Timothy R. Cook wrote:


> You need an excuse for modelling something? ;)


No, but it makes me feel better when I play with POV-Ray instead of 
doing my coursework if I can say to myself "I'm doing this because..." 
rather than "I'm just procrastinating here".

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Matt Walton wrote:
> 
> If I were to make an aerial vehicle:
> a) would you have any objections to the appearance of a 25-metre flying
> saucer (otherwise I'll just have to model one without any excuse for
> doing it)
The only things not allowed are those which cause serious offence (I'm
sure you can think of an example relating to air traffic...); I can't
see a flying saucer falling into that category :-]

> b) how would I go about submitting it, as it clearly doesn't require a plot
Just mail me the model; note that vehicles don't need to be normalised
to a box like structures do.
 
> Even a park-like plot filled with odd sculptures?
Yep; anything goes. (see above)

> Yes, this does look very interesting. Are there any restrictions on what
> version of POV-Ray can be used? I'm using 3.5b8 at the moment and have a
> tendency to use the new features without really thinking about them too
> much.
I'm using MegaPOV 0.7 until a stable release of POV3.5 comes out, then
I'll be switching to that.
 
> Also, will the PVC_GroundTex texture be available at some point so we
> can see how it looks?
PVC_GroundTex will probably be some sort of granite ForestGreen thingy
(unless anyone has better - no isotextures please!) for most of the
year, but a nice white colour in winter (see the section on macros in
http://www.geocities.com/greyknight3/pov_city.htm for more details on
time in PVC-II)

While we're on the subject of time... should the website:
a:  display an image of PVC-II at the current time in the user's time
zone
b:  display an image of PVC-II at the current GMT time
c:  display several images, at different times of day
d:  display a daytime image with the option to switch to other times
e:  [your suggestion here]

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s1631001 wrote:
> 
> While we're on the subject of time... should the website:
> a:  display an image of PVC-II at the current time in the user's time
> zone
> b:  display an image of PVC-II at the current GMT time
> c:  display several images, at different times of day
> d:  display a daytime image with the option to switch to other times
> e:  [your suggestion here]

I like option A, but there should still be an option to see other times
of day, so that someone could see (for instance) what the place looks
like at 4 AM.

Speaking of which, I'm curious: first, how will you be handling
rendering the city (will you have a scripted backend that renders on
demand, or do occasional rerenders for different times by hand as
necessary, or some other means)? Second, how are you handling weather
effects? Do you have some system for generating skies and such?
Moon/stars? Any thoughts on physical realism? (Simulating a realistic
sky might be too hard and/or demanding on the system - I know *I've* had
limited success - but reproducing natural cycles should be easier.) Or
are you looking for someone to handle all of this?

-Xplo

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In article <3C15F2BB.55D7CA71@namtar.qub.ac.uk>, "s1631001"
<s16### [at] namtarqubacuk> wrote:

> Matt Walton wrote:

> The only things not allowed are those which cause serious offence (I'm
> sure you can think of an example relating to air traffic...); I can't
> see a flying saucer falling into that category :-]

Excellent. I will get to modelling right away :-)
 
>> b) how would I go about submitting it, as it clearly doesn't require a
>> plot
> Just mail me the model; note that vehicles don't need to be normalised
> to a box like structures do

Okay, I'll make sure to stick to the 1 POV = 1 metre convention to save
trouble :-)

>> Even a park-like plot filled with odd sculptures?
> Yep; anything goes. (see above)

That's good, because I've got a few of those floating around as well,
although i don't know how well they're going to turn out.


> I'm using MegaPOV 0.7 until a stable release of POV3.5 comes out, then
> I'll be switching to that.

I should be okay with 3.5b8 then - I doubt I'll be using much of the new
feature set, and hopefully what I do use will be the parts that have the
same syntax in 3.5 and MegaPOV.

> PVC_GroundTex will probably be some sort of granite ForestGreen thingy
> (unless anyone has better - no isotextures please!) for most of the
> year, but a nice white colour in winter (see the section on macros in
> http://www.geocities.com/greyknight3/pov_city.htm for more details on
> time in PVC-II)

What would be nice for the website is some indication of what kind of
values the macros will return under certain conditions, when I looked
yesterday there wasn't any - it wouldn't be much good if snowy sculpture
appeared when POV-City thinks it's the middle of summer!
> 
> While we're on the subject of time... should the website: a:  display an
> image of PVC-II at the current time in the user's time zone
> b:  display an image of PVC-II at the current GMT time c:  display
> several images, at different times of day d:  display a daytime image
> with the option to switch to other times e:  [your suggestion here]
>

A, but with a choice so the user can see something else if they fancy it.

Matt

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Matt Walton wrote:
> 
> What would be nice for the website is some indication of what kind of
> values the macros will return under certain conditions, when I looked
> yesterday there wasn't any - it wouldn't be much good if snowy sculpture
> appeared when POV-City thinks it's the middle of summer!

