As I announced in my last video, the theme for this month is Weather!
So to kick it off, I’m starting with a very important topic: Puddles. Because no rain scene is complete without them!Puddles are notoriously known amongst the 3d community for being difficult to achieve, and for very good reason! They are flush with the ground, partly reflective and subject to water physics.
I used to just avoid them at all cost. But thankfully I’ve discovered an easy method that achieves stunning results by harnessing the power of textures 
Many of you have requested more text based tutorials, so today’s tutorial is sans-video
Setting up the scene
With a new scene, delete the default cube.
Add a plane (Shift+A).
In the top view, scale the plane to the shape of a rectangle. You can do this by pressing S and then X or Y.
We will now UV texture the plane. First split the view port vertically and change the new view port to a UV Image editor. In the image view port, open a floor texture of your choice. For this tutorial I will be using a cobble texture off CGTextures.com. You can download the texture here.
To UV unwrap the plane, enter edit mode (TAB) and press U and select Unwrap from the pop up menu. You will need to rotate the UV coordinates, so that the scaling matches the object.
Position the camera to the desired position for your scene. In my case it was on the left hand side.
If you switch to texture view mode, you can see the texture in real time. This can help you position the camera.
Creating an environment
Before we start texturing the plane, we need to set up an environment so that the plane has something to reflect.
Go the World panel and check Paper Sky. This will ensure the texture we are about to apply, is not stretched or warped in anyway.
Switch to the Texture panel and ensure that World is visible along the top bar. This means that we are applying textures to the world settings, not an object. Then add a new texture.
Set the texture type to Image or Movie and Open a background image.
You can choose any image for the background, but I will be using this image that I found on Flickr:
Depending on the size of your scene, you may need to tile the texture to create better reflections. You can do this in the Tile options. To make the background appear in your render, check Horizon.
To create reflecting light, move the default lamp to the end of the plane and duplicate it as many times as necessary. This will vary depending on the scene, but I’ve found that around 10 lamps at varied heights and varied energy values to be effective.
The lamp settings can be left as default, but you may like to change each lamps color depending on your scene.
Adding the ground texture
We’ve UV mapped the texture to the plane, but before it will show up in the render, we also need to add it too the texture settings.
With the plane still selected, add a new material.
Leave all the options as default for now.
Switch to the texture panel and add a new texture.
From the texture type drop down menu, select Image or Movie.
Next, click Open and select the same floor texture that we used previously.
To ensure the texture uses the UV coordinates, select UV from the mapping options drop down menu.
If you rendered now you would get a result similar to this.
Adding reflections
Now comes the tricky part. In order to tell Blender which parts of the ground are going to be puddles, we need to paint over the floor texture with a thick black brush. You can do this easily in a paint editor, such as Gimp or Photoshop. Make sure you paint on a separate layer as you will need to use it again later in the tutorial.
Alternatively you can download my ready created texture here:
Before we add the texture, you will need to activate Mirror in the materials panel. Leave all the settings as default as we want the texture to control what parts of the plane will be reflective.
Add a new texture and place it underneath the previous texture we created earlier.
You may like to name the texture Mirror and the previous texture Col so you don’t get them confused. Set Image or Movie as the texture type. Click Open from the texture panel and select the altered texture we just created.
In the texture mapping options, choose UV.
In the Influence panel, select Ray Mirror. This will take the light areas of the image and make them reflective. Check RGB to Intensity to convert the image to B&W format. Check Negative to invert the texture. This will make the dark areas of the image reflective instead of the white areas. We want this so the cracks and puddles in the image are reflective.
If you rendered now you would get a result similar to this, which is very reflective! This is necessary however, as we will be adding a bump map which will distort the reflections and make them less obvious.
Creating the bump map
Prepare for awesomeness! Bump maps push the scene closer to realism by adding raised imperfections to a surface, and are great fun to use.
Add a new texture underneath the previous, and name it Normals. Select Image or Movie as the texture type and click Open image. Select the custom made puddle texture.
In the mapping options, select UV.
In the Influence options, select Normal. If you choose a positive value the dark values will become raised. However the tiles in my texture are light, so I will be using a negative value to reverse it. Set the value to -0.15
If you rendered now you would see a result similar to this. Whilst it is okay, I would prefer the cracks to be more reflective and less distorted.
