Thanks to everyone who voted for my anim.

From ssh### [at] shelbyvisioncom:
> Very well done, I only had to view it once to get the point.

Well, the dialog is easier to follow than the Rusty entry.

From emp### [at] yahoocom:
> Color is everything, there is too much grey in this animation. 

If color were everything, the winner for the "Force of Nature" round would have
been different...

From ric### [at] brickbotscom:

> Wow, two entries this month!  I had to check again and again as the two entries
> have very different lighting and such.  

They are different, thematically.  In the future the Greb and the starbots will
no longer be appearing in Rusty animations; I intend to develop them into a
separate body of work, although I may not get an entry into every round.

> Technical:
> I liked your lighting model on this one.  My only suggestion would be to use
> more lights, or a larger shadow map filter, or both.

The robots are quite content with the light levels.

> There were some parts where I could see the individual shadows from the
> environmental lights as they did not quite merge.

The shadows are supposed to look that way.

> Again all the textures and surfaces were very flat and clean, which is more
> appropriate for a space like environment, but still a bit bland.

The robots don't seem to mind.

> Another nice set of motions from the robots.

Robots are generally very easy to animate.

> Nice attention to detail, rounding off all the corners to help catch the
> highlights, having the camera on the top of the iron lung correctly follow
> the captain, the captain breathing.. all very cool.

Rounding things off is probably the most time-consuming, but important,
step in modeling POV-Ray objects.  The captain breathing was quite simple;
all I did was build an extendable "bone" and attach some of the chests's
hull vertices to the moving end of the bone.  A simple POV-Ray #declare
sets the bone length to a changing value.

> Artistic:
> I think one of the best shots of the whole piece is the first one.  It is a
> great way to start the story.  But, there is always a but, I would have pushed
> the control box to the right hand side of the frame.  Stylistically, I think
> the whole thing is a bit spartan.  Perhaps this is appropriate for robots? 

Yes.

> Just maybe bumping out a section of wall here, or there, might help to break up
> the big rectangular expanses of wall and floor.  I did really like the detail
> on the door, and carrying this sort of extra detail through would have added a
> bit.  I did not really like the checkerboard floor, but after thinking about it
> for some time, I am not sure what I would do in its place.

There's actually a rationale for the austerity, which could not be communcated in
a non-annoying way in the animation.

> Theme:
> The passing of an eon.

I think you meant "era."

> I liked it! Especially the interchange about tiredness, which contrasted the
> two different worlds that the organic and mechanical inhabit, and the metaphor
> of a journey.  I think it could have been even better if the master had spent
> a bit more time with some words of wisdom about the end of things, or there was
> a bit more conflict between the captain and the master.

The rationale for everything here is that there is exactly one living member of
the Falkesian species left (well, now zero).  At his command are the many millions
of robots that the Falkesians have built over the years.  They are programmed to
keep him alive at any cost and to obey his every command.  He has in fact been
planning his own death for some time.  His medical staff will not obey the command
to disconnect the equipment; unlike the captain, they know his life depends on the
machines.  For the past weeks he has been summoning various robots from throughout
his empire, and has been giving them principles to follow when he is gone.  This
was done not only to provide guidance for the time after he passes on, but also
to ensure that when he finally calls in the robot who will end his life, the
medical staff does not suspect anything until it is too late.

The robots built all of the scenery you see here, and when doing so they thought
of nothing other than functionality; where available they used the designs that
their creators had already been using.

> It seems to me the captain must have known what the master was asking, but the
> captain did not object or question.

The captain was chosen specifically for his ignorance of what he was being
commanded to do.  The green robot (his chief medical bot) would never have obeyed
this order, and if present in the room would have commanded the guard bots to
destroy the captain the moment he moved one millimeter in obedience to the
command to shut off the equipment.

> I guess I am saying I think that the climax could have been a bit more intense
> if it was a little longer with more conflict.

Well, the Master has been planning this to minimize the conflict...

> From Mar### [at] asamnetde:
> This is an excellent example of what's possible with POVray. Congratulations!

Thanks!

> From irt### [at] yahoocouk:

> That looks like Homer Simpson in the suit: "Mmmmmmmmm, surface subdivision".

I colored him yellow to make sure that he wouldn't be mistaken for human...
I made the eyeballs light blue for that reason as well.

> It is always difficult to find something bad to say about your work
> without nit-picking and this is no exception. I think the worst
> thing about this is the larger than necessary amount of space on
> either side of the 'i' in 'Passing' in the opening titles.

It's a fixed-width font.

> My only real criticism is that not enough happens in it to justify
> the 97 seconds running time.

The subtitles are all timed to present the text for as long as a human would
take to speak them (I used a stopwatch to set the duration of each one).  One of
the Master's dialog shots was 15 seconds long, and in regular production I would
have cut to other views once or twice.  But to do what happened here and say what
gets said would take about that much time in a production with sound.

From file:
> a bit depressing, but hey, that's death. I really like the conecpt.

Thanks.

Regards,
John

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