Justin Smith <t74### [at] yahoocom> wrote:
> I'm trying to figure out how to code the trunk and branching structure of a
> normal deciduous tree. I took a look at some of the existing trees out
> there, and it seems that using blobs is the way to go. I think I want to
> use an isosurface with blob-like combinations, so that I can use a pigment
> with the function to easily roughen the surface of it.

  Well, if you have a couple of months of spare time to wait for the
render to finish... why not? ;)

  Really, I don't understand why blobs would be the way to go in order to
create trees. In order to make a tree which looks real, you need hundreds
of thousands of small details (leaves, branches, etc). If you make a blob
or isosurface with hundreds of thousands of components, then you'd better
have months of spare time...

  The classical and best approach is to use a triangle mesh. A mesh can
have all the details you need (thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions
of triangles) while still being quite fast and efficient.
  As a bonus, if you copy the tree several times into the scene, it will
take only the memory needed for one tree.

-- 
#macro M(A,N,D,L)plane{-z,-9pigment{mandel L*9translate N color_map{[0rgb x]
[1rgb 9]}scale<D,D*3D>*1e3}rotate y*A*8}#end M(-3<1.206434.28623>70,7)M(
-1<.7438.1795>1,20)M(1<.77595.13699>30,20)M(3<.75923.07145>80,99)// - Warp -

Post a reply to this message