TITLE: Mystic Eggs NAME: Jammer COUNTRY: USA EMAIL: jammer@shelby.net WEBPAGE: www.shelby.net/southerneagle TOPIC: Glass COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT. JPGFILE: glsseggs.jpg RENDERER USED: POVRAY 3.0 for DOS TOOLS USED: Corel 5.0 RENDER TIME: 180 hr. 43 min. 48 sec. (a little over seven and a half days) HARDWARE USED: Cyrix 686 120 IMAGE DESCRIPTION: In the vastness of space a forgotten mysty nebula conceals within its shrouds the Temple of the Eggs. This ancient structure of glass is the keeper of a magical treasure. On the glass tables in the middle of the temple, resting in gold holders, are the Mystic Eggs. DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: A lot of work went into making Mystic Eggs. At times like this I wish I had a wire frame modeler. Everything in this picture is made of glass except the gold holders, stars, and the white nebula. The way I got my glass effect is with my own mixes of filter, reflection, refraction, and phong statements. The eggs are elongated glass spheres that are the primary colors of light (blue, green, and red). The holders that the eggs in which the eggs are resting are made of cones, spheres, and toruses. The toruses were elongated to match the eggs and the top halves were cut off so the eggs would not be completely enclosed. The ring of spheres was created using a simple rotate statement. There are eight cones which support the holder. The larger end fits within the ring of spheres while the smaller end touches the table with a fine tipped point. The tables consist of shperes and cylinders. The flat top is a cylinder. The main support is a cylinder. The decorations around the main cylinder are eight cylinders, 4 long and 4 short. At the bottom of these are shperes which change the flat bottom to a smooth curve. The tables are magenta. Around the tables are colored spheres. The floor is made of a few cylinders. The one on the bottom is bigger than the one above it, creating a stair effect (more visible from the outside). The floor is an orchid color with white specks. The main part of the ceiling is a wide cylinder. Above it are four cylinders rotated around the y-axis. On top of those is one cylinder connecting them all together. There are flattened spheres all around the bottom edge of the main cylinder. The ceiling uses the same white specked pattern as the floor. The cylinders on the top can be seen, but not very noticably, creating a subtle change in the ceiling's pattern. The columns were hard to make. The main column is a cylinder. The multiple spirals around the cylinder are made by four similar statements. The statements are very complex, dealing with toruses that cut in half and then rotated to the angle I want them to spiral up. The next step in getting the constant spirals was to have a while loop which rotated them around and moved them up at just the right amount so they would attach to each other seamlessly. After I had declared one column as all of the above, I had to rotate it around in a circle, then add the proper glass effects. The color is a dark purple. The "magic gate" around the outside of the columns which prevents entry was also difficult to make. I started out by making two small toruses of equal size, one over the other. Then I calculated the proper points for a roughly 45 degree angle of the spokes in between. However, there weren't enough spokes, so I changed the already complex while loop to add even more; I also made the toruses wider in diameter. When I rendered the rough draft to see what my creation would look like, the spokes no longer went to the proper points. I then had to manually calculate a completely different equation that would roughly keep the spokes going around in a circular pattern and stay within (or at least near) the center part of the rings. Having finally achieved the desired result, I declared it as an object and imported and scaled it to the proper size. Finally, I added a glass effect using a medium purple. The glass chandelier in the center of the ceiling also took a while to perfect. The green, red, and blue globes are glass spheres with a black web- like pattern on them. The frame of the fixture was created by using a torus for the main support, in the middle. It holds the blue sphere in place. The other structures that hold the green and red spheres are part of a flattened sphere with a difference statement to allow the spheres to rest in them. The frame was given a glass statement with a grayish coloring. This leaves only the background. The background was created with the sky sphere command. The stars were a pigment statement I found in the star field include file. I altered the pattern and colors to until I got the stars how I wanted them. The white swirl I used for the nebula is a bozo pigment statement using white blended with transparent. After the image was done rendering, I used Corel to add gamma correction and my name and web site.