daishi wrote:
> 
> anyone have any tips/pointers/urls/include files or anything to help with
> photorealistic rendering in pov-ray?

What makes an image appear realistic? Obviously, the objects have to be modelled
as accurately as possible; but this is not enough. Other very important
considerations are texturing and lighting - not necessarily in that order. The
actual methods vary greatly, depending on the type of scene.
Some scenes are more dependent on advanced lighting (radiosity for indoor
scenes, reflections and caustics for glass objects and polished surfaces, etc),
some require complex texturing (e.g. natural surfaces like organics and
minerals).
One thing to consider: there is often a difference between what _is_ realistic
and what is _perceived_ as realistic. For example: a common complaint about
computer-generated images is "too sterile". This preconception is so strong that
subtly exaggerating the "dirtyness" of the scene can in fact increase the
apparent realism of an image.

As for pointers: one excellent learning recource is the website of the Internet
Raytracing Competition (http://www.irtc.org).
You can find some amazing works there. Many of them have the source files
available for download (although not all are created in POV-Ray). Some also give
a detailed description of the creation process.

-- 
Margus Ramst

Personal e-mail: mar### [at] peakeduee
TAG (Team Assistance Group) e-mail: mar### [at] tagpovrayorg

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