=====
From chipr@niestu.com:
Gorgeous colors, excellent lighting and atmosphere effects.  Modelling is very
impressive.  The "barnacles" or whatever they are on the whales' snouts are a
bit distracting.  The water looks very realistic, especially the surface.
However, the ocean seems to end abruptly in the near-middle distance.  BTW, a
group of whales is commonly called a "pod", not a "school".

=====
From mwhite@redshift.com:
Truly beautiful whales and ocean waves.  Nice job!

=====
From keitha@vcommons.com:

Wow. Lighting lighting uber alles
=====
From jsaxton@folio.com:

Gorgeous image. I love the light rays coming down thru the water.


=====
From charlie495@aol.com:
The beams of light would have looked nicer slanted and non-uniform.
=====
From bbowen@cswnet.com:
This is just an absolutely beautiful image. I wonder if a super ellipsoid cube
might have worked better for giving a feeling of depth. The hard edge along
with
the lighting makes it look like they're cooped up in an aquaraium. Still, the
whole thing is very soothing to look at.

=====
From xeo@sprynet.com:
Great job on the whales!
=====
From ucoakc00@mcl.ucsb.edu:
Very cool. But isn't it a pod of whales?


=====
From amarok@geocities.com:
Very pretty, but a bit too far off topic for me...



=====
From lowellr@globaldialog.com:
I think the use of the spotlites ruined the effect of the picture.
There is too much white at the water line.
I liked the whales


=====
From bill.marrs@pureatria.com:
There is a Silicon Graphics demo called "atlantis" that this reminds me of.

=====
From tholal@bga.com:
Incredible image as usual. I REALLY like the light thru the water effect. I feel
like
I oculd be watching a still from some nature show!

=====
From eallen@highway1.com:
Very nice. My only problems are with the surface of the water and the lights.
The lights look too parellel to me.  It almost looks like a spacecraft is
hovering right above the water's surface. 







=====
From klynn@minn.net:

Very good image.  I like the underwater caustics & the textures.  And congrats,
your image does evoke emotion. 
(I think that a grouping of whales is called a "pod",not a "school").

=====
From karl@pemail.net:
NICE WATER too dark though

=====
From jjanger@mail.cspp.edu:
   It's good, but it seems to lack the depth that steals your breath away like
13glory did. I think it's that the whales, though beautifully modeled, are too
perfect. They need something like a barnacle tecture to add authenticity.

=====
From quinet@gamers.org:
Good image.  It is not easy to perceive the depth in the image, tough. 
Probably
because all light sources come from above and none from the viewer's position.
You could try to put a spotlight near the camera (like if it was coming from a
mini-submarine or scooter) so that it casts shadows on the whales, thus making
it easier to see what is in front and what is behind.



=====
From gmccarter@hotmail.com:
shapes/sizes.  How about angling the beams?
Despite your description, I cannot make the emotional connection
to "school" with this image.

=====
From 93johnst@scar.utoronto.ca:
Very nice image. A little dark, since they are near the surface, but the image
has a 
very nice feel to it.

=====
From shipbrk@gate.net:
Very nice use of atmosphere!  The water/air interface looks particularly
good.

=====
From sonya_roberts@geocities.com:
Lovely picture.  The contrast of the spotlights along the surface of the water
stands out a bit too brightly, though
the "sumbeams through water" effect they create with the atmosphere is great. 
Good artistic marks, but I ended up
taking off quite a few for concept - it's just too tenuous a connection between
the topic "school" and the subject
of this image.  Esp. since whales travel in pods, so even the "school of fish"
idea doesn't apply.

=====
From jlb36@cornell.edu:
The whales are impressive.  The lighting is just aobut perfect too.
There are a few places on the whales that look a bit out of place though; 
specifically on the topmost whale on the nose.  It looks like (s)he has a horn,

but it's of no consequence.

Something that you might try doing is playing with the camera normal 
(I'm reffering to section 7.4.3 in the povray docs) to give the scene a more
"watery" look to it.

=====
From ingo@ibm.net:
Sorry, I didn't think your image in the last competition was the best one and
it's the same now. I had almost finished a comment regarding your entries the
last time, but then I found that almost anyone hit the topic as disappointing
as you did - so I dumped the text.
But this time I think it to be better to post my comment: 
You give a nice explanation why this one is 'on-topic', but I _never_ would have
been able to understand this without the text. Maybe my missing fantasy, maybe
I'm totally wrong with my idea of how art should be.
Don't worry - you've got really high rates for artistic and technical merit from
me (it's a _really great_ piece of computer art), but it's not 'school'.

=====
From jaime@ctav.es:
Very good shapes and postures, and nice deep sea blue color. But I don't like
the cilindrical lights (if trying to simulate caustics from water surface).
Jaime (jaime@ctav.es)

=====
From marvil@algonet.se:
Nice colours, but not very original concept.

=====
From ptdawson@voicenet.com:
This looks like a painting! Very nice scene.