Subject: comp.graphics.rendering.raytracing FAQ (part 1/2)
Supersedes: <rayfaq.1_827739673@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>
Date: 4 Apr 1996 16:10:37 GMT
Summary: Answers to Frequently Asked Questions about raytracing software
. on comp.graphics.rendering.raytracing

Posting-Frequency: every 10 days


                "But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old:
                        'It's clever but is it art?'"
                                                          Rudyard Kipling
                                         _The_Conundrum_of_the_Workshops_

This is the comp.graphics.rendering.raytracing Frequently Asked
Questions (FAQ) List.  It's not the most definitive ray tracing
reference you'll ever come across, but then, it was never meant to be.
What it does set out to do is to answer some of the questions which keep
cropping up on c.g.r.r and to give pointers to other references.  It
keeps the noise down on the group and we get to spend an extra 10
minutes in bed.  This is a Good Thing.

It was originally cobbled together by Andy Wardley,
<abw@peritas.demon.co.uk>, from answers posted to c.g.r.r (actually from
when it was c.g.r), from information people have supplied and from other
existing ray tracing lists and references, most notably, Eric Haines'
Ray Tracing News and other lists.  Since the spring of 1995, I have
taken over the maintenance of the FAQ.

You may distribute this document to whoever, or wherever you like, as
long as you keep the copyright message and give correct attributions for
material used.  This is just to stop nasty people with a substantial
lack of moral fibre from taking the document and fobbing it off as their
own.  The FAQ belongs to the group, Andy just wrote it (and I update it).

Lines with a + in the first column have been added or changed recently.
If you think that parts of the FAQ are outdated, or need improvement,
please feel free to send me your updates, and I will try to maintain and
update it, as time permits.  Authors of utilities should definitely send
updated descriptions if they feel their tool has improved since this was
written.

The latest version of this FAQ is available via WWW at:

http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/bngusenet/top.html

under comp->graphics->rendering->raytracing.  It is also available via
anonymous ftp at:

ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/graphics/raytrace-faq/

If you only have email, you can get it by sending email to:

<mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu>

with both

"send usenet/news.answers/graphics/raytrace-faq/part1" and
"send usenet/news.answers/graphics/raytrace-faq/part2"

in the body of the message (without the quotes).

And if you're only reading this document because your machine is locked
up tracing, remember that all things come to those who wait.

                                                        Andreas Dilger

  (C) Copyright 1994 Andy Wardley <abw@peritas.demon.co.uk>
  (C) Copyright 1995, 1996 Andreas Dilger <adilger@enel.ucalgary.ca>

------------------------------

Subject: Table of Contents

What is Ray Tracing?

1 - Ray Tracing Software

   1.1 - POV-Ray
   1.2 - Polyray
   1.3 - Vivid (including BOB)
   1.4 - Rayshade
   1.5 - Radiance and ADELINE
   1.6 - Others
   1.7 - Non-Ray Tracing Software

2 - FTP Sites, Web Sites, Bulletin Boards, etc.

   2.1 - FTP Sites
   2.2 - Bulletin Board Systems
   2.3 - Mailing Lists
   2.4 - Others

3 - Modelling Software

   3.1 - SCED
   3.2 - MORAY
   3.3 - GUM
   3.4 - Other Modellers

4 - Utilities and Other Software

   4.1 - Image Display/Conversion Programs
   4.2 - Format Conversion Utilities
   4.3 - Creation Creators
   4.4 - Texture Editors
   4.5 - Animation
   4.6 - Miscellaneous Utilities

5 - Further Information and Resources

   5.1 - On-line Resources
   5.2 - Other Newsgroups
   5.3 - Books
   5.4 - Image Libraries
   5.5 - Texture Libraries

6 - Frequently Asked Questions

   6.1 - "Who is..."
   6.2 - "This picture doesn't trace."
   6.3 - "I traced my picture, but I can't see anything."
   6.4 - "I traced my picture, but the output is garbage."
   6.5 - "How can I view these pictures?"
   6.6 - "Rotating/Scaling this object doesn't work properly."
   6.7 - "Where can I find model data for..."
   6.9 - "Can I post binaries/images to this group?"
   6.9 - "What does this mean..."
   6.10 - "What is the difference between rendering and ray-tracing?"
   6.11 - "When will POV-Ray 3.0 come out?"
   6.12 - "Where are the .inc files for POV-Ray?"

7 - Roll The Credits...


------------------------------

Subject: What is Ray Tracing?

Ray Tracing, in a one-line description, is a method that allows you to
create stunning photo-realistic images on a computer.  All you need is
a computer, some ray tracing software, a little imagination and some
patience.

The first stage of creating this masterpiece is to "describe" what it is
that you want to depict in your picture.  You may do this using an
interactive modelling system, like a CAD package, or by creating a text
file that has a programming language-like syntax to describe the
elements.  Either way, you will be specifying what objects are in your
imaginary world, what shape they are, where they are, what colour and
texture they have and where the light sources are to illuminate them.
Having done all of this, you feed it into your ray tracer, sit back and
wait.

And wait...

That's the main drawback of ray tracing - it's not fast.  The software
actually mathematically models the light rays as they bounce around this
virtual world, reflecting, refracting and generally having a good time
until they end up in the lense of your imaginary camera.  This can quite
literally involve thousands and millions of floating-point calculations
and this takes time.  Tracing images can take anything from a few
minutes to many days.  It's a long process, I know, but the results can
make it all worth while.

