Euphotica gives the water a transparent effect. It's named after the euphotic zone, which is the distance from the surface of the water to the depth where the light entering the water has been attenuated to 1% of it's original intensity. Euphotica calculates this attenuation, and then blends the water colour with a user specified colour for the underwater terrain, which gives the effect of transparency.

Euphotica is also able to fix, or at least improve, the "climbing quads" problem you sometimes see around the edge of the water, where you get solid blocks of the water colour going up onto the land. It will replace the block of water colour with the base colour you've specified. If the base colour is similar to the colour you have along the shoreline, then it should be much less noticeable. This can markedly improve TG images. However, if you use a plugin which changes the colouration of the water, such as Ice Shelf, Lava or Sorta Surf, then the problem can come back. All is not lost though, as the new Shore Snipper plugin can fix this.

The Interface

Mac version	Windows version

Euphotica is easy to use. Here's a guide to it's settings :

• File Menu
  The File menu allows you to open and save your plugin settings. The settings are saved in files with a .wwk extension. All of the different plugins save their settings in files with a .wwk extension, but each has it's own format. If you try and open a .wwk file that was saved by a different plugin, then you will be notified about it.
  

  All of the commands in the File menu should work pretty much as you expect them to, however there is a File Menu page here if you would like it explained.
  

  WaterWorks settings files are cross platform, and can be exchanged between the Mac and Windows versions.
  

• Base Colour
  Click the colour button to choose the colour that Euphotica blends with the water to give the transparent effect. The default colour is the same as the default colour of Terragen's base surface layer.
  

• Absorption / Opacity
  This controls how quickly the light is attenuated or, to put it another way, how murky the water is. Smaller numbers give clearer water. At present, the attenuation calculations are based on one Terragen unit being equal to one metre. I am considering adding a Scale setting to allow for situations where this isn't the case.
  

• Exaggerate depth effect
  This setting changes the way in which the depth effect is applied. If this setting is not checked, the colour of the water in the deeper parts stays truer to the original water colour and the transparency effect is a lot more subtle. If it's checked, then there tends to be more contrast between the light and dark parts, and the deeper parts of the water become darker than the actual water colour. Here are a couple of images to illustrate the difference, the one on the left has the "Exaggerate" setting unchecked, the one on the right has it checked :

• Cancel button
  This button closes the plugin window without recording the changes you've made to the settings.

• OK button
  This button closes the plugin window and records the changes you've made to the settings.

Tips for using Euphotica

Here are some hints and tips to help you get the most out of Euphotica :

• Make a note of the colour of the surface layer you would like to represent the underwater terrain and use that for the base colour. Of course, you can set the base colour to anything you like, depending on the effect you want. It's possible to make some truly vile combinations...
  

  If you are using the Mac version, then there's an easy way to transfer the colour of the surface layer. Open the surface map editor for the layer which has the colour you want to use as the base colour. Click on the Colour button, and then click the Pick Up button in the colour picker. Now open the Euphotica window again, and click on the Colour button. When the colour picker opens, click the Drop button. This will copy the colour settings from the surface layer into Euphotica. The Pick Up and Drop buttons are like Copy and Paste for colours. Unfortunately this isn't possible with the Windows version yet, but hopefully will be at some stage.
  

• Think a bit about the colours you're using for the water. You may find that darker colours give better results.
• Results are often better with higher settings for the waves ( Roughness and Wave Size in the Water window ), to break up the surface of the water a bit. Euphotica is really faking the transparency of the water, although in a pretty accurate way for the given situation, and if the water is too smooth it can look as if the blended water / terrain colour is almost painted on the surface of the water. The rougher water surface can help alleviate this.

Requirements

WaterWorks needs the TGPGuiLib to run. This file provides cross platform interface functionality. To find out more about the TGPGuiLib and download the latest version, visit it's website.

© Jo Meder 2000, all rights reserved