

    cheers nice one!

  • ghost

    I love how you make up words ;)

  • ashwnai

    n ice one

  • caubebutchi

    Why I can’t watch tutorials .

  • Christopher

    Where is the video?!?!! ANybody?!?!?!

  • Richard

    I did everything with the exact same settings yet my ball falls through and my wifes are crazy.

  • Saahil

    yaar ye kiya hei 3D MAX mujey b kuch btao
    mea b sekhna chahta hun ………

    yaar kisi k pass koi 5,6 mints ki movie bani hoi hei 3d max mea tou plz sent mea i need it hard

    this is my id
    irfanahmed.ajk@gmail.com

  • http://cyad.xoc.uam.mx/albertinic/ Albertinic

    i didnt know Maxwel… Thanks for this.. i really learn with this tut…
    From Mexico City

  • Simon

    how do you get all those tools along the bottom like create animation and stuff?

  • brazileiro

    I have the same problem:

    “I did everything with the exact same settings yet my ball falls through and my wifes are crazy.”

  • gelu

    my ball doesn’t sync ! LOL

  • http://www.yahoo.com Tanu

    Thanks evan,
    want to learn more can you help…
    from India

  • http://none Goran

    Really a nice tutorial m8, thanks a lot. but have one question.. how do I increase the frames.. Now the animation starts at frame 0 and ends at frame 100.

    What to do so that it starts at, idk, frame number 400 and ends and 500?

  • ape

    can u make a splash tutorial because i can’t find one

  • ape

    nice tutorial btw

  • http://www.ankmyrandor.com Ank Myrandor

    i’m having a question about the length of the animation, if its rendering the animation
    for me it goes to 100 frames top. but that will leave you with a really short animation of 4 seconds

    even if i change the total frames for example to 400 it will only render 100 of them in animation
    is there an option to change it’s total frames ?! of the animation button i presume ?

    searched a lot of options but i can’t find a solution

    tnx

  • Newman

    How exactly do you get the MaxwellMaterials to be a part of the 3Ds System? I am trying to do this tut but am unable to complete it because I can’t figure out hot to implement the Maxwell Mats.

  • FodoR

    I can’t make the connection between the reactor and the plane …

  • Linus

    Really Thanx for this NIIIICE Water tutorial :) 5 stars for you

  • manjinder singh

    hello bro ur grate thanks send me cell no

  • Mozammal

    Thanks for that tutorial. This 3d water is very realistic.

  • LunarGuy

    Water turned out awesome thanks for the tutorial