TITLE: Elevator
NAME: Ian MacKay
COUNTRY: Australia
EMAIL: ianm@hermes.net.au
WEBPAGE: None
TOPIC: Epic Proportions
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION
JPGFILE: twoup.jpg
ZIPFILE: twoup.zip
RENDERER USED: 
    Povray 3.5 for Windows

TOOLS USED: 
    Photoshop to adjust contrast and convert to Jpeg.

RENDER TIME: 
    17 mins 25 sec

HARDWARE USED: 
    Pentium 4 2.4Ghz 512 Ram

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: 

                  The Space Elevator has existed in fiction for several decades
but only recently been considered seriously. A cable dropped from a satellite
in a geostationary orbit to the surface of the earth would be more than 35000
Km or 22000 miles long. There would need to be another length up ( or out ) to
a counterweight so that the centre of mass of the whole structure remained in
the geostationary orbit.  Constructing something like this would be an
engineering task of epic proportions as would the structure itself.
                  In this image I have made a double capsule, to carry
passengers and freight, and using an electromagnetic drive, climbing the cable.
The passengers are shown standing as the capsule is not in orbit at the height
shown and effective gravity would be probably 90% of surface normal. Effective
gravity would decrease as the capsule climbs, and be micro gravity or freefall
on reaching the satellite in orbit. 
                  The NASA website has an illustration showing a capsule docked
in the geostationary satellite. The passengers are shown seated as though there
was effective gravity - seems wrong to me.
                  I have put stars in this image as a formality though I don't
think they would be visible in reality with the earth being so bright. 
                                     

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: 

                  This image is mainly simple CSG. The Earth and clouds are
concentric spheres. The atmosphere haze on the horizon is actually a colour
band on a black sphere surrounding everything else in the image. It had to be
adjusted so that it appeared to be against the Earth.
                  The stars are small spheres scattered randomly. The capsule
and the passengers are just the usual spheres, cylinders etc..