You don't need to use the Lakes Javascript to create animated rippling water pictures. All you need is the free Almathera Puddle plug-in for Paint Shop Pro.
I use PSP v6 with the upgrade patch to v6.02. To make the above sample, download my Cherub Tube and save a copy of this photo from which I made the cherub tube.
First, install the Puddle plug-in and the cherub tube. Launch PSP, open the cherub picture, then create a new transparent image 200 x 400.
Select a foreground color and a dark background color. I chose black and a purple shade, R 214; G 204; B 248 (#D6CCF8).
Select the flood fill tool. Use these settings:
The linear gradient has some visible lines. Make them disappear by adding some noise. Select Image/Noise/Add. Set the noise to 2%. Click on the cherub picture, resize it so it will fit into your new image. Then select Edit/Copy. Click on the new image to make it active, then select Edit/Paste as a new layer. With the mover tool, move it to the top, and center it. If it extends more than half-way down the length of your canvas, undo and resize the cherub picture again, copy and paste again. The noise screen [the smoothness does not appear in my captured screens, but it will on your working image]:
Add a new raster layer. Select the tube tool, open the cherub tube. Settings should be as follows:
Click on the picture. You need the image to be a reflection, so select Image/Flip to turn the cherub upside down. Using your mover tool, move the tube cherub so that its feet are on top of the picture cherub's feet. If your entire picture flipped, then you forgot to add a new layer. If this happened, then use Undo back to and including pasting the cherub tube, then add the new layer and repeat the steps of pasting the tube, flipping it, and moving it into place. Once you have it place, then select Layers/Merge/Visible. Here's my pictures with the image pasted and then flipped and placed correctly:
With the selection tool set to rectangle, antialias checked, feather 0, begin drawing across the cherub's feet starting on the far left and extending to the far right and all the way down to the bottom of the picture. Save this as a psp, then make three copies of it using Shift +D. Close your original working copy. Here's one of my copies showing the marching ants around the bottom.
Click on the bar of one of your copies to make it active, then select Image/Plug-in Filter/Almathera/Puddle. When the plug-in screen pops up, select the arrow beside the "Last used" slot and select Pond. Yeah, I named this tutorial "Rippling" because "Pond" doesn't describe what the tutorial is about. :)
For your first copy, use the default settings. Move to the second copy, bring up the plug-in again and change only the lower number from 30 to 25. For the third copy, change the 25 to 20. Save each copy as cherub1.psp, cherub2.psp, cherub3.psp. You might get by with only two copies, or you may like using four copies better. Experiment to get the effect you prefer. Here's one of my Puddle/Pond copies. Each will be slightly different, though at first glance you may not think the copies are different, they are if you reduced the lower number for each copy.
Open Animation Shop, and use these settings:
To see how your final animated water reflection will look, select View/Animation. Is it okay? Close the animation, then select File/Optimization. Then select File/Save As, decide what to name your picture. I always use ani or ani- in front of all my animations.
I thought my final picture was too large for a Web page, so I reduced it to the size you see at the beginning of this tutorial which is 53 KB. To see my large 91 KB picture, click HERE.
If you have any problems with this tutorial, please don't hesitate to let me know.
