TITLE: Barren
NAME: Edward m. Blake
COUNTRY: United States of America
EMAIL: Kitsune_e@hotmail.com
WEBPAGE: N/A

TOPIC: Loneliness
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
JPGFILE: barren.jpg
ZIPFILE: barren.zip
RENDERER USED: 

        Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer v3.5


TOOLS USED: 

        Gilles Tran's MakeGrass include
        Tom Aust's tomtree package
        Daylon Leveller v2.0
        Jasc Paint Shop Pro v3.1


RENDER TIME: 


        1h 18m 7s

        From concept to completion the scene took a little over two weeks.
        The final image took one hour and eighteen minutes to render.  I had
        planned to include some of the other statistics provided by POV, but
        I accidentally deleted the render messages instead of copying them...


HARDWARE USED: 

        Pentium4 1.7GHz
        256Mb RAM
        Windows XP home edition


IMAGE DESCRIPTION: 

        This image was in all ways an experiment.  This is my first attempt to
        create a "complete" composition.  I attempted first to create a
convincing
        setting.  I then tried to create an atmosphere by use of fog and focal 
blur.
        The image did not develop as I had wanted, but the end is true to my 
vision.


DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: 

        The development of this image was an intense learning experience.  I 
created
        about ten different height fields using different tools before arriving
at
        the last one.  I then spent almost a week trying to create a  texture
for
        my field.  I tried separating segments by CSG, I tried assigning
textures 
to
        ranges of values in my material map, and finally just created two
gradients
        based on the height fields rgb values.  I experimented with fog and 
atmospheric
        media, and used focal blur and radiosity for the first time.  I am 
especially         pleased by the effect of the focal blur, it reminds me of
Tool's 
"Sober" video.
        I am sure that  with more experience I could do better, but I am very
happy 
with
        the results of my efforts.


