Did the IRTC become the Internet Rendering Tools Competition while I
slept last night?  If not, how did this win?

>RENDERER USED: 
>    3D Studio Max default renderer

And what about this?

>the sun was softened by a fadin Lens Effect Flare
>rendered in Video post.

Can we have a clarification on the question of whether
postprocessing being "built in" to your renderer makes it legal? 
Should I start working on that Photoshop plugin patch for POV-Ray now?

And please note that this is not sour grapes.  I didn't enter the
competition this round.  I'm just disappointed to see a bunch of
imagemaps rendered with a scanline renderer in seven minutes win this
round when there were so many more deserving entries.

Post a reply to this message

Ron Parker wrote:
> 
> Did the IRTC become the Internet Rendering Tools Competition while I
> slept last night?  If not, how did this win?
> 
> >RENDERER USED:
> >    3D Studio Max default renderer
> 
> And what about this?
> 
> >the sun was softened by a fadin Lens Effect Flare
> >rendered in Video post.
> 
> Can we have a clarification on the question of whether
> postprocessing being "built in" to your renderer makes it legal?
> Should I start working on that Photoshop plugin patch for POV-Ray now?
> 
> And please note that this is not sour grapes.  I didn't enter the
> competition this round.  I'm just disappointed to see a bunch of
> imagemaps rendered with a scanline renderer in seven minutes win this
> round when there were so many more deserving entries.


The admins said several times that rendering in general is OK, same with
me. But for the post filters I allways give a malus. Looks like a lot of
people don't read the texts that belong to the pics, but that doesn't
wonder me.
This wasn't the only pic that used postprocessing. Anyway I did enter so
I better shut up! :-P

Marc

-- 
Marc Schimmler

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What we are seeing here is the infamous cross-contamination of voting
categories. If the image looks great it will receive lots of points in
each category regardless of whether it is good in that specific category
or not.
  In this case the technical merit became blown up because the image looks
so pleasant to the eye although the image doesn't deserve it. As you said,
it's only a bunch of image maps rendered on a scanline rendering program
and with possible post-processing. This has no technical merit at all.
Honorable mention for artistic merit? Perhaps. But not a winner, that's for
sure.
  'Canyon' got 13.972 points for TMerit while 'triangle' got 13.514. Almost
the same amount of points although the difference in technical merit is
enormous.

  Why there are different voting categories? Just a few people takes them
into account anyways.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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On Fri, 17 Sep 1999 03:26:26 GMT, par### [at] fwicom (Ron Parker) wrote:

>Did the IRTC become the Internet Rendering Tools Competition while I
>slept last night?  If not, how did this win?
>
>>RENDERER USED: 
>>    3D Studio Max default renderer
>
>And what about this?
>
>>the sun was softened by a fadin Lens Effect Flare
>>rendered in Video post.
>
>Can we have a clarification on the question of whether
>postprocessing being "built in" to your renderer makes it legal? 
>Should I start working on that Photoshop plugin patch for POV-Ray now?
>
>And please note that this is not sour grapes.  I didn't enter the
>competition this round.  I'm just disappointed to see a bunch of
>imagemaps rendered with a scanline renderer in seven minutes win this
>round when there were so many more deserving entries.

I have been pondering on how IRTC submissions may be judged to give a result which the
majority think is a fair outcome.  It's a controversial subject because it must
involve
that most personal of human attributes - judgement.

 I suspect that many people, like me, find it difficult to judge technical merit
because
1) the entrants don't give enough technical detail (fair enough if you first language
isn't English)
2) my experience is limited to ray tracing with POV and I don't know how easy, or hard
it
is to generate scenes using other methods such as line scan rendering.

I would also like to say that rendering time is no help whatsoever in judging merit in
any
of the categories.  I accept Juha's point about "cross contamination" but I like the
idea
of the three criteria and don't see how it would be possible to avoid a judgment on,
say,
artistic merit, having some effect on one's feelings about the technical merit of a
submission.

One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images of
the
same scene from different viewpoints.  This fairly simple modification to the rules
may
stick in the gullets of those artists who believe that any scene has only one perfect
composition, but it may help to sort out some of the image plasterers from the true
ray
tracers.  The use of two images would allow an overall artistic view of the scene, and
a
close-up showing some of the interesting technical detail. It should help to give a
better
appreciation of technical merit.