Ray tracing isn't the only method for creating photo-realistic pictures.
There are packages like 3D Studio which uses scanline rendering,
Radiance, which uses radiosity, and so on.  Although these don't count
as ray tracing, the methods you use from one system to the next are
often sufficiently similar to warrant their discussion in this group.
So if you think it's relevant, feel free to bring it up.  These systems
will be mentioned in a little more detail later on.


------------------------------

Subject: 1 - Ray Tracing Software

------------------------------

Subject 1.1 - POV-Ray

  The Persistance of Vision Ray Tracer (POV-Ray) is an all-round
  excellent package, but there are two things that particularly make it
  stand out above the rest of the crowd.  Firstly, it's free, and
  secondly, the source is distributed so you can compile it on virtually
  any platform.  It's without doubt the most used package among the
  comp.graphics.rendering.raytracing crowd and well worth checking out
  if you  haven't already.

  POV-Ray is based on David Buck's original ray tracer, DKB-Trace and
  has been (and still is) developed and supported by a whole crowd of
  people on CompuServe Graphics Developers' Forum (GO GRAPHDEV).

| The latest version currently available is 2.2, however, the long
| awaited release of POV-Ray 3.0 is near.  It is currently in a public
| beta testing stage, after having undergone a lengthy private alpha
| and beta testing following nearly two years of modifications and
| enhancements.  See http://www.povray.org/ for more information.

  There are now three official distribution sites for POV-Ray.
  ftp://ftp.povray.org/ [192.216.222.14]  the main site in North America.
  ftp://alfred.ccs.carleton.ca/ [134.117.1.1]  an alternare site.
  ftp://uniwa.uwa.edu.au/ [130.95.128.1]  for the Southern Hemisphere.

  There is also a growing list of sites that mirror all or part of
  ftp.povray.org (see 2 - FTP Sites, Web Sites, Bulletin Boards, etc.).

  The files that make up the DOS version of POV-Ray are:

  - povsrc-2.2.zip       Source files for compiling POV-Ray yourself.
  - povdoc-2.2.zip       Documentation
  - povscn-2.2.zip       Sample scenes
  - povibm-2.2.exe       Runtime binary for IBM PC systems.

  There are also official executables available for Amiga, Linux, and
  MacOS, as well as unofficial executables for MacPPC, DEC Alpha,
  DEC OSF, HP, FreeBSD, SGI, RS/6000, and SunOS.  If your system is
  not in this list, it is recommended that you use the generic Unix
  sources for compiling POV-Ray.  You can also find the above archives
  packaged in different formats or binaries for other platforms.

  If you have access to several networked computers and a compiler,
  it is possible to have POV-Ray render using multiple CPUs using the
  PVM system of distributed computing.  More information is at:
  http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/povray/pvmpov.html

  There is a large collection of software related to POV-Ray available
  on the Raytrace! CD-ROM from Walnut Creek.  This includes modellers,
  viewers, utility programs, scene files, and rendered images.  For
  For your browsing pleasure, you can have a look at almost the whole
  contents of the CD-ROM at http://www.povray.org/pov-cdrom/

------------------------------

Subject 1.2 - Polyray

  The program Polyray is a rendering program for producing scenes of
  3D shapes and surfaces.  The means of description range from
  standard primitives like box, sphere, etc. to 3 variable polynomial
  expression, and finally (and slowest of all) surfaces containing
  transcendental functions like sin, cos, log.  Polyray supports
  rendering in a number of different modes: Raytracing, Zbuffered
  polygon rendering (fully textures or Gourad shaded), wireframe and
  hidden line, and raw triangles (as ASCII output, one tri per line).

  The texturing in Polyray is not limited to a few predefined styles -
  you can use mathematical expressions to modify any part of the
  shading.

  If you find Polyray valuable and can afford it, the registration cost
  is $35.00.  Note that the version available online is the complete
  thing. Polyray is not crippled in any way, nor are there any annoying
  nag screens.  The extended DOS version of Polyray is available at:
  ftp://ftp.povray.org/pub/polyray/

  UNIX versions are available at:
  http://www.inf.fu-berlin.de/~leitner/grafik/polyray.html
  (binaries for: HP-UX, Linux, FreeBSD, Sun OS 4&5, SGI/IRIX 4&5)

------------------------------

Subject 1.3 - Vivid (including BOB)

  Vivid is a shareware ray tracer for IBM PC's by Stephen Coy
  <scoy@microsoft.com>.  Version 2, the current publicly available
  version, is available from several FTP sites as vivid2.zip.
  Version 3 is expected soon (I expect it is already available [AED]).

  Compared to POV-Ray, Vivid doesn't have as many features, but in many
  cases it can run faster.  Source code isn't available, so the package
  is limited to systems which can run DOS executables.

  Stephen Coy, Christopher Watkins and Mark Finlay co-authored a book
  on Ray Tracing called "Photorealism and Ray Tracing in C".
  Distributed free with the book was an example ray tracer called BOB.
  This was actually a cut down version of Vivid which did include
  source.  (see also 5 - Further Information and Resources).