To do this we need to alter the contrast of image. In the texture settings, set the contrast to 3. This will make the cracks extremely dark, and as a result unaffected by the bump mapping.
Perfect! The cracks now look more flooded as if they have collected water.
Adding specularity
Specularity is used in 3d to fake reflections, so as a rule of thumb you normally shouldn’t use both reflections and specularity on the same object. However… in this particular case, I want the lights to create a light sheen effect over the tiles and puddle.
Because the tiles are white, you will need to create a separate texture with white puddles. This is so the specularity effects the puddles as well. This texture will be identical to the previous, only the puddles will be white. This can easily be achieved in Gimp or Photoshop, by selecting the puddles layer that you previously painted and inverting it.
Alternatively, you can download my ready made texture here:
Before you add the texture to the plane, go to the material settings and turn off specularity! The reason for this is that we want the image texture to control the strength of the specularity. The value in the material settings will apply normal specularity to the entire object, which we don’t want. So make sure this is set to 0.
Go to the texture panel and add a new texture underneath the previous textures.
Change the name of the texture to Specularity, and set the type to Image or Movie. Click Open and select the new puddle texture.
In the mapping options, select UV.
Check the Specular Intensity. The value will define how much or how little specularity you want in the image. In this example, 0.6 works okay but you may need to experiment with a value that is appropriate for your scene.
If you rendered now you would see a result similar to this. Notice the subtle sheen off the tiles and the puddles? Perfect 
Adding ripples
The only thing missing are some subtle ripples in the puddle. This can easily be achieved with a basic procedural texture.
For the last time, add a new texture.
Name the texture, Ripples and leave the texture type as Clouds.
By default the cloud texture is too large, so set the texture to 0.02 and increase the depth to 6 to create finer more detailed ripples.
In the Influence panel, check Normal and set the amount to 0.001. This will create very subtle imperfections across the plane.
Finished!
Well… almost. If you want to push the scene further, why not give it a little Wow Factor
I’ve added color correction, soft glow, vignette and depth of field.
Now it’s finished!
As always I’m excited to see what you guys create, so feel free to post them below! If you know of any alternative methods to create puddles, feel free to share that as well
Great work. Thank’s.The written tutorials are really the better way for me to learn.
Can text tutorials please be made available for download as PDF? Great work though keep it up
Another great tutorial ! Thanks for keeping me inspired.
Great tutorial as always!!
How difficult is it to get that puddle to be reflective of the actual scene already set up?
Say you had a puddle underneath some buildings in new york that you had modelled and wanted it to relfect those? I have done mirrors inside interiors but never quite got a good effect for exterior architectural relfections.
Nice tutorial.
As puddles are in parts where the ground has some holes, i generally use real deformations of the ground and I add a reflective and half transparent plane just under the level of the upper stones surfaces. It allows simpler textures and shows some depth in the puddles (more realistic in day light).
wat blender r u useing??
Blender 2.5 I think.
thank u……
Text is nice for step following, but I really do like the videos as they give a much better feel for the actual time it takes. (or should take)
Plus, all the extra insight and comments especially when something isn’t right and you have to problem solve gives us “blender way of thinking” that text won’t capture. I guess all that to say, text is great but don’t give up videos!
This tut was great too. Thanks!
For my own, I like writen tutorials. When it’s not your native language, written things are more understandable than video, even if Andrew’s voice is very easy to understand.
it is great to have a text based tutorial! first i was for video based tutorial, but this one convinced me! can’t wait for the next one! :p
Muy buen tutorial , me gusto parece real , saludos
Thanks for the comments guys!
And I’m not abandoning video! The results from the survey I posted recently told me that 75% of you prefer video and 25% of you prefer text.
So I will aim to make 1 in every 4 tutorials text, and the rest video.
Hopefully that will keep everyone happy
Very interesting techniques there. Good start with the regular tutorial delivery! Keep goin
That’s awesome, Andrew.
Yeah, I voted video, I think. >_>
This was a fantastic tutorial. I used my own images and it turned out great – to my eyes anyway.
Thank you so much for the lesson… keep up the great work.
Thank you.
Very nice!
Nice worskhop,
can make a tutorial, how to place 3D Objects with shadow in a videoscene, after using 3D Camera Tracker like “Voodoo”? And how to mask out 3d objects with other 3d objects or how to mask some moving objects in the videoscene in front of the placed 3d objects.
