In article <3d4ee807@news.povray.org>, "Slime" <slm### [at] slimelandcom> 
wrote:

> > Patches (IIRC) are converted into triangles during parsing
> 
> Are they? I doubt it... that wouldn't be consistent with the functionality
> of a raytracer.

They are converted into triangles, type 0 does everything at render time 
and type 1 does some of the work at parse time. It doesn't have anything 
to do with POV being a raytracer. It is just easier to solve for a 
tesselated patch than to solve for the mathematical surface...more 
reliable as well, it doesn't give as many artifacts. Height fields are 
also tesselated, and POV supports triangles and two kinds of mesh 
primitives...being a raytracer does not make triangles forbidden.

-- 
Christopher James Huff <chr### [at] maccom>
POV-Ray TAG e-mail: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
TAG web site: http://tag.povray.org/

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