"Kenneth" <kdw### [at] earthlinknet> wrote in message 
news:web.442101aa6340e35ca0aec440@news.povray.org...
>
> Nicely done!  (One of my favorite ST episodes as well.) Actually, your
> multi-sphere placement DOES look hexagonal to me; good job.

Thank you, Ken. Maybe depends on how you look at it. It's actually spiraling 
lines, with a twist. I've used more than one set of spheres for the 
yellow-white group by changing the incremental value added in the other 
loops and using a slightly different sphere size. It's terribly sloppy 
because that put spheres within spheres but it helped get variances in the 
pulses of light without trying to find other ways to pattern their 
locations.
Here's one loop:

#local n=500;
#local i=1; // initial value. could begin at 2 or ?

#while (i<=n)

#local h = -1 + 2*(i-1)/(n-1);
#local theta=acos(h);

#if (i=1 | i=n) // need to match above initial value
#local phi = 0;
#else
#local phi = i; // was: (phi[k-1] + 3.6/sqrt(N*(1-h^2))) mod (2*pi)
#end

sphere {
 <cos(phi)*sin(theta), sin(phi)*sin(theta), cos(theta)>, 0.06
 hollow
}

#local i=i+3; // would otherwise be +1 or +2

#end

Converted from what I found in a search, which used arrays instead, I almost 
got nowhere with it until I removed that modulus (did try correct syntax for 
POV) from phi and just used the increment value (was k, changed to i). It 
had been placing spheres pseudorandomly before that. Or I just didn't get 
the conversion right.

> I seem to recall (a fading memory...kind of like your video ;-)  ) that 
> the
> small spheres may have been larger/closer together. Filling up more of the
> intervening spaces. Just a guess.

I was surprised to find out the smaller light spheres aren't two different 
colors in two different places, even after such a recent watching of the TV 
show being fresh in my mind. So, in one way it has more spacing and another 
it doesn't. I searched for Fesarius and found this:

http://www.memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Fesarius

> How about posting a larger image of your Enterprise model? Looks good.

Thanks again. You will see how crude it really is now! I think I've put the 
nacelles on there wrong, too low, but I haven't even checked against another 
model or picture until now. It was only put in there for the scale effect.

-- 
Bob H  www.3digitaleyes.com
http://3digitaleyes.com/imagery/

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