Thanks!
I think when you are making text tutorials you should be more precise about measures and any other kind of values. That why it’s easier to follow the tuto and later we can recreat it with other sets.
Very very nice !!!
Pls score me among those who prefer text tutos. It would be nice ofc to have both, If it would not bother u too much
Bellissimo =)
@John Edingfield
I wanna see! Got a link to the finished work you created?
Andrew, when you alter the contrast to fill in the cracks, the puddles edges become sharper, and more translucent. In my opinion the step before looks better, and more realistic. Is this sharpness intentional?
@Andrew Price
You can see my web blog where I have been sharing my images at http://web.me.com/jedingfield
Thanks heaps! This is one of the best results I’ve ever had from a tutorial
perfect!
Do I need to say something else?
Want a quik way to save these text tuts? just copy and paste them into your favorite program ( Word, Acrobat, etc ) and then save it to your hard drive through that program. Its quik and simple and probably would save the Guru alot of extra work.
Thanks a bunch! My finished result isn’t as good, but I like it
http://rosasecta.com/images/submissions/2882.png
@Matt
Nice work mate! I like your puddle pattern
is it able to use this tutorial with any version of Blender ? i have the version 249.2
Thank you Andrew for another great tutorial!
Here’s my try with a bit of daylight conditions.
http://yfrog.com/5mdddoip
Thank you for the great effect! It made me lough a lot after adding the bum map. It took me off guard getting such a great effect after so little effort, it’s the most “instant reguarding” tutorial I’ve made.
There’s a huge problem going on with this effect, though. It’s that when you have depth of field in a reflection, the focus must be in the reflected object (thus: distance-to-puddle + distance-to-reflected-object) so, if you’re focusing the puddle you wouldn’t be able to focus the reflection and you would have mostly transparency, if you focus on the reflection, the sidewalk would be out of focus. In conclusion I would think this effect is for use without DoF, but maybe there’s a fix for it.
Here’s my render http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e219/ScaroDj/Render.png
This is WOOOW!! Fantastic!!
I’m thankful Your tutorials!
Good and nice work! Welcome from Hungary!
Einfach genial. first dlass. thanks
The results are fantastic! Thank you so much!
Thank you Andrew, you doing a great job!)
wow…simple and simple genious… ^^ w2g, keep it on
Here is my final result
http://i492.photobucket.com/albums/rr289/GnomGames/Roserain.jpg
Thanks for the text-based tutorial. Videos do have certain advantages, but I like being able to quickly glance through the steps in a Text-based tutorial, and also being able to go back easier. Videos can show certain hard-to-describe techniques or painting techniques better… anyway great work!
Thank you very much Andrew this is really great for a beginner, for the first time I did this tutorial I didn’t know how to unwrap and put the texture on my plane but now I did it
Now move and make more tutorials
Here is my first try: http://emdesigns.de/puddle_render.jpg
Thanks for the tutorial.
This is my 1st puddle..
http://img96.imageshack.us/i/mypuddle.jpg/
@ScaroDj
Instead of using a regular reflection, try the blurred reflection. That will help diffuse the bright reflection and fake the dof look your looking for.
This is my puddle. What you say?
http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=58&u=12404464
I am learning so much with you. Thanks so much, Andrew.
Nice tut. And my results:
http://img541.imageshack.us/i/61022644.jpg/
Thanks for sharing knowledge.
Hi, I saw you’r work it’s awesome. so i just want to know how can i creat a foutine in blender with the motor fluid? thaks
it’s fountain sorry thanks.
@Azmisov
Peace.
Yes, I know, thanks. But what I was looking for was to use this effect for animation, changing the DoF between the puddle and the reflected object, a very common resource in cinematography. I’ll find out when it comes the time to use it.
Hi Andrew, awesome Tut!
Regarding the DOF, it tooks me some time to find out that you have to use the DOF Params in the Camera Panel to adjust the focal Point. It’s not enough to just juse the Node inside the Compositor. So maybe worth to update in yout Tut. (or did I missed this step?)
Regards
Kai
for those who want this page as pdf you can just using many print as PDF tools that available for your OS…
My result here: http://yfrog.com/f/mrrendertotoro3bp/
Thanks Andrew!