Umm... If you mean some way to let the user know what time of year it
is, you can use the PVC_date_now() macro (see the "Global Stuff"
section). In POV-City, every Christmas is a white one, so you don't need
to check if it has snowed yet, just the time of year; POV-City winter
will start around November and continue until January.

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Xplo Eristotle wrote:
> 
> Speaking of which, I'm curious: first, how will you be handling
> rendering the city (will you have a scripted backend that renders on
> demand, or do occasional rerenders for different times by hand as
> necessary, or some other means)?

I'll be using an interface scenefile which renders pictures of the
various plots; it will also have options to display a picture of the
entire city and to cycle through all the plots, rendering a frame for
each one. I also have a separate scenefile which renders a top-down view
using coloured blocks to represent the plots (I'll use this to generate
maps). I can re-render people's plots as and when they are updated
(along with any neighbouring plots which might be affected by the
change)

> Second, how are you handling weather
> effects? Do you have some system for generating skies and such?
> Moon/stars? Any thoughts on physical realism? (Simulating a realistic
> sky might be too hard and/or demanding on the system - I know *I've* had
> limited success - but reproducing natural cycles should be easier.) Or
> are you looking for someone to handle all of this?

I was going to use a SkyBlue & White bozo texture for daytime sky and a
granite for nighttime, but sunrise/sunset will cause me some headaches!
If anyone has a good way to generate good sky textures depending on the
time of day (PS: PVC_time_now() returns a value ranging from 0 to 1 ),
please let me know!
As to the weather itself, I hope to set up a PVC Met Office; slightly
different from other weather Bureaus, this one actually *makes* the
weather! PVC:MET's job will be to define solutions for things like cloud
textures, rain, lightning, etc. If you join PVC:MET, you also get the
fun job of deciding what the weather will be like! Now who's never
wanted to do that?

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> Umm... If you mean some way to let the user know what time of year it
> is, you can use the PVC_date_now() macro (see the "Global Stuff"
> section). In POV-City, every Christmas is a white one, so you don't need
> to check if it has snowed yet, just the time of year; POV-City winter
> will start around November and continue until January.

That means that POV-City will be in the northern hemisphere.  How about
having different degrees of snow cover so we can have islands of snow
in late fall, early winter and early spring.  What areas of the world
has its snowing period of winter finish by January?  I guess that the
Gluf Stream keeps Europe warm.  In the northeastern United States, there
could be big snow storms as late as mid-March although this winter looks
like it will be a warm one here.  A few years ago, on the last days of
March, the temperature went up into the low 80's.  Is this weird
variation from year to year as compared to other areas?  Would POV-City
be inland or anywhere within a few hundred miles of the ocean or large
lakes?
Brendan

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s1631001 wrote:

> Matt Walton wrote:
> 
>>What would be nice for the website is some indication of what kind of
>>values the macros will return under certain conditions, when I looked
>>yesterday there wasn't any - it wouldn't be much good if snowy sculpture
>>appeared when POV-City thinks it's the middle of summer!
>>
> 
> Umm... If you mean some way to let the user know what time of year it
> is, you can use the PVC_date_now() macro (see the "Global Stuff"
> section). In POV-City, every Christmas is a white one, so you don't need
> to check if it has snowed yet, just the time of year; POV-City winter
> will start around November and continue until January.
> 
> 

What I actually want is more detail on the return values of the PVC 
macros. Sure, it says that PVC_time_now() returns from 0 to 1, but does 
that mean 0 is 0000 hours and 1 is also 0000 hours with 0.5 being 1200 
hours? When's sunset? When's sunrise?

I assume PVC_weather_forecast(n) returns the same values as 
PVC_weather_now(), but it would be nice to have it explicitly said. 
Also, what are the components of the vector returned by PVC_date_now()? 
<day, month, year>? <month, day, year>? <year, month, day>? And is it 
y2k-compliant? ;-)

Okay, so I'm fussy. I must have picked that up somewhere when I was 
learning C++.

Now I must stop being picky and go model some sculptures. I thought that 
a shop where you can buy glass spheres on chequered planes is a little 
too much for me (at the moment at least, need more POV experience!) but 
I see no reason not to have a glass sphere on a chequered pedestal in 
the middle of a park...

Matt

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Hey, Tracers...

I heard about Pov-City, searched it, found only ruins. Then I found this thread 
- rather fresh. But it, too, seems to be dormant, as there is nothing new since 
last year. What happened?

I mailed Gray Knight some days ago, but didn't receive an anwser. Is this 
project down before it even started??

I would be interested in owning a place in Pov-City.

:Frederic:

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I'm working on an IRTC entry at the minute, and expect to start work on
PVC-II after that. Sorry I didn't reply to your email, but exams do
that. Err... I'll go reply to it now!


Trickser wrote:
> 
> Hey, Tracers...
> 
> I heard about Pov-City, searched it, found only ruins. Then I found this thread
> - rather fresh. But it, too, seems to be dormant, as there is nothing new since
> last year. What happened?
> 
> I mailed Gray Knight some days ago, but didn't receive an anwser. Is this
> project down before it even started??
> 
> I would be interested in owning a place in Pov-City.
> 
> :Frederic:

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