Hello again folks,

My prior post was "isosurfaces in v3.5 and how to convert them to
heightfields" and there I mentioned that isosurfaces were slower in Pov3.5
due to the lack of "method 1"... Here is the proof, and I humbly ask the
great people developing Pov to take another look at this and eventually
explain why method 1 was removed from Pov 3.5.

Render times for an isosurface on AMD 1 ghz  (full code below):

MegaPOV 0.7:
 Method 2 = 11 secs
 Method 1 =  2 secs

POV 3.5 beta 5:
 Method 2 = 13 secs

//  ----- The code
#version 3.5;

camera { right -1.33*x up 1*y direction 1*z location <-3,0,6> look_at 0
angle 48 }
light_source { <-25,25,35> color rgb 1.5 }

isosurface { function { (x-.5)*(x-.5)+y*y+z*z-1
     + .001^((x+.5)*(x+.5)+y*y+z*z-.75)
     - .0001^abs((y+.2)*(y+.2)) }

//  method 1  // method 2
     max_gradient 278.219 accuracy .008
     contained_by { box { <-1,-1,-1.5>,<1.25,1,1.5> } }
     pigment { rgb 1 } finish { ambient 0 diffuse .67 specular .1 }
no_shadow }

//  ----- End

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