[Community Project] FREE Ocean Water Shader

[Wisevir]

Hey guys!
Any news for 4.21 version?

To get the current Github version to work you can compile the source of the ocean plugin yourself for engine version 4.21:
1. Copy the OceanPlugin folder from the main github project eg. D:\OceanProject-master\Plugins\OceanPlugin into your engine version Runtime folder of your plugins eg. D:\UnrealEngine\UE_4.21\Engine\Plugins\Runtime\
2. Delete the Binaries folder and Intermediate folder (if available)
3. Open (power) shell: shift-right click >> open power-shell (normal Windows cmd shell works as well)
4. Using the Unreal build tool execute the following script to build the plugin from scratch (of course make sure the paths are correct):
.\RunUAT.bat BuildPlugin -plugin="D:\UnrealEngine\UE_4.21\Engine\Plugins\Runtime\OceanPlugin\OceanPlugin.uplugin" -package=""D:\UnrealEngine\UE_4.21\Engine\Plugins\Runtime\OceanPlugin"
5. If build finishes correctly you will have two folders (Binaries and Intermediate). Binaries contains the build ocean plugin for version 4.21

Now following the changes listed on the Github page to use the engine for version 2.20.3 adjust your games uproject file to atleast include the following lines:
{
"FileVersion": 3,
"EngineAssociation": "4.21",
"Category": "",
"Description": "",
"Modules": [
{
"Name": "QuickStart",
"Type": "Runtime",
"LoadingPhase": "Default",
"AdditionalDependencies": [
"Engine"
]
}
],
"Plugins": [
{
"Name": "OceanPlugin",
"Type": "Runtime",
"LoadingPhase": "PreDefault",
"Enabled": true
}
]
}

Now for a quick start you can copy the folders in the Content folder of the OceanProject into the Content folder of your game. (Or append if you already have maps premade for instnace). Then simply boot UE and done.

[Dreamcastgamer]

Been working with it for several months and finally got something out of it that is worth showing off. Still a heavy WIP and need to work on lighting/smoke ect. The main challenge ahead is to make a semi decent wake, however iv been unable to get any of the ocean materials to look nice and the infinite ocean is still giving me troubles. Still love the project and keep up the good work!
https://youtu.be/LhV7sUbY4K0

[sstefan4]

Hey guys i love that project , the thing is that i only need the material ocean water without buoyancy for the moment , how can i without breaking everything ?

[NilsonLima]

Buoyancy only happens if you use the specific blueprint for it otherwise nothing will break. In theory you can use the material for the ocean in a plane with some tessellation on it if you want to have a small portion of the ocean showing into the scene, otherwise you will still need the C++ portion of the plugin to handle the infinite ocean system, which automatically scales a plane for you depending on the camera position and distance.

If you still think you are uncomfortable doing changes I would suggest picking the free Water Materials available in the marketplace, they have an ocean material which is quite nice, and you can change it to have the coloring we have in the community project by copying the relevant nodes from this to the Water Materials' ocean material.

[Dreamcastgamer]

Seems like a few years ago some people where able to get a wake function on the ocean, was wondering if this was ever documented or instructions made for it?
https://forums.unrealengine.com/comm...-shader/page48

[NilsonLima]

Seems like a few years ago some people where able to get a wake function on the ocean, was wondering if this was ever documented or instructions made for it?
https://forums.unrealengine.com/comm...-shader/page48

The feature is broken. Something happened when new engine releases came in and nobody noticed that the wakes were not visible anymore. When you posses a bot with 'E' key and you move it, you can see the BP_Wake actors being spawned and destroyed, but they are not visible. There is a camera position I discovered that you can see the wakes visible, but any change they go poof again.

The method is consistent, but it would be necessary to look the last engine version this worked as it should and start to compare engine source code changes that made this behavior to happen, takes a huge amount of time, which I don't have right now.

PS: I have figured out the issue and will post the changes needed with a small video. It is just a translucency sorting issue.

[NilsonLima]

Seems like a few years ago some people where able to get a wake function on the ocean, was wondering if this was ever documented or instructions made for it?
https://forums.unrealengine.com/comm...-shader/page48

The video showing the feature explanation and the fix can be found here:

[Thunder_Owl]

The video showing the feature explanation and the fix can be found here:

Thank You !

[sstefan4]

Buoyancy only happens if you use the specific blueprint for it otherwise nothing will break. In theory you can use the material for the ocean in a plane with some tessellation on it if you want to have a small portion of the ocean showing into the scene, otherwise you will still need the C++ portion of the plugin to handle the infinite ocean system, which automatically scales a plane for you depending on the camera position and distance.

If you still think you are uncomfortable doing changes I would suggest picking the free Water Materials available in the marketplace, they have an ocean material which is quite nice, and you can change it to have the coloring we have in the community project by copying the relevant nodes from this to the Water Materials' ocean material.

the thing is that the oceanmaterial from marketplace dosent have edge foam and deep fade

[NilsonLima]

the thing is that the oceanmaterial from marketplace dosent have edge foam and deep fade

Just to be sure we are talking about same FREE asset: https://www.unrealengine.com/marketp...ater-materials

[sstefan4]

lmao i didnt know that actually exist , i thought it was the ue4 demo . thanks!

[Dreamcastgamer]

The video showing the feature explanation and the fix can be found here:

Thanks for that fantastic video! Your video's are always very informative! Got it working in the default map and it works great!

I was wondering though if i could ask a question though

So as you might have seen in the quick video i posted im obviously using a waaayyy different model than the default fishing boat one.

For in my game this mesh/actor is not controlled by the player but instead is on a pre set path i animated in Matinee (i never liked sequence editor myself)
For the example in the default maps this is on a blueprint/actor that only is effected by a user's input, would you have any idea on how to get it working on a different model?

My thought process is that maybe one could take the fishing boat blueprint and change the meshes around in it and get rid of the controlling aspect, not too sure if that work though

Again thanks for the fantastic video!

[sstefan4]

Just to be sure we are talking about same FREE asset: https://www.unrealengine.com/marketp...ater-materials

Its kind of lame but i cant setup the material in my level landscape , dosent looks the same (white water and 0 realism , tiny foam etc) as in the overview level of the asset any idea what should i do?

[NilsonLima]

Its kind of lame but i cant setup the material in my level landscape , dosent looks the same (white water and 0 realism , tiny foam etc) as in the overview level of the asset any idea what should i do?

In this case you need to ask for support for that asset's creator. The asset is free, but he received US$ 7,500 from Epic to sponsor that asset, so kinda free for us, but creator was paid and needs to give support.

[Dreamcastgamer]

I was experimenting around today and i was wondering if its possible if one can take the Wake stuff from the fishing boat (where its spawning and then deleting itself) and make it its own blueprint that is constantly making wakes. This would allow it be treated say like a smoke system where one can attach it to a actor so it following it at all times.

This could be a cool way of adding it to non playable objects, like something in a sequence or cut-scene.

Be cool if that could be done