Another, more controversial suggestion, might be some sort of weighted apportionment
of
the points awarded.  But on reflection I think not :-) 

Just to quell any suggestions of sour grapes, I think my result this time, 31st out of
 87
is pretty fair, but I was sorry that Christian Radek's image of the same subject as
mine
only merited 8th place.  I fear that he suffered because there were two similar
images.
Lighthouses may have suffered similarly, but this suggestion falls down in the case of
Pyramids :-)
David 
------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

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David Wilkinson wrote:
> 
[snip]
> 
> One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images of
the
> same scene from different viewpoints.
[snip]

Well this would certainly weed out a lot of the raytraced entries.

Cheers PoD.

Post a reply to this message

PoD wrote:
> 
> David Wilkinson wrote:
> >
> [snip]
> >
> > One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images
of the
> > same scene from different viewpoints.
> [snip]
> 
> Well this would certainly weed out a lot of the raytraced entries.
> 
> Cheers PoD.

Not to mention that it would nearly double the storage space requirments
at the contests server and it would require greater bandwidth to download
double the number of images. I don't think this is practicle at all.

-- 
Ken Tyler

See my 1000+ Povray and 3D Rendering and Raytracing Links at:
http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

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On Sun, 19 Sep 1999 07:08:27 +0930, PoD <pod### [at] merlinnetau> wrote:

>David Wilkinson wrote:
>> 
>[snip]
>> 
>> One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images
of the
>> same scene from different viewpoints.
>[snip]
>
>Well this would certainly weed out a lot of the raytraced entries.
>
>Cheers PoD.

Do you mean that ray tracers can't find more than one veiwpoint?
David

------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

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On Sat, 18 Sep 1999 14:45:25 -0700, Ken <tyl### [at] pacbellnet> wrote:


>
>Not to mention that it would nearly double the storage space requirments
>at the contests server and it would require greater bandwidth to download
>double the number of images. I don't think this is practicle at all.

Well perhaps we could restrict image size to 640x480  (or smaller)
There must be some way I can get higher in the table without having to produce better
images.
David

------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

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David Wilkinson wrote:

> >Well this would certainly weed out a lot of the raytraced entries.
> >
> >Cheers PoD.
> 
> Do you mean that ray tracers can't find more than one veiwpoint?
> David

  Actually I think he was thinking about the amount of time it takes to
raytrace a scene vs. scanline render a scene. Scanline rendering is
generaly much faster than raytracing and those that wait until the last
minute with their submissions because of bloated raytracing times will
never have a chance to wait on a second render to finish.

-- 
Ken Tyler

See my 1000+ Povray and 3D Rendering and Raytracing Links at:
http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

Post a reply to this message

David Wilkinson wrote:
> 
> On Sat, 18 Sep 1999 14:45:25 -0700, Ken <tyl### [at] pacbellnet> wrote:
> 
> >
> >Not to mention that it would nearly double the storage space requirments
> >at the contests server and it would require greater bandwidth to download
> >double the number of images. I don't think this is practicle at all.
> 
> Well perhaps we could restrict image size to 640x480  (or smaller)
> There must be some way I can get higher in the table without having to produce
better
> images.
> David

I see. David wants to level the playing field a bit in compensation for his
talent or lack thereof.

Perhaps instead there should be two competitions. One for the novice and
one for the advanced.

-- 
Ken Tyler

See my 1000+ Povray and 3D Rendering and Raytracing Links at:
http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

Post a reply to this message

On Sat, 18 Sep 1999 17:32:09 -0700, Ken <tyl### [at] pacbellnet> wrote:

>> Well perhaps we could restrict image size to 640x480  (or smaller)
>> There must be some way I can get higher in the table without having to produce
better
>> images.
>> David
>
>I see. David wants to level the playing field a bit in compensation for his
>talent or lack thereof.
>
>Perhaps instead there should be two competitions. One for the novice and
>one for the advanced.

Yes, the novices submit one image, the rest submit two.
David
------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

Post a reply to this message

You could cheat with a reflective plane. 

