Review of method
Statistical wave models are the current trend
Not based on physical models, instead uses statistical
models based on observations of the real
ocean
Uses measured wave spectra
Notable: Pierson-Moskowitz, JONSWAP ( Joint North Sea Wave Project ) and Phillips spectra
High levels of realism are limited to relatively calm
conditions
Commercially pioneered in Waterworld and Titanic
Preferred method in todays CG
Described in detail in Tessendorf [2Tes] and Jensen,
et al [1Jen]
Prior use confined to the optical oceanography
community
Synthesizes a height field from a FFT prescription
The model is two-fold
Use statistical data to generate the height field data
in the frequency domain
Retrieve the spatial height field from the frequency
data via the inverse DFT( FFT )