TITLE: The Toy Left Behind

NAME: David S. Johnson
COUNTRY: USA

EMAIL: somersj@aya.yale.edu
WEBPAGE: http://www.oursquare.com/members/somersj/

TOPIC: Childhood
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
JPGFILE: lftbehnd.jpg
ZIPFILE: lftbehnd.zip
RENDERER USED: 
    Povray 3.0

TOOLS USED: 
    SPatch and Texture Magic


RENDER TIME: 
    Sometime between 5 and 6 hours (the save energy mode was on and
blanked the
 screen which for some reason I was unable to unblank and so I couldn't see the
POV stats)


HARDWARE USED: 
    Pentium, 133 Megahertz


IMAGE DESCRIPTION: 
    The image is of a crazed clown driving a wooden toy train
which
 carries some alphabet blocks which have seen better times.  The action takes
place 
in an empty room in an empty house.  It was inspired by a childhood memory and
fantasy 
of a toy that was left behind in an empty house after we moved.  After we moved
I often 
fantasized the toytrain taking on a life of its own and moving throughout the
house in 
search of its missing master.


DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: 
    This is my first submission and also
includes 
a lot of POV firsts for me (use of bezier patches, spotlight, atmosphere, halo,
and layered 
textures).  I would have liked to have added more detail but ran out of time. 
The window 
and windowframe needs work although a more developed window frame would perhaps
distract 
attention from the train and the clown.  It would be nice if the smoke coming
out of the 
smokestack was more substantial (billowing) but this was my  first experience
with halos 
and there was not enough time to experiment.  Also the headlight on the train
could use 
some more detail which I did not have time to finish.  The clown and the bell
were made 
using the excellent freeware modeller SPatch.  This was my first experience at
trying to 
make a human like form and face and took quite a while to do although I could
definitely 
use more practice in this area.  Unfortunately the clown face is too far away in
the picture 
to see all the details and textures clearly.   The face itself is made up of
three separate 
objects: a long  nose which fades from red to white, the smile and the rest of
the face.  
Anton Matkovic's SPatch tutorial for drawing heads was a great help.  The
nightcap attached 
to the clowns head could use more work.  It is not that visible and perhaps the
clown costume 
itself could use a more striking texture .  Most of the textures were created
using the 
Shareware Texture Magic which was a great help.  (Now that I have finished the
picture I can 
send in the registration).  The alphabet blocks have the most interesting
texture although you 
cannot see them that well since they are obscured by the atmosphere.  The white
portions of the 
blocks are stained perhaps from spilled coffee and the blue portions look as if
some of the 
blue paint has been rubbed off revealing the wood underneath.  A clearer view of
the blocks 
by themselves can be seen on my graphics page at 
http://www.oursquare.com/members/somersj/graphics.html.  The rest of the train
was created 
using CSG.  You can look at the pov scripts in the zip file lftbehnd.zip.