"aelgoa" <wra### [at] gmailcom> wrote in message 
news:web.498811b6f0bf7a9c626c89e40@news.povray.org...
> i'm trying to wrap several dozens of height-fields around a curved shape
> (similar to an S-shape)
>
> how would i go about this?
> do i use a spline or an iso-surface? and how do i correct the orientation?
>
> the result should look as if the shape has an irregular "skin" or "hair"
> covering the entire (cylindrical) surface
>
> thank you in advance
>

Nobody seems to have taken up on this question so I'll give it a shot.

You can use a heightfield as a function in an isosurface so, if you can 
define the cylindrical S-shape you want as a function, you may be able to 
suitably combine a single heightfield with  the S-shape. Mike Williams' 
isosurface tutorial may give you some inspiration for this sort of thing.

I can't think how you'd go about wrapping several dozen height fields around 
such a shape because it would be difficult to imagine how you could get them 
to mesh together in any sort of a decent way.

If you don't have to use height fields, then there are quite a few hair 
growth macros about (there's one on the POV-Ray object collection), so you 
may be able to achieve what you want with one of those. You can get an 
S-shape using a sphere sweep which you could grow hair out of. If you're 
after a sort of skin texture, then you might want to use a mesh object with 
a uv-mapped image map to provide the texture.

Regards,
Chris B.

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