------------------------------

Subject 1.4 - Rayshade

+ Rayshade is a free ray tracing package originally developed in 1988
+ by Craig Kolb <cek@princeton.edu>, David Dobkin, and David Hoffman for
+ unix/X11, but it has since been ported to several platforms and
+ re-written and improved several times since.  Several non-UNIX ports
+ are available, including DOS, Amiga, Mac, and OS/2.  This is the
+ program often used by universities for teaching ray-tracing and as a
+ result, it is often also used for research on rendering and object
+ generation.  Because of its extensibility, there are a large number of
+ user-contributed additions and modifications to the base renderer.
+ This means that many incredible images and ideas saw first "light" under
+ Rayshade.  The image gallery at the Rayshade Homepage can bear witness
+ to this statement.  The "official" ftp and WWW sites are located at:
+ ftp://ftp.princeton.edu/pub/Graphics/rayshade/
+ ftp://graphics.stanford.edu/pub/rayshade/
+ http://www-graphics.stanford.edu/~cek/rayshade/rayshade.html

| There are (at least) two programs to distribute rayshade traces over
| multiple machines.  One is called inetray, the other raynet, available at:
  ftp://maggia.ethz.ch/pub/inetray/
  ftp://mars.sapham.debis.de/pub/raynet/

------------------------------

Subject 1.5 - Radiance and ADELINE

  Radiance is a free Unix software package that adopts a radiosity- type
  approach to lighting simluation.  A MS-DOS version is now available as
  part of the ADELINE 1.0 software package for a site license fee from
  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

  Greg Ward <gjward@lbl.gov>, discusses Radiance here:

  "I've spent the past ten or so years developing a ray-tracing program
  for lighting simulation and rendering called Radiance.  Although it
  doesn't use the typical finite-element/form-factor approach of
  radiosity programs, it does compute what they compute plus some.
  Specifically, Radiance computes diffuse, specular and directional-
  diffuse reflection and transmission in arbitrarily complicated
  environments.

  Here is a short description:

  Radiance is a suite of programs for the analysis and visualization of
  lighting in design.  Input files specify the scene geometry,
  materials, luminaires, time, date and sky conditions (for daylight
  calculations).  Calculated values include spectral radiance (ie.
  luminance & color), irradiance (illuminance & color) and glare
  indices.  Simulation results may be displayed as color images,
  numerical values and contour plots.  The primary advantage of Radiance
  over simpler lighting calculation and rendering tools is that there
  are no limitations on the geometry or the materials that may be
  simulated.  Radiance is used by architects and engineers to predict
  illumination, visual quality and appearance of innovative design
  spaces, and by researchers to evaluate new lighting and daylighting
  technologies.

  Radiance has been written up in many technical and non-technical
  articles in various journals and magazines.  Most recently, a
  Radiance-generated image appeared on the cover of the 1992 Siggraph
  Proceedings.

  There are hundreds of happy Radiance users world-wide, including
  public and private research institutions as well as engineering and
  architecture firms.

  I guess that's all I can think of to say about it at the moment..."

                                                            -Greg

  The Unix version of the software is free, in source code, runs on most
  UNIX/X11 platforms (including Linux), and is available in source form:
  ftp://hobbes.lbl.gov/ [128.3.12.38] in California and
  ftp://nestor.epfl.ch/ [128.178.139.3] in Switzerland.

  The Radiance WWW home page can be found at:
  http://radsite.lbl.gov/radiance/HOME.html

  A version of Radiance for MS-DOS is available as part of a software
  package called ADELINE.  ADELINE is being distributed by Lawrence
  Berkeley National Laboratory for a site-license fee of $450.00 US.
  For detailed information, please browse:
  http://radsite.lbl.gov/adeline/HOME.html

  An ftp site with basic information and an order form is available at:
  ftp://hobbes.lbl.gov/pub/adeline

  for PC to: <ckehrlich@lbl.gov>

------------------------------

Subject 1.6 - Others

  There are many other ray tracing packages available; ART, DKBtrace,
  RTrace, RAY4, MTV, QRT, and DBW for instance, and some for parallel
  tracing: XDART, RRLib, prt, and VM_pRAY.  Eric Haines' <erich@eye.com>
  Ray Tracing News (see 5 - Further Information and Resources), or the
  comp.graphics.misc FAQ for more info.

  The Blue Moon Rendering Tools (BMRT) is of special note because it is
  a shareware ray-tracing and radiosity implementation of Pixar's
  Renderman language.  This was written by Larry Gritz as a student and
  he is, not surprisingly, working for Pixar now.  For more info look at:
  http://www.seas.gwu.edu/student/gritz/bmrt.html

------------------------------

Subject 1.7 - Non-Ray Tracing Software

  * Pixar's Photo-Realistic Renderman
    Because of the excellent and sophisticated techniques used in PRMan,
    many people think that it is a ray tracer, when in fact PRMan is a
    scanline based software package.  PRMan is the grand-daddy of all
    high-end rendering packages, and was the source of many of the
    techniques used in rendering software today.  Pixar showcased their
    skills in short animations such as Tin Toy and Red's Dream.  PRMan
    to animate the Walt-Disney feature film Toy Story.

    There is a newsgroup news:comp.graphics.rendering.renderman devoted
    to the discussion of all implementations of the Renderman language.

