Skip to content
Uyen Dang
All notes

Blender stylized water shader (tutorial-based)

Notes from building a stylized water material in Blender. This is the setup I used for quick look tests and easy shader tweaking.

Date
Jan 1, 2026

Source tutorial (credit)

This shader is based on the workflow from the tutorial below. I followed it closely, then tweaked values for my own look tests.

Stylized Water in Blender — tutorial

Look tests (still frames)

These are the four variants I liked most. Same node graph. Mostly different ramp positions, mix factors, and texture scales.

Look test 1
Look test 2
Look test 3
Look test 4

Look tests (videos)

Same four looks, but animated. These are short clips so I can judge motion, highlights, and how the ripples read over time.

Look test 1 — video variant.
Look test 2 — video variant.
Look test 3 — video variant.
Look test 4 — video variant.

Node graph overview

This is the full material layout. I split it into readable chunks: a base diffuse banding pass, a watercolor breakup pass, a distortion pass, and a wave/ripple pass. Then everything gets combined and pushed through the final output mix.

Full node graph overview (grouped by function).
Full node graph overview (grouped by function).

Diffuse bands

This part builds the base stylized shading. The idea is simple: convert lighting into bands with a ColorRamp, then push color a bit with HSV and controlled blends. If the water looks flat, this is usually where I fix it first.

Diffuse banding setup (Shader to RGB + ramps + light color control).
Diffuse banding setup (Shader to RGB + ramps + light color control).

Watercolor breakup

This pass adds the blotchy, paint-like variation. Noise feeds into Voronoi, and the ramps decide what becomes “paper texture” vs. what stays clean. The quickest knobs here are Noise scale, Voronoi scale, and both ramp contrast levels.

Watercolor breakup (Noise → Voronoi → ramps for paint coverage control).
Watercolor breakup (Noise → Voronoi → ramps for paint coverage control).

Water distortion

This section fakes depth and swirl by warping the pattern with gradients and noise. I treat it like a “push/pull” layer: subtle values give a nice drift, heavy values start looking like marble. Keep it restrained unless you want chaos.

Distortion setup (gradients + noise blended to drive warping).
Distortion setup (gradients + noise blended to drive warping).

Waves and ripples

This is where the ripple rings come from. Wave Texture drives the concentric pattern, then Map Range + ramps snap it into stylized steps. Scale controls ring spacing. Distortion controls how “organic” the rings feel.

Waves/ripples (Wave Texture shaped with Map Range and ColorRamp).
Waves/ripples (Wave Texture shaped with Map Range and ColorRamp).

Final mix and output

After the groups are built, I combine them and balance the final read. This is where I decide how much glow vs. transparency I want, and how strong the stylization should be. If I’m doing multiple looks, I only tweak the ramps and a few mix factors.

Final output section (mixing the groups into the material output).
Final output section (mixing the groups into the material output).