Tidal Surface

The water surface material (shader Tidal/Tidal).

The water surface is drawn with a deferred-style pipeline. Water geometry first writes per-body GBuffers, then a fullscreen pass shades every water pixel at once (pass name FULLSCREEN_SHADING in the Tidal/Tidal shader). Because shading is deferred, reflection, caustics, subsurface scattering, god rays, and the meniscus are all driven by properties on this one material.

The material exposes a large number of parameters grouped by functional tabs. Each property below corresponds directly to a shader property and can be deep-linked from the Unity Inspector. For how caustics and shading are composited, see Shading & Caustics.

Key material rows

Foam Texture - the row has a Generate button that opens the Sea Foam Generator to create a tileable procedural foam texture.
Planar Reflection Strength - consumes the body's planar reflection camera; a value of 0 disables that camera entirely.
Wake Normal Strength - lives under Surface > Advanced; a value of 1 is physically correct.

Surface

Base Color

_Color

Surface · Core

Base surface tint of the water. Primarily affects shallow water color and overall tone.

Additional Color

_WaterFogColor

Surface · Core

Secondary color used to enrich shallow areas and reduce flat coloration.

Max Gloss

_MaxGloss

Surface · Core

Controls the maximum surface glossiness. Higher values result in sharper reflections and sun highlights.

Distant Roughness

_Roughness

Surface · Core

Roughness applied at far distances to reduce shimmer and temporal noise.

Roughness Scale

_RoughnessScale

Surface · Core

Scales roughness variation across wave normals.

LOD Scale

_LOD_scale

Surface · Quality

Controls displacement detail across FFT LODs. Higher values increase detail but cost more GPU time.

Sun Shadow Clip

_SunShadowClip

Surface · Advanced

Suppresses specular highlights in shadowed regions.

Wake Normal Strength

_WakeNormalStrength

Surface · Advanced

Scales how strongly interactive wake ripples perturb the surface normals. A value of 1 is physically correct; higher or lower values exaggerate or soften the wake shading.

Lighting

SSS Color

_SSSColor

Light · Directional Light

Tint applied to subsurface scattering from the primary directional light.

SSS Scale

_SSSScale

Light · Directional Light

Controls how far light scatters through the surface.

SSS Base

_SSSBase

Light · Directional Light

Baseline offset added to subsurface scattering.

SSS Max

_SSSMax

Light · Directional Light

Upper clamp for subsurface scattering intensity.

Scatter Strength

_ScattStrength

Light · Additional Lights

Strength of scattering from additional lights.

Scatter Wrap

_ScattWrap

Light · Additional Lights

Allows light to wrap around wave normals.

Absorption Sigma

_SigmaRGB

Light · Additional Lights

Wavelength absorption per RGB channel.

Transmission Tint

_TransColor

Light · Additional Lights

Color of light transmitted through thin water.

Reflection

Probe Reflection Strength

_UniversalEnvProbeReflectionStrength

Reflection · Universal Realtime Skybox

Strength of URP realtime skybox probe reflections.

Probe Ripple

_UniversalEnvProbeRipple

Reflection · Universal Realtime Skybox

Distortion applied to environment probe reflections by waves.

Enable Planar Reflection

_UsePlanarReflect

Reflection · Planar Reflection

Enables high-quality planar reflections for calm water surfaces.

Planar Reflection Strength

_PlanarReflectionStrength

Reflection · Planar Reflection

Controls intensity of planar reflections. This value consumes the body's planar reflection camera - a strength of 0 disables that camera entirely, saving its render cost.

Planar Ripple

_PlanarRipple

Reflection · Planar Reflection

Distortion applied to planar reflections by surface waves.

Enable Color Reflection

_UseColorReflect

Reflection · Color Reflection

Enables artist-controlled color-based reflections.

Reflection Color

_ReflectBaseColor

Reflection · Color Reflection

Base color used when color reflection is enabled.

Reflection Strength

_ReflectBaseColorIntensity

Reflection · Color Reflection

Scales color reflection contribution.

Darkens With Sunset

_ReflectBaseColorDimWithSun

Reflection · Color Reflection

Reduces reflection intensity when facing the sun.

Foam

Foam Bias

_FoamBias

Foam · Wave Foam

Bias controlling foam visibility on wave crests.

Foam Strength

_FoamScale

Foam · Wave Foam

Overall foam intensity and coverage.

Foam Color

_FoamColor

Foam · Wave Foam

Tint applied to surface foam.

Contact Foam Amount

_ContactFoam

Foam · Shore / Object

Foam generated near intersecting geometry.

Contact Foam Color

_ContactFoamColor

Foam · Shore / Object

Color of foam near intersecting objects.

Dampen In Zone

_FoamDampenInZoneScale

Foam · Advanced

Reduces foam intensity inside Tidal zones.

Foam Bias LOD0

_FoamBiasLOD0

Foam · Advanced

Foam bias for highest-detail FFT LOD.

Foam Bias LOD1

_FoamBiasLOD1

Foam · Advanced

Foam bias for mid-distance FFT LOD.

Foam Bias LOD2

_FoamBiasLOD2

Foam · Advanced

Foam bias for distant FFT LOD.

Foam Texture

_FoamTex

Foam · Wave Foam

Tileable foam texture sampled across the surface. This row has a Generate button that opens the Sea Foam Generator (

Tools → Tidal 2 → Sea Foam
        Generator

) to author a new procedural foam texture.

Opacity

Absorption

_WaterAbsorption

Opacity · Core

Controls wavelength absorption with depth.

Density

_WaterDensity

Opacity · Core

Overall absorption multiplier for water depth.

Ripple

_RippleAmount

Opacity · Core

Distortion strength applied underwater.

Clipping

Enable SDFs

_EnableSDFs

Clipping · Core

Enables signed-distance field clipping volumes.

Clip Tolerance

_ClipTolerance

Clipping · Core

Precision tolerance for SDF clipping edges.

Underwater

Refraction / Reflection Ratio

_RefactN

Underwater · Surface

Balance between refraction and reflection underwater.

Underwater Ripple

_RefractionStrengthUnderwater

Underwater · Surface