  * 3D Studio
    Autodesk's 3d Studio is an interactive 3d modelling, rendering and
    animation package for the IBM PC platform.  It employs scanline
    rendering to achieve photo-realistic effects rather than
    ray-tracing.  Because of this, it cannot do true shadows,
    reflections or refractions, but can, in many cases, simulate them
    accurately enough for most purposes.  The package costs around $3000
    or $1200 with the educational discount.  There is a newsgroup for 
    discussions on this package.  news:comp.graphics.packages.3dstudio 

  * Alias
    The newsgroup for this software is news:comp.graphics.apps.alias

  * Lightwave
    The newsgroup for this software is news:comp.graphics.apps.lightwave

    Note that there is also a group news:comp.graphics.rendering.misc
    for the discussion of general rendering issues.

------------------------------

Subject: 2 - FTP Sites, Web Sites, Bulletin Boards, etc.

------------------------------

Subject 2.1 - FTP Sites

  The following list details some of the main graphics related FTP
  sites, their maintainers (where known) and any other info.

  For a more complete list of FTP sites, see the list by Eric Haines
  <erich@eye.com> and Nick Fotis <nfotis@theseas.ntua.gr> from which
  much of the following has been taken.

  * ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ [128.252.135.4]
    George Kyriazis <kyriazis@esd.sgi.com>

    A huge repository of graphics stuff, particulary:

    - /graphics/graphics - get CONTENTS file.
    - /graphics/graphics/objects/TDDD - the TDDD objects and converters.
    - /mirrors/unix-c/graphics - Rayshade, MTV, Vort, FBM, PBMPLUS, etc.
    - /mirrors/msdos/graphics - DKB ray tracer, FLI RayTracker demos.
    - /graphics/graphics/mirrors - mirrors many sites.
    - /pub/rad.tar.Z - SGI_RAD.
    - /graphics/graphics/radiosity - Radiance and Indian packages.
    - /systems/ibmpc/msdos/graphics - loads of PC graphics stuff.

  * ftp://ftp.informatik.uni-oldenburg.de/ [134.106.1.9]
    Frank Neumann <Frank.Neumann@informatik.uni-oldenburg.de>

    Another good site for ray tracing, particulary POV-Ray.

    - /pub/pov-ray - get INDEX for full details
    - /pub/pov-ray/conv - format converters
    - /pub/pov-ray/edit - graphical editors
    - /pub/pov-ray/ext - source extensions
    - /pub/pov-ray/gen - data file generators
    - /pub/pov-ray/misc - other tools, ray tracers, etc.
    - /pub/pov-ray/new - uploads
    - /pub/pov-ray/obj - objects
    - /pub/pov-ray/pack - compression
    - /pub/pov-ray/pix - pictures
    - /pub/pov-ray/scen - scenes
    - /pub/pov-ray/text - text articles
    - /pub/pov-ray/view - viewers
    - /pub/pov-ray/pbin - unofficial POV binaries

  * ftp://ftp.povray.org/ [192.216.222.14]
    http://www.povray.org/ [192.216.222.14]
    Christopher Cason <Chris.Cason@oaks.com.au>

    This has become the primary site for POV-Ray.  It contains a large
    number of POV-Ray utilities, executables, and scenes.  This site has
    also grown to have a mirror of avalon.vislab.navy.mil (see below),
    as well as polyray and rayshade.

    - /pub/povray/Hall-Of_Fame - incredible ray-traced images
    - /pub/povray/Official - official sources and executables
    - /pub/povray/Ray-Tracing-News - archive of Eric Haines' newsletter
    - /pub/povray/animation - animations created with POV-Ray
    - /pub/povray/ezine - a magazine about POV-Ray
    - /pub/povray/fonts - font utilities
    - /pub/povray/modellers - CAD packages for creating scene files
    - /pub/povray/objects - a collection of POV objects
    - /pub/povray/scenes - complete POV-Ray scene files
    - /pub/povray/unofficial - modifications and executables by others
    - /pub/povray/utilities - tools and programs to make life easier
    - /pub/competition - monthly ray-tracing competition images [in recess]
    - /pub/mirrors/avalon - mirror of avalon.vislab.navy.mil (Objects)
    - /pub/polyray - Polyray source files
    - /pub/rayshade - Rayshade source files

    Due to increasing demand for better access, ftp.povray.org now has
    several mirror sites around the world.  If you have a choice, use
    the http (WWW) mode, rather than the ftp mode, since it puts less
    load on the server.

    ftp://alfred.ccs.carleton.ca/         (Official)      [134.117.1.1]
    ftp://uniwa.uwa.edu.au/               (Official)      [130.95.128.1]
    ftp://sunsite.wits.ac.za/pub/mirrors/                 [146.141.15.214]
    http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/graphics/graphics/mirrors/ [128.252.135.4]
    ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/graphics/graphics/mirrors/  [128.252.135.4]
    ftp://plaza.aarnet.edu.au/graphics/graphics/mirrors/  [139.130.23.2]
    ftp://ftp.shu.ac.uk/pub/computing/packages/raytrace/  [143.52.20.24]
    http://www.hensa.ac.uk/ftp/mirrors/povray/            [129.12.200.129]
    ftp://www.hensa.ac.uk/ftp/mirrors/povray/             [129.12.200.129]
    http://ftp.nectec.or.th/pub/mirrors/ray-tracing/      [192.150.251.33]
    ftp://ftp.nectec.or.th/pub/mirrors/ray-tracing/       [192.150.251.33]
    ftp://ftp.etsimo.uniovi.es/pub/raytrace/              [156.35.23.24]

    The POV-Ray CD-ROM from Walnut Creek Raytrace! is now available
    online.  Check it out at:
    http://www.povray.org/pov-cdrom/

  * ftp://ftp.princeton.edu/ [128.112.128.1]
    Craig Kolb <cek@cs.princeton.edu>

    Home of Rayshade, and other graphics tid-bits.

