In article <387f5a27@news.povray.org>, "TonyB" 
<ben### [at] panamaphoenixnet> wrote:

> You can also use hf_height_at.

You could, I think that patch was also included in MegaPOV. But it seems 
to just be redundant to me, and nowhere near as versatile/flexible as 
trace().

With trace(), you can easily set up your placement algorithm, and if you 
decide you want to have a box embedded into your height field, you could 
just use a union of the box and height field. With hf_height_at, you 
would have to manually check for intersection with the box, and would 
probably end up using trace() anyway. And if you decide to use an 
isosurface instead of a height field, hf_height_at is useless.

Also,  trace() can give the normal of a surface, which can be useful in 
the realistic placement of objects.

But you are right, I had forgotten about that patch, and it can be used 
if you are only using a height field and if you know you will always be 
using a height field.

-- 
Chris Huff
e-mail: chr### [at] yahoocom
Web page: http://chrishuff.dhs.org/

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