TITLE: Chlipalae flos coloratus (flowering stage)
NAME: George Chlipala
COUNTRY: United States of America
EMAIL: cwolf@prairienet.org
WEBPAGE: http://www.prairienet.org/~cwolf
TOPIC: Nature
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
JPGFILE: c_flos1.jpg
RENDERER USED: 
    POV-Ray 3.0

TOOLS USED: 
    Photoshop to convert to JPEG

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: 

This picture shows the fictional flowering plant Chlipalae flos coloratus
(Division Magnoliaphyta).  It is a flowering plant that has undergone xeric
modifiction, modifiction for cold, dry environments.  It has a wood stem, and
reduced, needle leaves.  The multicolored pistil has a narrow style and large
ovary.  The stamens are large and have thick filaments.  The petals are mottled
blue and semi-transparent.  The sepals, underlying the petals, have been
reduced and are hidden to the untrained eye.   These plants have been measured
at heights of 1 meter.  The combination of the brightly colored pistil and
semi-transparent petals, make the pistil the attration point, rather than the
petals of other flowers.  These flowers are also unique, in that the major
pollinators are small birds, rather than insects or bats.  This makes the
flower well adapted to the northern forests in which it lives.
DESCRIPTION OF HOW IMAGE WAS CREATED:
Long hours of imaging the scene then figuring the math for the POV-Ray file. 
The only modeler used was a piece of paper, a pencil, and my brain.  This image
is a further development of an image I created a few years ago.  That time I
did use a modeler to aid the construction of the image, however only the image
itself was used as an inspiration for this images, similar to an artist using a
photo to make a painting.  Although I think the second "flower" was better.   I
would like to note that science was part of the design process.  The first
plant was created while I was taking botany in college.  The second plant was
created about one year later (spring 1997).  At the time I was a junior
majoring in biological research, since then I have graduated, and my interest
is in the botanical realm (and still is).  Thus, this picture was some science
mixed with imagination.  (Think about it... a scientist with an artistic
creativity... woah, what is this world coming to???)  *grin*

