TITLE: NeuroBugs
NAME: IanC
COUNTRY: UK
TOPIC: Robot
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
MPGFILE: neurobug.mpg
RENDERER USED: 
    PovRay 3.1g

TOOLS USED: 
    CMPEG for MPEG encoding, PaintShop Pro 5 for titling, my own Java
tool to automate overlaying of titles and fades between frames

CREATION TIME: 
    Approximately 5 days

HARDWARE USED: 
    Pentium II 400Mhz

ANIMATION DESCRIPTION: 

Independent robot _bugs_, each controlled by a 20 cell neural network to allow
co-ordination of movement towards goal points and avoidance/overtaking of other
bugs.

VIEWING RECOMMENDATIONS: 

Tested on Microsoft Windows Media Player version 6.4.05.0809

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS ANIMATION WAS CREATED: 

I trained a 20 cell neural network to guide each bug towards a goal point while
avoiding other bugs, using my own Java-based network trainer. I placed the bugs
in several start-up positions (varying their number between about 20 and 300 in
different scenes), and gave them goals (sometimes random, sometimes the same
goal). I then recorded the bugs_ movement against time, including position,
base rotation, rotation of the front wheel and velocity, and converted the
resulting data into a POV-Ray include file for each frame of the animation.
(This data took up 28Mb, which is why I have not included animation source
files!) I then wrote a POV-Ray macro to render a NeuroBug when supplied with
the parameters above (position, rotation etc.). I used my own simple Java-based
curve generator to add camera positioning and smooth camera movement to some
shots. I rendered a low-quality preview animation, followed by a higher quality
finished product after tweeking some settings. I used PaintShop Pro 5 and
another Java tool of mine to automate blending between scenes and overlaying of
titles. The frames themselves are not re-touched in any way other than
overlaying of titles and this blending between scenes. Finally, I used CMPEG to
encode the frames in MPEG format. I repeated this last stage several times
in-order to cut the animation down to the required 5Mb.