<Peter> wrote in message 
news:web.47ae9f01e7ebe4ed140a26e60@news.povray.org...
> I'm an Optics guy. I have a hard time getting a "visible" light beam from
> POVRay.
> I would like to generate a beam (e.g. spot light source) which can be 
> visible
> and directed towards an object or lens.
>
> I have enabled photons mapping and stuff for the light source and objects, 
> but
> the beam is only visible when it hits the object. It's not visible in air 
> or
> the background.
>
> How can I simulate a laser beam? Can anybody point me to the right 
> resources
> (tutorials, example pov files, etc...)?
>
> I would like to illustrate simple concepts like reflection, refractio,
> diffraction on lenses and some other optical objects. But I need to 
> actually
> control the beam size and see it. I don't want a *virtual* light source. 
> Thanks
> for any help.
>
>
> --
> Cheers,
> Peter "Excalibur"

There's a scene I made a long time ago. It doesn't work with POV v. 3.7, but 
works with versions 3.5 and 3.6.

It's not a true laser. Basically, a light source is placed a long way from 
the scene (999,900 units, in this case) and the scene is in a box with a 
hole in the wall for the "laser" to enter the scene. A media-filled box 
allows the laser to be seen. I'll post the image that this scene file 
produces in .binaries.images. The code is a bit on the spaghetti-ish side, 
and it's been a long time since I wrote it, so I'm not real familiar with 
the specifics of it anymore. Feel free to cut-and-paste the parts you need. 
Hope it helps.

I've posted the POV file in pov.text.scene-files and the resulting image in 
pov.binaries.images

Eric

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