    - /pub/Graphics/GraphicsGems - source code from Graphics Gems books
    - /pub/Graphics/URT - Utah Raster Toolkit
    - /pub/Graphics/SPD - Standard Procedural Database
    - /pub/Graphics/rayshade - rayshade source code
    - /pub/Graphics/RTNews - Ray Tracing News
    - /pub/Graphics/Papaers - ray tracing papers, bibliographies

  * ftp://avalon.viewpoint.com/ [204.212.34.3]
    http://www.viewpoint.com/ [204.212.34.10]
    Webmaster <sph@viewpoint.com>

    Avalon was created to be a 3D object "repository" for the net.  3D
    objects (multiple formats), utilities, and file format documents are
    only part of what is available here.  Since July 1995, Avalon has
    been run by Viewpoint, a commercial 3D model vendor, but they insist
    that the Avalon models will still be available for free to all.
    This site is also mirrored by (among others):

    http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/graphics/graphics/mirrors/avalon/
    ftp://sunsite.wits.ac.za/pub/mirrors/ftp.povray.org/mirrors/avalon/

  * http://cedar.cic.net/~rtilmann/mm/ [192.131.22.3]
    Webmaster <rtilmann@cedar.cic.net>

    Meshmart is a repository of 3D objects in a variety of formats.  Not
    only does meshmart have objects available, they also have objects on
    consignment as well as an "objects wanted" area.

  * ftp://hobbes.lbl.gov/ [128.3.12.38]
    http://radsite.lbl.gov/radiance/HOME.html [128.3.12.33]
    Greg Ward <gjward@lbl.gov>

    Official distribution site for Radiance ray trace/radiosity package.

  * ftp://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/ [128.32.35.31]

    - /pub/graphics/mm/encode - MPEG encoding software
    - /pub/graphics/mm/play - MPEG decoding/display software

  * ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/ [18.70.0.209]
    http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/bngusenet/top.html
      [164.107.8.52]

    - /pub/usenet/news.answers - the land of FAQs.

------------------------------

Subject 2.2 - Bulletin Board Systems

  The following list details some Bulletin Boards Systems dedicated to
  graphics and, in particular Ray Tracing.  At the end of the section
  there is a list of BBS'es of PCGNet (Professional CAD and Graphics
  Network) kindly provided by Bjorn-Kare Nilssen <bjoernk@oslonett.no>
  This list may be out of date at the time of printing.  If you know one
  of the boards here no longer works please let me know.

  * The Graphics Alternative

    TGA is heavily orientated around Ray Tracing, 3D Rendering,
    Modelling and Animation.  It's the official support BBS for Vivid
    and has an extensive library of utilities, programs, source and
    images built up by its 1300+ users.

    Location:  El Cerrito, CA, USA.
    Sysop:     Adam Shiffman
    Data:      (510) 524-2780 (PM14400FXSA v.32bis 14.4k, Public)
               (510) 524-2165 (USR DS v.32bis/HST 14.4k, Subscribers)
    WWW:       http://www.tgax.com/

  * Pi Squared

    On the East Coast of the USA is Pi Squared.  Alfonso Hermida is the
    sysop and he is the creator of POVCAD.  All the latest POV files
    available as well as support for his own products.

    Location:  Maryland, USA.
    Sysop:     Alfonso Hermida (CIS: 72114,2060)
    Data:      (301) 725-9080 (14.4K, 24hrs)

  * The Tackle Box

    A huge BBS dedicated to POV-Ray with hundreds of modelling
    utilities, source, pictures and animations.  2 GIG online, 24 hours
    a day.  Walnut Creek "RayTrace!" CD ROM is now loaded with 200 file
    areas.  The first month is 100% FREE with subscriptions available
    for $20/year.

    Location:  Edmond, Oklahoma, USA.
    Sysop:     Neil Clark <clark@ionet.net>
    Data:      (405) 359-3301 (14.4K, N/8/1, 24hrs)
    WWW:       http://www.ionet.net/~clark/ (Files available for ftp)

  * The New Graphics BBS

    A graphics specific system for those interested in 3D, objects,
    image processing, animation, MPEG, JPEG, GIF, file formats, etc.
    Knowledge Media "Graphics 1" CD-ROM available, 645 Mb "MultiMedia"
    CD online shortly.

    Location:  ?
    Sysop:     Bob Lindabury <bob@bobsbox.rent.com>
    Data:      (908) 469-0049 (14.4K, 24hrs)

  * The Graphics Emporium BBS

    A BBS for the graphics professional and hobbyist to exchange ideas,
    information and creativity.  Not dedicated to any one platform.

    Location:  Redondo Beach, CA, USA.
    Sysop:     ? <Emporium_Admin%Graphics_Emporium@morph.uu.holonet.net>
    Data:      (310) 374-8805

  * Windows World BBS

    Specializing in DOS/Windows based ray tracing, mathematics, stock
    market technical analysis and also the latest CICA Windows CDs
    (1 gig). No fees and free access. Requires Windows 3.1 and the
    Excalibur(tm) client communications program to access the BBS. It
    is down-loadable on the first call.

