Graphics & Engineering Tutorials

	Tutorials

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		Photorealistic model rendering These models were scripted with a text editor, and rendered by the Persistence of Vision Raytracer (POV-Ray). English-like words describe the objects, modified by numbers defining sizes, locations, colors, textures, and so on. GUI tool front-ends can be used to build models, but do not fully exploit powerful POV-Ray language capabilities. Clock Mechanism components were built up using Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG). Components were then combined into subassemblies and positioned. Floating Mill used similar methods with the addition of hierarchical groups. Consequently the entire machine is very easy to position and animate, by entering only the cutting bit tip XYZ position. The mill workpiece is a raw data object built in PaintShopPro and Terragen, then ported to POV-Ray with Raw-Inc.
Clock Mechanism


Floating Mill

Landscapes Terragen was used for these renderings, with PaintShopPro (PSP) for pre- and post-processing. The general method for these models uses Terragen and PSP as two ends of a data shuttle. The common data object is an altitude-encoded 8bit greyscale floorplan, representing higher altitudes as lighter greys, and black as the floor. First, the topology is made. PSP has full sets of brushes and filters, for total control of the floorplan. Terragen may be used to randomly generate, or simply brush paint the terrain. Frequently both tools are used on the same model, but Terragen is not used to modify topology after buildings are added. After the terrain is complete, architecture is started. A new PaintShopPro image is setup with medium grey background. The terrain image is placed on a new layer atop the background. Architecture is built on one or more new transparent layers, above the terrain layer. Buildings are made at very high magnification, 10x or better, to get one pixel per grid. A reasonable scale is about one meter wide and long per pixel, with one meter high per 4 or 5 shades of grey. During construction, the terrain layer visibility and grid are switched off occasionally for viewing buildings. A good monitor is required, due to the tight grouping of grey levels! The PSP eyedropper tool picks foundation level from the building site, on the terrain layer. The numerical value of the pick shade is increased by the desired wall height above ground. Finally, the new value of grey is used on the building layer to draw walls. Intermediate and finished stages of the models are saved in PSP format to preserve layers. Finished models are also saved as flat, unlayered raw data for the next import into Terragen. Raw data will not convert back to PSP layers. Terragen has multilayer color and texture adjustments for land surface, and complete settings for water, atmosphere, sky with clouds, and sun position. A fully mobile virtual camera is also included. Raw data is imported into Terragen, for a day, or days of "painting" and viewing small snapshots. Terragen produces finished large, high quality renderings too. As examples of post-processing, a starfield made with Universe was added to Voices of Gravity, and PSP was used to halo the moon in Lovecraft Isle Festival.
		Voices of Gravity


		Lost Temple


		Copper Lake


		Hand of Kali - Fusion One


		Lovecraft Isle Festival

		Patterns Pattern outlines were made in Visio, then colored and finished in PaintShopPro (PSP). Visio is ideal for this kind of work, because it is a vector drawing tool, meaning every line, curve, and shape is a separate entity. With grid-snap turned on, each small part of the pattern outline is shaped, dragged to location, and scaled with perfect accuracy. Any arbitrary collection of parts may be grouped as needed to move, scale, or rotate - all together. The ungroup function returns temporary collectives back to individual status. Multiple copies of the entire project are easily made to check for perfectly seamless edge matching. Completed tile outlines are saved twice: first as Visio drawings, then as bitmaps for use by PaintShopPro. Conversion to the bitmap format is one-way, there is no going back to Visio. In PSP the outlines are duplicated from the background layer for reference, and colored on upper overlay layers. Celtic Knot Magic is a two layer project, and Happy Dragons uses five layers plus the Flaming Pear plugin. First, simple colors are added and edge matching checked, then effects and filters are applied. Finally, any distortions introduced by filtering are smoothed at the edges by using temporary clone tiles for matching.
Happy Dragons


Celtic Knot Magic

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