File of the Month:   POV-Ray



Author: 

Date: January, 1994

Keywords: SMUGgler's BBS

Text:

File of the Month:   POV-Ray.     
          Recently I've been playing around with the Persistance of
Vision ray tracing application posted to the SMUGgler's BBS. FREEware
doesn't get much better than this! 
          I've had an interest in such applications, but the commercial
prices had put me off the idea. Then I saw the POV-RAY upload, and it's
exactly what I've been looking for on the price performance curve,
(does lots of cool stuff for free!) 
          The POV-Ray creates 3-D, photo-realistic images using a
rendering technique called ray tracing. It reads in a text file
containing information describing the objects and lighting in a scene
and generates an image of that scene from the view point of a camera
also described in the text file. Ray tracing is not a fast process by
any means, but it produces very high quality images with realistic
reflections, shading, perspective, and other effects. Check our online
version of this issue of the SMUG newsletter to see the results in
color. - Steve Kayner 
          POV-Ray can be downloaded from SMUGgler's BBS, in the Art &
Graphics section of the Mac Archives.

Copyright © january, 1994 by Date: January, 1994