    Location:  Dayton, OH, USA
    Sysop:     H. Lawrence Rowe (hrowe@erinet.com)
    Data:      (513) 866-8181 (V.22-V.34, 24hrs)

  * Boards of the Professional CAD and Graphics Network

    USA and Canada
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    SAUG BBS                     Bellevue          WA      206-644-7115
    Joes CODE BBS                West Bloomfield   MI      810-855-0894
    Engineering Services         Atlanta           GA      404-325-0122
    Autodesk Global Village      Sausalito         CA      415-289-2270
    The Graphics Alternative     El Cerrito        CA      510-524-2780
    PC-AUG                       Phoenix           AZ      602-952-0638
    Convergence Spline BBS       Richmond          BC      604-275-3462
    Graphicly Speaking           Langley           BC      604-534-2954
    Tern Solution BBS            Ottawa            ON      613-228-0539
    Canis Major                  Nashville         TN      615-385-4268
    CAD Engineering Services     Hendersonville    TN      615-822-2539
    The Virtual Dimension        Oceanside         CA      619-722-0746
    The Drawing Board BBS        Anchorage         AL      907-349-5412
    The University               Shrewsbury Twp    NJ      908-544-8193

    France
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    CAD Connection               Montesson                33-1-39529854
    Zyllius BBS!                 Saint Paul                 33-93320505

    United Kingdom
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    Raytech BBS                  Tain, UK                44-1862-832020
    The Missing Link             Surrey, England         44-81-641-8593
    CADenza BBS                  Leicester, UK            44-533-596725

    New Zealand
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    The Graphics Connection      Wellington               64-4-566-8450

    Australia
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    The Baud Room                Melbourne                61-3-481-6873
    Sydney PCUG Compaq           New South Wales          61-2-540-1842
    My Computer Company          Erskineville             61-2-557-1489

    Slovenia
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    MicroArt                     Koper                     386-66-34986

    Germany
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    NEWS BBS                     Duesseldorf            49-211-680-1458

    The Netherlands
    -------------------------------------------------------------------
    BBS_Bennekom: Fractal Board  Bennekom                 31-8389-15331
    CAD-BBS                      Amsterdam                31-3402-90287
    Foundation One               Baarn                    31-2154-22143

    Some of the above may require additional country or long-distance
    codes.

------------------------------

Subject 2.3 - Mailing Lists

  Listed below is a selection of mailing lists related to graphics
  and/or ray tracing.  If I haven't included specific details on
  subscription, it's because I don't know.  Best bet is to send a
  "help" message.

  * POV-Ray

    Called the dkb-list for historical reasons (POV-Ray was based on
    David Buck's "DKBTrace"), the list exists for users of POV-Ray and
    associated products, on all platforms.

    Subscription:  listserv%TREARN.BITNET@vm.gmd.de
      Body Text:   subscribe dkb-l <Your full name>
    Posting:       DKB-L%TREARN.BITNET@listserv.gmd.de

  * Rayshade

    Mailing list for Rayshade users, mainly on UNIX platforms.

|   Subscription:  rayshade-users-request@cs.princeton.edu
    Posting:       rayshade-users@cs.princeton.edu
+   Archive:       ftp://graphics.stanford.edu/pub/rayshade/rayshade-users/

  * Radiance

    Greg Ward, the author of Radiance has a distribution list of all
    users.  Register with him: greg@pink.lbl.gov

  * Imagine

    For users of the Imagine 3d rendering and animation package for the
    Amiga and, more recently, the IBM PC.

    Subscription:  listserv@sjuvm.stjohns.edu
      Body Text:   subscribe imagine <first name> <last name>
    Posting:       imagine@sjuvm.stjohns.edu

  * Toaster

    This mailing list deals with the Video Toaster system for the Amiga.

    Subscription:  toaster-request@bobsbox.rent.com
      Body Text:   subscribe <address> toaster
    Posting:       toaster@bobsbox.rent.com

  * Lightwave

    Lightwave is part of the suite of programs that come with the
    Video Toaster system for the Amiga.

    Subscription:  lightwave-request@bobsbox.rent.com
      Body Text:     subscribe <address> lightwave
    Posting:       lightwave@bobsbox.rent.com

  * TrueSpace

    This is a mailing list for users of trueSpace, maintained by
    Shane Davison <daviso@cs.uregina.ca>.

    Subscription:  truespace-request@caligari.com
      Body Text:     subscribe <address> truespace
    Posting:       truespace@caligari.com

  * 3D Studio

    Autodesk's 3d modelling and rendering system for the IBM PC.

    Subscription:  3dstudio-request@bobsbox.rent.com
      Body Text:     subscribe <address> 3dstudio
    Posting:       3dstudio@bobsbox.rent.com

------------------------------

Subject 2.4 - Others

  * CompuServe

    The CompuServe Graphics Developers' Forum (GO GRAPHDEV) is the home
    of POV-Ray (section 8 POV Sources and section 9 POV Images) as well
    as other development projects including fractals, animation and
    morphing.  You can get information of joining CompuServe (in the US)
    by calling (800) 848-8990.  CompuServe access is now available in
    other countries, including Japan and Europe.

  * America On-Line

    AOL also has a section (PCGRAPHICS) dedicated to POV-Ray support.

