 |
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
"Mitchell Waite" <mit### [at] dnai com> wrote in message
news:3c4cb098$1@news.povray.org...
> Nice ideas Tom. GUI extensions probably belongs in an appendix. By
"patches"
> do you program patches to the langauge?
> I certainly would like to cover the history of POV Ray and the IRTC
contest.
> Not sure about the moive stuff but it deserves a link as does the
> distributed ray tracing project.
>
> Mitch
>
One of the strengths of POV is that the source is available for people to
look at, play with,
and contribute improvements. However it is a jump in the deep end for most
people. A good
chapter on the code structure would become a bible for many people here.
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
Mitchell Waite wrote:
> My only competition at this time is my own book which is out of print.
This is not all together true. As has been pointed out (more than once
I believe) the POV-Team is in the process of organizing and writing an
officially sponsored book on the same basic subject matter. The proceeds
of the sales of this book will help offset the costs of running this news
server, the povray.org website, and the IRTC competition, all of which
are bandwidth intensive and expensive to operate. In fact there is some
fear that your current project may actually hurt their efforts and your
timing is at best poor.
--
Ken Tyler
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
Ken:
Rather then looking at a single book on a subject as a negative, most pros
in the publishing world feel that the appearance of more than one title is a
sign of a robust market and welcome them. More than one title can lead to
increased buyins by the chains. Also did you know there is another POV Ray
book project that has been underway for some time? See
http://www.povworld.org/. I think there is a lot of room out there for
multiple titles on a subject. If there is some concern about my particular
project I would be happy to discuss it with a real person on the team. and
see if we can keep the books complementary and not too overlapping. Please
have them contact me. Thanks.
Mitch
"Ken" <tyl### [at] pacbellnet> wrote in message
news:3C4CD9F6.D33003A6@pacbell.net...
>
>
> Mitchell Waite wrote:
>
> > My only competition at this time is my own book which is out of print.
>
> This is not all together true. As has been pointed out (more than once
> I believe) the POV-Team is in the process of organizing and writing an
> officially sponsored book on the same basic subject matter. The proceeds
> of the sales of this book will help offset the costs of running this news
> server, the povray.org website, and the IRTC competition, all of which
> are bandwidth intensive and expensive to operate. In fact there is some
> fear that your current project may actually hurt their efforts and your
> timing is at best poor.
>
> --
> Ken Tyler
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
Ken wrote:
>
> Mitchell Waite wrote:
>
>
>>My only competition at this time is my own book which is out of print.
>>
>
<snip>
It also isn't true because the market has changed drastically in
5 years... POV isn't the only thing out there anymore, and the
public's recognition of names such as: 3ds max, lightwave,
renderman, etc. is a lot greater than before. The
movie-interest, special effects, animation approach is really
common out there now.
True your only competition *in the POV market* would be the POV
team's book, but exactly what is the size of the market you are
actually entering? I think you're no longer in the general CG
market anymore. If someone asked me 5 years ago what to do to get
into CGI and animation- I would have said, "POV!" because if you
knew POV you could adapt to anything out there rapidly. but I
wouldn't say that anymore. If someone's serious about commercial
CG why would they waste their time with POV? And even hobbyists
now seem to think "why not play with what the professionals use?"
Many off the shelf apps are making our television and films
nowadays, POV is (for the most part) not one of those apps. Even
in schools it's pretty absent...
my <2 cents.
-peter
--
Current obsession: "Ballet pour ma fille."
http://www.applesnake.net
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
I think that the competition that is here today was around years ago. The
fact that there is more competition just means the market is healthy, not
unhealthy. 3DStudio was the commercial program of choice when we first
published our POV Ray book and there where others like it. That did not stop
people from buying the book. The reason that POV Ray can't be compared to
these other products is that its free, it has a huge following of users that
are available to help in all kinds of ways, it has a huge number of macros,
utilities, materials, tutorials, and other items that make it a great place
to learn about the subject of CG. Sure people will graduate to commercial
products, but that does not take away from the idea that there is a market
for this product. Indeed if you think about it, the real competition to any
commercial POV Ray venture is the built in documentation that comes with POV
Ray.
"Dearmad" <dea### [at] applesnakenet> wrote in message
news:3C4### [at] applesnakenet...
> Ken wrote:
>
> >
> > Mitchell Waite wrote:
> >
> >
> >>My only competition at this time is my own book which is out of print.
> >>
> >
> <snip>
>
>
> It also isn't true because the market has changed drastically in
> 5 years... POV isn't the only thing out there anymore, and the
> public's recognition of names such as: 3ds max, lightwave,
> renderman, etc. is a lot greater than before. The
> movie-interest, special effects, animation approach is really
> common out there now.
>
> True your only competition *in the POV market* would be the POV
> team's book, but exactly what is the size of the market you are
> actually entering? I think you're no longer in the general CG
> market anymore. If someone asked me 5 years ago what to do to get
> into CGI and animation- I would have said, "POV!" because if you
> knew POV you could adapt to anything out there rapidly. but I
> wouldn't say that anymore. If someone's serious about commercial
> CG why would they waste their time with POV? And even hobbyists
> now seem to think "why not play with what the professionals use?"
