[RESOURCE] Basic Custom Water Material Generator

[Cynick]

Sick of all of those BORING default water materials that just don't feel right for your highly specialized needs for your super awesome never-before-seen map? Need an extra-blue colored water material for that beach map you're working on? A whitish-fog water material for that snowy map?

Before, you might look at the work required to create a custom water material (roughly 250 lines of VMT code spread over 4 VMT files) and say "NO WAY! I'll just use the boring default Sawmill water until someone else makes the water I need and steal that!"

NO MORE! Presenting:

Custom Water Material Generator (Beta 1A)

What is this, you say? An easy way to make your water look good with your map? Impossible. But it's true! And it's FREE!

Features:

• Generate custom water materials quickly and painlessly, with no VMT editing necessary!
• Save water definitions as XML for editing later, and export to VMT simultaneously!
• Auto-directory feature--auto saves files to your tf\materials\water directory, instantly accessible in Hammer
• Control fog color/fading for both above and below water!
• Auto generates DX8 Fallback materials

Screenshots!
I apologize for the quality on some of these shots, my tf2 was screwed up for a little while, and I didn't have the time to mess with it.

The User Interface

Really blue carribean water! (Beach not included)

Egypt during the 2nd plague!

So now that you're like :O "how do I make water/blood river?" Here's the download link!

Download: From DropBox

Notes:

• Auto directory feature will automatically detect your steam username, see below note.
• Auto directory feature will ask you for your steam username. This is only necessary to determine the place to put your newly created materials. Your steam username will NOT be stored/saved anywhere, and the program will NEVER ask for your password. YOU ARE NOT REQUIRED TO PROVIDE A USERNAME AT ALL, if you choose not to, a normal file browser will pop up.
• Only supports TF2 at the current time

Now go forth and make water (and post criticisms too! ). Happy mapping! :thumbup1:

 

[YM]

only a gui for vmt editing waters?

underwhelming I want a way of making new water textures. changing the fog values in a text editor is easy.

 

[Cynick]

Water is barely based on textures at all (no $basetexture) and the Valve water materials all use the 2fort overlay textures pretty much. And I don't have the skill to make a program to create seamless, animated bumpmapped water textures :O. I just hate having to sift through the 250+ lines of code in 4 VMT files to change the color/fog one little bit, and I figured other people might too. (Especially when you realize it still isn't *quite* right, and you need to change it again).

So would it be awesome? Yea. But with my (lack of high level) coding experience, it's unlikely >_>.

 

[A Boojum Snark]

Auto directory feature will ask you for your steam username. This is only necessary to determine the place to put your newly created materials.

Pull the %sourcesdk% environment variable, backtrack to the user directory, and then down the tf install path to where you need to go.

 

[Cynick]

Really? :O I searched and searched and never found that. Thanks x 9001

EDIT: Epic fast update...it now automatically detects your steam username from %sourcesdk%. It still allows the option to not specify a username because some people hate convenience.

EDIT2: A side note (I promise: last edit tonight ): This was aimed mostly at the newer mappers/mappers who don't know the in's and out's of VMT editing, etc. More experienced mappers will probably find this superfluous.

 

[The Political Gamer]

Holy crap how did I miss this! D: Jarate water here I come!

 

[MrDonde]

Does this tool also add a glow to the water?

 

[MrDonde]

OK I posted this question in another forum but I thought maybe someone here might know whats the issue.

When I created some green water with this tool I started having some strange issues with the edge of the water in game. It looks like the reflection is off or something. Here is a screenshot.

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4...010a370000.jpg

If anyone has any ideas to fix this please let me know.

-MrDonde

 

[Cynick]

Link is broken for me, so I can't see exactly what problem you have, but I have seen issues in the past with all water brushes, not just the ones this program generates, when they are up against the skybox. I never found a solution to this, so any insight is appreciated.

Try using a official valve water material to see if this problem persists.

 

[MrDonde]

Let me see if this works

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4127/donde2010a370000.jpg