------------------------------

Subject: 3 - Modelling Software

------------------------------

Subject 3.1 - SCED

  SCED is a constraint based scene editor written by Stephen Chenney
  <schenney@franklin.cs.berkeley.edu>.  Stephen also maintains a mailing
  list for bug reports, patches, and early notification of new releases.

  Sced is a scene modeller for UNIX and X. It runs on many UNIX platforms,
  including Linux.  It is being distributed as source code.  The latest
  version is always available at:
  http://http.cs.berkeley.edu/~schenney/sced/sced.html
  ftp://ftp.povray.org/pub/povray/modellers/sced/
  ftp://ftp.cs.su.oz.au/stephen/sced/

  An enhancement to SCED by Denis McLaughlin, called SCEDA, has all the
  features of SCED, but also adds support for keyframed animation.
  Animated objects have their position, rotation, and scale interpolated
  smoothly across multiple keyframes via a (modified) spline function.
  SCEDA is available at:
  ftp://ftp.cyberus.ca/pub/sceda/

  You can find out more about SCEDA at:
  http://www.cyberus.ca/~denism/sceda/sceda.html.

  Feature List:

  * Cube, Cylinder, Cone, Plane, Sphere primitives.
  * Full support for CSG, including CSG wireframes that look like CSG
    objects.
  * A constraint based editing interface, which supports the accurate
    placement of object relative to other objects, and dynamic
    constraint maintenance.
  * Previewing using your favorite renderer.
  * Arbitrary, dynamic view of the scene.
  * Support for Radiance, RenderMan, POV-Ray, Rayshade, and VRML.
  * Target renderer specific attributes - allowing the full range of POV
    textures to be accessed, including the declaration of new textures
    and the inclusion of files.
  * Arbitrarily dense wireframes.
  * A simple input file format.
  * Support for arbitrary OFF format polygonal objects.
  * Automatic compression and decompression of files.
  * Spotlight and Area light sources.
  * Removal of many restrictions on the editing of CSG objects,
    including the ability to change the basic type of an object.
  * Lots of bug fixes. This version is now very stable under Linux and
    Solaris at least. The last very was regretably unstable.
  * Lots of small improvements to things like previewing, selection,
    handling of objects behind the eye and so on.

  Tutorials are provided to introduce use of the interface.

  The system has been tested on several platforms, and appears to be
  easy to port to different systems.  It REQUIRES X11 Release 5.  Note
  that POV 2.2 NEEDS TO BE PATCHED to use files created by SCED.
  Binaries will soon be available for Linux and Solaris.  Binaries for
  other platforms are also desired.

  Planned in the future:
  * POV->Sced conversion program, for editing an old POV file.
  * Bezier patch and arbitrary wireframe support.

------------------------------

Subject 3.2 - MORAY

  MORAY, by Lutz and Kretzschmar [CIS: 100023, 2006], is a shareware
  modeller for PC's that directly supports POV-Ray 2.x primitives and
  more.  Registration is US $64 which will get you a protected mode
  version, allowing full memory usage, plus all the usual support and
  upgrade info.

  MORAY is a program with which you can design scenes for the POV-Ray
  raytracer to render. Contrary to normal scene design, with MORAY you
  design the scenes graphically. Up to now it was pretty difficult to
  imagine what the scene looked like, without laying it out on graph
  paper, or doing many test renders. MORAY is like a graph paper, it
  lets you place and change objects in wireframe while you see them.
  MORAY then generates the text file that POV needs to read.

  MORAY can thus also be used as a rapid prototype tool, to place
  objects quickly and write the scene file. You can then edit scene
  files to suit your needs, just like you have been doing up to now.

  MORAY stores and works with POV-Ray primitives, as opposed to normal
  CAD systems, which mostly convert all objects to triangle meshes or
  similar polygon based formats when outputting. This ensures optimum
  performance and image quality from the raytracer.

  If you're a POV enthusiast and have access to CompuServe you should
  check out the GRAPHDEV forum for the latest news and tips on using POV.
  The RayTracing conference on PCGnet also carries lots of tips for POV.

  The emphasis in designing MORAY was to be able to work as easily and
  as graphically as possible. Most of the work can be done with the
  mouse.

  Three 2D views and a 3D view of your scene are visible on screen.  You
  can perform all transformations of the objects in the 2D views with
  the mouse. The 3D view shows what the current camera will see, i.e.
  how POV will raytrace it.  MORAY allows you to:

  *  scale, rotate and translate an object interactively
  *  define cameras with which to view your scene
  *  view the scene in wire frame as POV-Ray will raytrace it
  *  specify the wire-frame complexity of on screen objects
  *  graphically place a bounding box around an object
  *  automatically create bounding boxes of any objects
  *  make nested CSG or composite objects
  *  assign textures from the TEXTURES.INC file to your objects
  *  define a new texture from within MORAY
  *  place imagemaps interactively on objects
  *  manipulate the control points of a bezier patch to create shapes
     not easily created otherwise
  *  create bezier patch meshes
  *  create rotational, translational and tapering sweeps that are
     output as smooth triangles
  *  copy complex nested objects
  *  create multiple copies of an object transforming each independently
  *  specify a region of the 3D view to render
  *  call POV-Ray from within MORAY to render scenes

  Features new with MORAY 2.0 include:

  * A complete 100% Texture Editor for POV-Ray 2.2 with Preview.
  * Polyray V1.8 support and output of all scenes.
  * Faster, more streamlined (and more attractive) interface.
  * Fewer redraws and they're now interruptible.
  * Right-Mouse-button support.
  * New Sweep editors and types.
  * New Objects (Blobs, RAW triangles, User-defined objects).
  * Completely new File Handling.
  * Shallow and deep copies.
  * CSG evaluation.
  * Actual Heightfield display (for TGA).
  * Improved, more efficient output.
  * Freely definable viewports.
  * Manipulations in 3D views.
  * Spotlight views.
  * Multi-level Undo for major scene operations.

