SketchUp modeling - How to render a water feature

 

Fountains, ponds, pools, and other water features are easy to add to any SketchUp model.  Rendering these features can pose some very interesting challenges.

In this brief video I'll discuss an easy to learn and use technique that can be applied to a SketchUp surface to illustrate water with realism.  Additionally, I use a light balancing feature to post process my original rendering, providing me with a nice daylight image of the model and an evening image.  The benefit is that I am able to achieve a rendering with realistic water and I get two renderings after processing only one.

This model was created with Trimble SketchUp and I used IRender nXt to generate the renderings.

SketchUp Rendering - Indirect Lighting

Indirect Lighting Example - Cove Lighting

When indirect lighting such as cove lighting is included in a project, there are a variety of ways to add this artificial lighting to a SketchUp model.  When cove lighting is the only light source, as in the example above, the room is illuminated completely by light bouncing off of the ceiling and then to and from other surfaces in the model.  The result is a rendering with soft lighting and very realistic shadows.

SketchUp Rendering, Water Features

Rendering a Water Feature

Modern rendering programs that can be added to modeling applications have a variety of ways to render materials.  Arguably one of the more challenging surfaces to render with realism is water.  Water is clear, water reflects light, water refracts light, and the surface of the water can be smooth, rippled, or wavy.  Designers will spend considerable time and effort to render a water feature in their model that actually looks like it is filled with water.  Realistic renderings of water are impressive, adding to the overall quality of the rendered image.

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