"FrogRay" <nomail@nomail> wrote:
> Hello all,
>   I have just updated my Povray Height-Field tutorial located at
> http://homepages.xnet.co.nz/~calculus/index.html

Nice work. A good addition to the tutorials out there.  I'm sure it will be
appreciated my many new POV-er's.

Actually, I've always felt that POV-Ray's own description of a heightfield,
and how to create one, is a bit too "technical" for newbies.  I remember
being *completely* flummoxed when I first read about it. Scratched my head
about it for quite awhile. Of course, the description makes perfect
sense--*after* you know what it's all about!  If *I* were to try and
explain a heightfield to a newbie, I think I would dispense (temporarily)
with all the "x/y" jargon, and just say (--trumpet fanfare here--):  It's
just a square horizontal surface, a shell with no thickness, made of many
small connected triangles; this surface is automatically "extruded" or bent
by a user-supplied image--either color or grayscale.  (Leaving out
procedural heightfields for the moment, which are beyond a newbie anyway.)
The image distorts the field of triangles, based on its color or brightness
at any point.

Of course, as Mr. Spock used to say, such a description is "less technical,
therefore less accurate."  Probably true.  But newbies don't need to be
inundated with tech jargon, that they probably don't even fully understand
yet. And a heightfield is certainly one of those "Wow!" techniques /
objects that a beginner would like to jump right into.  I know I did!

Ken W.

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