  MORAY requires at least a 386, a VGA card and a mouse, although this
  is not recommended.  The minimum usable system for larger scenes
  would be a 486DX/25 and 4MB memory.  The shareware version needs 2MB
  EMS, but this limitation is removed in the registered version, since
  it runs in protected mode.

  You need to have POV-Ray 2.0 or greater is needed to render the scene.

------------------------------

Subject 3.3 - GUM

  GUM is a solid and surface modeller that currently supports POV,
  Polyray and Rayce and runs in MS Windows.  The author is Lex van der
  Sluijs <IO770073@student.io.tudelft.nl>.

  GUM is DemoWare: the demo is yours and you have NO obligation to
  register whatsoever, but there is a limitation: only 50 objects can be
  saved. The price of the full program is f 150 (Dutch guilders) or
  about US$85.

  GUM stands for 'Grand Unified Modeller' which means two things:
  * It will never be done.
  * The fact that its internal data structure can accomodate all major
    object types, that is solids (implicit, b-rep), surfaces
    (parametric and polyhedral) and wireframe objects.  (and yes, a
    layout of its C++ class hierarchy takes many pages).

  The current version is 0.91 (Jan 24th 1995), and can be found at:
  ftp://ftp.povray.org/pub/povray/modellers/gum/
  CAD BBS Holland (+31-3402-90287) where it is a free file
  CompuServe, in the GRAPHDEV forum, thanks to Harry Rowe

  I won't list the list of supported objects here since that would
  become a bit long. Instead, some highlights:

  * CSG evaluation, (wireframe representation of CSG Differences)
  * 3D direct manipulation: 3D handles on objects like on the SGI
  * support for trimmed surfaces (trimmed with a solid, that is) Polyray
    can render these.
  * real-time pan and zoom (non-real-time also possible)
  * several renderers can be supported at once
  * relatively advanced texture- (and other types of declaration)
    handling, resulting in self-contained scene-files.
  * heightfield reading for Targa files: see what you're doing
  * Custom objects for external/not-yet-supported/huge objects
  * support for 'extra special' features via the Header dialog (timer
    variables, directional & textured lights, etc)
  * the ability to find all used files used in the scene
  * a robust RAW file reader
  * Object library feature: use objects from other GUM scenes
  * flexible FastDraw: Full, Skip(variable), Bounding Box. Static,
    during viewport change/object dragging (multiple-viewport too)
  * Automatic starting of the specified renderer, automatic starting of
    your favourite imageviewer when the image is done

  Some 'lowlights' (all of which will -naturally- be addressed):
  * cumbersome installation procedure
  * lack of sweeps
  * lack of blobs
  * cylinders, cones and paraboloids must be capped manually by
    intersecting them with discs

  System requirements: 386+387 @ 40 MHz with 4 Mb RAM. An 800x600
  display is highly recommended, although 640x480 can be used. GUM plus
  one renderer takes about 6 Mb on your harddisk.

  Here are some frequently asked questions and their answers about GUM,
  but first there are two things that should be brought to your
  attention:
  * there's already a FAQ in the manual, see the Contents topic. The
    Q&A's here have popped up after the release of the program.
  * most questions about usage of the program can be eliminated if you
    do the Quick Start, also in GUM's help-file.

  Q: I get a list of warnings every time I try to render or save
     something, saying that some 'pages' could not be found. However,
     all these 'pages' are POV/Polyray/Rayce keywords, such as 'marble',
     'green' and 'diffuse'.

  A: You need to move GUM.INI from GUM's directory to your WINDOWS
     directory.  If it's not there, extract a fresh GUM.INI from
     GUM091EX.ZIP. In it are the keywords that have special meaning to
     programs like POV, and without the file GUM can't discern between
     references to other definitions (like using the normal 'Bumpy' in
     'BumpyGlass') and keywords (such as 'red' and 'ior').

  Q: When I try to start the program I get an error message saying that
     CTL3DV2.DLL is not correctly installed.

  A: More than one copy of this DLL could be found by Windows, which is
     not allowed for this particular file, hence the cryptic error
     message. You should find the most recent copy of it on your system,
     move it to WINDOWS\SYSTEM and delete all others.

------------------------------

Subject 3.4 - Other Modellers

  * Blob Sculptor
    Blob Sculptor, by Alfonso Hermida, Steve Anger and Truman Brown
    allows you to model shapes using blob primitives.   Output is to RAW,
    DXF, BLB (internal format), POV, Polyray, Rayshade and CTDS.  In
    addition, the Windows version, ported by Ronal Praver, supports NFF,
    VideoScape and others.  NeXTStep and Open GL ports are expected soon.

-- 
Andreas Dilger   University of Calgary  \"If a man ate a pound of pasta and
(403) 220-8792   Micronet Research Group \ a pound of antipasto, would they
Dept of Electrical & Computer Engineering \   cancel out, leaving him still
http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/       hungry?" -- Dogbert
