OK everyone, here's a tuff little cookie for you...

How do you make something *look* reflective? How do you make something
*look* transparent?

Of course, making something reflective is easy - just add the appropreate
block to the texture statement. But that doesn't necessarily make the object
*look* reflective... For example, take a shiny white sphere, and add a
reflection statement. Since there is nothing else in the scene, the
resulting image is identical. The sphere IS reflective, but still doesn't
LOOK reflective. Ditto for refraction.

Now, I find that if the surfaces in question are curved, animating the scene
so that the surface itself or something else in the scene moves immediately
gives the desired effect. But how do you make objects in still images look
right?

Don't get me wrong - I have managed to do it before now. I'm just asking if
anyone out there has any specific tips on how to do this. (Aside from the
obviouse "have something else in the scene to reflect/refract"!)

What kinds of things make for good reflections/refractions? Checkered floors
tend to emphasise the curved nature of non-flat surfaces, but the image can
get rather "busy" and confusing to look at. Stone-like or shy-like textures
seem to work better, but I still have trouble finding good colours.

In particular, the reflections/refractions can make an object look the wrong
colour - that is, sometimes it looks like the object itself is coloured and
the image being reflected in black and white... Is there a general answer
these sorts of questions, or is it just a case of fiddling for hours until
it looks right?

OK, well, let's see what people can come up with...

Thanks.
Andrew.

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