Houdini Simulation Water FX Ship Crossing Through a Parted Sea | Karma XPU

Did some R&D with Karma XPU for quick-turn Houdini water FX dynamic simulation before applying it to a recent client project. After delivery, I rendered this shot using favorite movie reference: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, a parted sea/ocean-split moment where the ship travels along the water’s edge.

The ocean is fully procedural with Houdini’s Ocean Toolkit, keeping consistent wave motion and direction. As a self-challenge, I inverted wave direction to let the ship move under a parted ocean setup, all procedural for fast iteration while preserving visual coherence.

Close-up camera required a dual-layer particle system, one for near-cam droplets, another for mid-range, rigged procedurally to maintain detail and performance. Over 300M droplets were used, with adaptive density based on camera distance.

The most fun part was the Rope/Sail system. Originally a CFX task, I did a quick workaround in under an hour using constraint-style logic, first semi-manual, later procedural. Not feature-quality yet, but solid for shot-based use.

2–3 days total, plus a 4th day for final render tweaks. Render time: around 1 min+/pass. Sim fast, wedge-driven per camera, with point/volume/geo-level optimization. Sometimes too optimized to debug easily, but it worked.