POV-Ray : Newsgroups : irtc.stills : Well, that was unrewarding : Re: Well, that was unrewarding Server Time
11 Jan 2025 05:52:38 EST (-0500)
  Re: Well, that was unrewarding  
From: Ron Parker
Date: 27 Mar 2001 09:32:19
Message: <slrn9c193k.4sv.ron.parker@fwi.com>
On Tue, 27 Mar 2001 14:57:42 +0100, Tom Melly wrote:
>Here are mine:
>
>Apart from the sun, the textures are very grainy (what is the grail
>reflecting? whatever it is, it doesn't look very nice).
>
>IMHO, the pic seems cluttered and unfocused - it might be better if you
>dropped the other objects apart from the grail, and dropped the egg as well.
>
>The planet at the right is clipped too much by the edge of the picture.
>
>Is there any AA on this? It seems very jaggy, particularily the edge of the
>sun.

It's hard to use AA with a granite starfield and get anything resembling
stars.  

Please note that I wasn't eligible to vote in this round, so I didn't 
rate this image against the others.  If I had, I think I'd rate the 
concept a little higher than average, the technical merit a little below
average, and the artistic merit right about average (since I fail to see
what "artistic merit" is if it isn't a combination of concept and technical 
merit...  but that's another discussion.)

Tina, please don't take these comments too hard.  We were all beginners
once.  The only time I've ever entered the IRTC I got dinged pretty 
heavily on technical issues, too, so I don't pretend to be an expert.
Nevertheless, if you'd like more information on any of the comments below,
or if you'd like some help understanding or fixing something from the list
below, don't hesitate to ask.  There are a lot of very generous and talented 
people who frequent this server, and I'm sure most of them would love to
help make your next IRTC entry the best it can be.

Technical comments:

- The camera angle is too wide.  Sun and Earth are both stretched in an 
  unattractive way due to the wide perspective. 

- Some of the larger stars look more like water spots.  I realize this is a
  side-effect of the granite texture.  Perhaps the effect could have been
  lessened by reducing the brightness of the larger stars to make them stand
  out less.

- The CSG on the three religious symbols is a little spotty.  There's a 
  coincident surface problem with the cross, the points of the Muslim star 
  don't line up right, and the Star of David has different-sized points and
  the tips of the points aren't joined cleanly.

- The texture on Earth is a little simplistic.  No clouds, the landmasses
  are uniformly bright green... an image map, even a small one, would have 
  helped here.

- I like the grail itself.  It appears to be well-modeled, and the texture
  is evocative of turned metal.  The idea that the real grail would have 
  been turned (or even metal!) might be a little anachronistic, but I like 
  the effect anyway.

- The lighting is good.  It definitely adds something to the metallic
  texture.

Conceptual comments:

- I'm not sure what that magenta stuff is.

-- 
Ron Parker   http://www2.fwi.com/~parkerr/traces.html
My opinions.  Mine.  Not anyone else's.


Post a reply to this message

Copyright 2003-2023 Persistence of Vision Raytracer Pty. Ltd.