> Many off the shelf apps are making our television and films
> nowadays, POV is (for the most part) not one of those apps. Even
> in schools it's pretty absent...
>
> my <2 cents.
>
>
> -peter
> --
> Current obsession: "Ballet pour ma fille."
> http://www.applesnake.net
>
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
Ken wrote:
>
> This is not all together true. As has been pointed out (more than once
> I believe) the POV-Team is in the process of organizing and writing an
> officially sponsored book on the same basic subject matter. The proceeds
> of the sales of this book will help offset the costs of running this news
> server, the povray.org website, and the IRTC competition, all of which
> are bandwidth intensive and expensive to operate. In fact there is some
> fear that your current project may actually hurt their efforts and your
> timing is at best poor.
There has been only very few information about this book project so far,
what's written on the survey page sounds interesting, but some more
information about the style of the book and when it's planned to be
published would be great.
I think it is important that the content of an 'official' Povray book does
not overlap with the Povray documentation too much, maybe it would be a
good idea to offer a bundle of the book and a printed version of the
documentation.
Christoph
--
Christoph Hormann <chr### [at] gmxde>
IsoWood include, radiosity tutorial, TransSkin and other
things on: http://www.schunter.etc.tu-bs.de/~chris/
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
"Christoph Hormann" <chr### [at] gmxde> wrote in message
news:3C4D963B.5BFE3935@gmx.de...
> not overlap with the Povray documentation too much, maybe it would be a
> good idea to offer a bundle of the book and a printed version of the
> documentation.
>
Actually, just offering a nice printed version of the documentation is a good
idea in itself, and could raise some money.
Howzabout the documentation printed on the side of a mug or keyring? ;)
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
"Mitchell Waite" <mit### [at] dnaicom> wrote in message
news:3c4c37c0@news.povray.org...
> As I look and listen I am beginning to see a structure that will satisfy
> everyone which involves more of a spiral approach that winds though the
> learning space in a way that all the major topics are presented but
> sometimes more than once. I used this approach in Basic Programming Primer
> and in C Primer Plus and the with Lafore in Object Oriented Programming in
> C++ and the last two of those are still in print after about 5 editions,
so
> I know that works. I also see that this would not be a small book, the
> Materials Editor alone could be a huge chapter, maybe a book by itself.
This
> might end up being a POV Ray Bible rather than a Primer.
Sounds good. For what it's worth, here's my two cents:
Try organizing the book in separate sections on, for instance, modelling
via:
CSG
Patches
Functions
Animation
Materials
Of course, you would have an introductory section which covered the bare
necessities of each; after that, each section deals with ~only~ things
related to it (beginning with "CSG stands for..." and ending with a dragon
modelled entirely by spheres). The animation section, of course, would have
to incorporate just about everything previous :)
BTW, one thing about examples I've noticed (not necessarily yours, just in
general): although commenting the code is very helpful in and of itself,
comments should also suggest things in the example that can be changed by
the user (generally describing the effects). That is, not just saying "Then
we type <this>, and it does <this>", but saying "Type <this> to do <this>,
or change <this part> and it gets bigger!" Just a thought :)
...Chambers
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
"Tom Melly" <tom### [at] tomandlucouk> wrote in message
news:3c4d9942@news.povray.org...
>
> Actually, just offering a nice printed version of the documentation is a
good
> idea in itself, and could raise some money.
>
> Howzabout the documentation printed on the side of a mug or keyring? ;)
>
Now that would have to be a REALLY large mug.
Gail
--
#macro G(H,S)disc{0z.4pigment{onion color_map{[0rgb<sin(H/pi)cos(S/pi)*(H<6)
cos(S/pi)*(H>6)>*18][.4rgb 0]}}translate<H-5S-3,9>}#end G(3,5)G(2,5.5)G(1,5)
G(.6,4)G(.5,3)G(.6,2)G(1,1)G(2,.5)G(3,.7)G(3.2,1.6)G(3.1,2.5)G(2.2,2.5)G(9,5
)G(8,5.5)G(7,5)G(7,4)G(7.7,3.3)G(8.3,2.7)G(9,2)G(9,1)G(8,.5)G(7,1)//GS
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
On Wed, 23 Jan 2002 07:52:53 +0200, Gail Shaw wrote:
>
> "Tom Melly" <tom### [at] tomandlucouk> wrote in message
> news:3c4d9942@news.povray.org...
>>
>> Actually, just offering a nice printed version of the documentation is a
> good
>> idea in itself, and could raise some money.
>>
>> Howzabout the documentation printed on the side of a mug or keyring? ;)
>>
>
> Now that would have to be a REALLY large mug.
But sadly, still not large enough. They never really are.
--
#macro R(P)z+_(P)_(P)_(P+1)_(P+1)+z#end#macro Q(C,T)bicubic_patch{type 1u_steps
6v_steps 6R(1)R(3)R(5)R(7)pigment{rgb z}}#end#macro _(Y)#local X=asc(substr(C,Y
,1))-65;<T+mod(X,4)div(X,4)9>-2#end#macro O(T)Q("ABEFUQWS",T)Q("WSXTLOJN",T)#
end O(0)O(3)Q("JNKLCGCD",0)light_source{x 1}// ron### [at] povrayorg
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
