Gleb Alexandrov posts a great article and tutorial showing not only how to create realistic ice in Blender, but also covers the concepts of refraction, reflection, absorption and scattering.
Have you ever tried to create realistic ice, glass, or a bottle of whiskey, just to discover how frustratingly hard is to get the refraction right?
This is part of what will be a larger guide that is an open project called “Lighting for Nerds” which eventually will compile all the tutorials and information into one grand book.
There is much more information available than is explained in the video tutorial for creating realistic ice, so be sure to drop by Gleb’s post on How to Create Realistic Ice in Blender here.
Gleb covers everything that is needed for creating the ice render including reflection, refraction, fresnel theory, scattering, caustics, and so much more.
