Ships, Splashes, and Waves on a Vast Ocean

TL;DR

This paper introduces a hybrid simulation method combining FLIP and Boundary Element Method to efficiently model detailed splashes and long-distance water waves with accurate dispersion.

Contribution

A novel hybrid time-stepping algorithm that integrates volumetric FLIP and surface-based BEM for improved water simulation efficiency and accuracy.

Findings

Captures detailed splashes near moving objects.

Produces convincing long-distance water waves.

Maintains correct dispersion relationships at modest costs.

Abstract

The simulation of large open water surface is challenging using a uniform volumetric discretization of the Navier-Stokes equations. Simulating water splashes near moving objects, which height field methods for water waves cannot capture, necessitates high resolutions. Such simulations can be carried out using the Fluid-Implicit-Particle (FLIP) method. However, the FLIP method is not efficient for the long-lasting water waves that propagate to long distances, which require sufficient depth for a correct dispersion relationship. This paper presents a new method to tackle this dilemma through an efficient hybridization of volumetric and surface-based advection-projection discretizations. We design a hybrid time-stepping algorithm that combines a FLIP domain and an adaptively remeshed Boundary Element Method (BEM) domain for the incompressible Euler equations. The resulting framework captures the detailed water splashes near moving objects with the FLIP method, and produces convincing water waves with correct dispersion relationships at modest additional costs.