TITLE: Seance NAME: Ruy Flavio de Olivera COUNTRY: Brazil EMAIL: ruy@hipernet.com.br TOPIC: Spirit of Asia COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT. JPGFILE: seance.jpg ZIPFILE: seance.zip RENDERER USED: POV-Ray 3.5 b7-9 TOOLS USED: hamaPatch SpilinEditor RENDER TIME: 4h36m23s HARDWARE USED: Celeron 600MHz 128MB RAM IMAGE DESCRIPTION: (Four mighty land bodies gather around a table in a dimly lit room. They open their hands and concentrate, trying to channel with the afterlife Europe: "Oh, Great Deity of all Tectonic Plates! We gather here tonight seeking news of the spirit of our sibling continent, Asia The Ancient and Wise." (Out of nowhere a chilling breeze fills the small room. Continentally speaking, of course. Suddenly a shape starts to materialize over the table.) Asia: "Who disturbs my eternal slumber? Can't the spirit of a mighty continent rest in peace?" Africa: "Asia, my dear Asia! We miss you so much! So, how's it hanging in the afterlife?" Asia: "Not too bad, bro, not too bad at all. Actually I miss you guys. But what can I do for you?" America: "Actually we seek news from continetal afterlife. What's it like? Asia: "Well, I kinda miss my topography, but either than that, it's pretty good.And it's nice not to have to worry about those damn volcanoes. As you recall, no ammount of acne cream could get me rid off them. Ah, and that people infestation is totally gone as well. So, I guess I can't complain." Europe: "And aren't you lonely over there?" Asia: "Nope, not at all. Actually I have plenty company. For instance, in about 10 minutes I have a badmington game with Atlantis." Africa: "REally? How is dear good old Atlantis?" Asia: "Oh fine, I guess. That poor sod never quite recovered from that sad deep sea diving accident. We were never that close, but now that I'm here I'll try to take care of the old gal. Well, I must be off now. But feel free to summon me whenever you guys feel like. I can use the chat. Bye now." All: "Bye..." DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: From the moment I learned that the theme was "Spirit of Asia", it took me less than 10 minutes to realize I would have to find and approach totally out of the ordinary. Instead of focusing on the obvious (Asia), I decided to focus on what I believe everybody will overlook: Spirit. On the spot I envisioned this scene: a seance of the decesed spirit of Asia. Of course this is a humouristic way to approach the subject, and I don't mean any disrespect towards the continent. I just didn't feel that a picture could capture all of asia, lest it depicted the whole country. Technical Aspects ========= ======= The continents and white-gloved hands were designed from scratch using hamaPatch. They were my first attempts to learn this nice little tool, and I'm quite pleased with the outcome. I used the olympic colours to, well, colour them because I didn't have time to learn how uv mapping works. The tables and vases are lathes created with SpilinEditor, another very useful tool. The picture on the wall is Rembrandt's "Abraham and Isaac", it's an oil on canvas, painted in 1634 and is part of the Hermitage museum, in St. Petersburg. The chairs, door and picture frame are simply CSG. The candle is a modification and adaptaion of JRG's excellent candle. Thanks Jonathan!