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Manual - Blender 2.4x

[edit] Wave Modifier

[edit] Description

The Wave modifier adds an ocean-like motion to the Z coordinate of the Object Mesh.

[edit] Options

Wave Modifier Panel

Linear Wave Front

Circular Wave Front

This panel is found in the Editing buttons, Modifier panel, selecting Wave as the modifier.

X and Y

The Wave effect deforms vertices in the Z direction, and originates from the given starting point and propagates along the Mesh with circular wave fronts, or with rectilinear wave fronts, parallel to the X or Y axis. This is controlled by the two X and Y toggle buttons. If just one button is pressed fronts are linear, if both are pressed fronts are circular.

Cycl

Repeats the waves cyclically, rather than a single pulse.

Normal

Displaces the mesh along the surface normals.

Time sta

The Frame at which the Wave begins (if Speed is positive), or ends (if Speed is negative). Use a negative frame number to prime and pre-start the waves.

Lifetime

The number of frames in which the effect lasts. 0=forever, else frame at which waves stop being simulated.

Damptime

An additional number of frames in which the wave slowly dampens from the Height value to zero after Lifetime is reached. The dampening occurs for all the ripples and begins in the first frame after the Lifetime is over. Ripples disappear over Damptime frames.

Sta X and Sta Y

The starting points of the waves, in the Mesh object's Local coordinates.

Ob

Use an Object as reference for starting position of the wave. Leave blank to disable.

VGroup

Vertex group name with which to displace the Object.

Texture

Affects the Object's displacement based on a texture.

Local

This menu let's you choose the texture's coordinates for displacement.

Speed

The speed, in Blender units per frame, of the ripple.

Height

The height or amplitude, in Blender units, of the ripple.

Width

Half of the width, in Blender units, between the tops of two subsequent ripples (if Cycl is enabled). This has an indirect effect on the ripple amplitude - if the pulses are too near to each other, the wave may not reach the z=0 position, so in this case Blender actually lowers the whole wave so that the minimum is zero and, consequently, the maximum is lower than the expected amplitude. See Technical Details below.

Narrow

The actual width of each pulse, the higher the value the narrower the pulse. The actual width of the area in which the single pulse is apparent is given by 4 divided by the Narrow value. That is, if Narrow is 1 the pulse is 4 units wide, and if Narrow is 4 the pulse is 1 unit wide.

[edit] Technical Details and Hints

The relationship of the above values is described here:

Wave front characteristics

To obtain a nice wave effect similar to sea waves and close to a sinusoidal wave, make the distance between following ripples and the ripple width equal, that is the Narrow value must be equal to 2 divided by the Width value. E.g. for Width=1 set Narrow to 2.

Manual