We are used to the fact more work usually means better results, but it's not always this way, as tech artist Taras Tereshchenko demonstrated in his fountain animation created in Unreal Engine.
The water flows nicely without "expensive and complex solutions" like translucency, Single Layer Water Material shading model, or Geometry Cache. "Simpler doesn't always mean worse," he noted.
Tereshchenko used the Masked Blend Mode and his Dither Temporal AA modified function to achieve the result, which will work for VR and mobile. The splashes were animated with the particle system, and the falling water – with WPO (World Position Offset).
