"Peter Popov" <pet### [at] usanet> writes:
>
> Thomas Willhalm wrote in message ...
> 
> >Another method, which I already used, is to incorporate human knowledge
> >about the scene. More precisely, in a scene where a disco ball is lit
> >by a spot light, it is known where to place the virtual lights (if we
> >assume one light per mirror). Using the capabilities of the POV-Ray
> >language is it possible the automatically calculate the position of
> >these light sources, their respective directions, and the test whether
> >they are in the shadow of the disco ball. I know this, because I've done
> >it. The result is at
> >http://www.fmi.uni-konstanz.de/~willhalm/graphics/tracegallery/
> >I have even created an animation of my disco ball.
> 
> If your disco ball is the one posted in binaries.images, it is what made my
> cpu think a little on the subject.

Yes, it is.

For the integration of reflected light in POV-Ray, I think we should take
a look at the work that has already been done. Last weekend -- clearing up
my room -- I found a copy a paper with an interesting topic:

Illumination from Curved Reflectors

Pat Hanrahan and Don Mitchell. 
Computer Graphics (Proc. SIGGRAPH 1992), July 1992 

http://www-graphics.stanford.edu/papers/reflectors/

I haven't read it yet, and I'm not sure whether the presented technique can
be used in POV-Ray, but the images look promising.

Another article that sounds interesting is:
Monte Carlo techniques for direct lighting calculations 
Peter Shirley, Changyaw Wang and Kurt Zimmerman
ACM Transactions on Graphics
Volume 15, No. 1 (Jan. 1996)
Pages 1-36

However, I don't have a copy of it (yet).

Thomas

-- 
http://www.fmi.uni-konstanz.de/~willhalm

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