David Wilkinson wrote:
> 
> On Fri, 17 Sep 1999 03:26:26 GMT, par### [at] fwicom (Ron Parker) wrote:
> 
> >Did the IRTC become the Internet Rendering Tools Competition while I
> >slept last night?  If not, how did this win?
> >
> >>RENDERER USED:
> >>    3D Studio Max default renderer
> >
> >And what about this?
> >
> >>the sun was softened by a fadin Lens Effect Flare
> >>rendered in Video post.
> >
> >Can we have a clarification on the question of whether
> >postprocessing being "built in" to your renderer makes it legal?
> >Should I start working on that Photoshop plugin patch for POV-Ray now?
> >
> >And please note that this is not sour grapes.  I didn't enter the
> >competition this round.  I'm just disappointed to see a bunch of
> >imagemaps rendered with a scanline renderer in seven minutes win this
> >round when there were so many more deserving entries.
> 
> I have been pondering on how IRTC submissions may be judged to give a result which
the
> majority think is a fair outcome.  It's a controversial subject because it must
involve
> that most personal of human attributes - judgement.
> 
>  I suspect that many people, like me, find it difficult to judge technical merit
because
> 1) the entrants don't give enough technical detail (fair enough if you first
language
> isn't English)
> 2) my experience is limited to ray tracing with POV and I don't know how easy, or
hard it
> is to generate scenes using other methods such as line scan rendering.
> 
> I would also like to say that rendering time is no help whatsoever in judging merit
in any
> of the categories.  I accept Juha's point about "cross contamination" but I like the
idea
> of the three criteria and don't see how it would be possible to avoid a judgment on,
say,
> artistic merit, having some effect on one's feelings about the technical merit of a
> submission.
> 
> One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images of
the
> same scene from different viewpoints.  This fairly simple modification to the rules
may
> stick in the gullets of those artists who believe that any scene has only one
perfect
> composition, but it may help to sort out some of the image plasterers from the true
ray
> tracers.  The use of two images would allow an overall artistic view of the scene,
and a
> close-up showing some of the interesting technical detail. It should help to give a
better
> appreciation of technical merit.
> 
> Another, more controversial suggestion, might be some sort of weighted apportionment
of
> the points awarded.  But on reflection I think not :-)
> 
> Just to quell any suggestions of sour grapes, I think my result this time, 31st out
of  87
> is pretty fair, but I was sorry that Christian Radek's image of the same subject as
mine
> only merited 8th place.  I fear that he suffered because there were two similar
images.
> Lighthouses may have suffered similarly, but this suggestion falls down in the case
of
> Pyramids :-)
> David
> ------------
> dav### [at] cwcomnet
> http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
> ------------

-- 
Cheers       
Steve        email: mailto:sjl### [at] ndirectcouk   

%HAV-A-NICEDAY Error not enough coffee.   0 PPS

web: http://www.ndirect.co.uk/~sjlen/   
 or: http://start.at/zero-pps

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David would have to enter the Advanced class, hopefully people
like him would be disqualified if they tryed to enter that
complicated stuff in the novice class. 

Ken wrote:
> 
> David Wilkinson wrote:
> >
> > On Sat, 18 Sep 1999 14:45:25 -0700, Ken <tyl### [at] pacbellnet> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >Not to mention that it would nearly double the storage space requirments
> > >at the contests server and it would require greater bandwidth to download
> > >double the number of images. I don't think this is practicle at all.
> >
> > Well perhaps we could restrict image size to 640x480  (or smaller)
> > There must be some way I can get higher in the table without having to produce
better
> > images.
> > David
> 
> I see. David wants to level the playing field a bit in compensation for his
> talent or lack thereof.
> 
> Perhaps instead there should be two competitions. One for the novice and
> one for the advanced.
> 
> --
> Ken Tyler
> 
> See my 1000+ Povray and 3D Rendering and Raytracing Links at:
> http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

-- 
Cheers       
Steve        email: mailto:sjl### [at] ndirectcouk   

%HAV-A-NICEDAY Error not enough coffee.   0 PPS

web: http://www.ndirect.co.uk/~sjlen/   
 or: http://start.at/zero-pps

Post a reply to this message

On Sat, 18 Sep 1999 23:24:09 +0100, Steve <sjl### [at] hotmailcouk> wrote:

>You could cheat with a reflective plane. 
>
I suppose it's possible, but this would show a fair degree of technical achievement
:-)
David
------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

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Ken wrote:
> 
> David Wilkinson wrote:
> 
> > >Well this would certainly weed out a lot of the raytraced entries.
> > >
> > >Cheers PoD.
> >
> > Do you mean that ray tracers can't find more than one veiwpoint?
> > David
> 
>   Actually I think he was thinking about the amount of time it takes to
> raytrace a scene vs. scanline render a scene. Scanline rendering is
> generaly much faster than raytracing and those that wait until the last
> minute with their submissions because of bloated raytracing times will
> never have a chance to wait on a second render to finish.
> 
> --
> Ken Tyler
> 
> See my 1000+ Povray and 3D Rendering and Raytracing Links at:
> http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

Indeed.  I've done some scenes (not for IRTC) which are fairly simple in
concept but very slow to render, so an extra image would increase the
total time required significantly.

Cheers, PoD.

Post a reply to this message

Ron Parker wrote:
> 
> Did the IRTC become the Internet Rendering Tools Competition while I
> slept last night?  If not, how did this win?
> 
> >RENDERER USED:
> >    3D Studio Max default renderer
> 
> And what about this?
> 
> >the sun was softened by a fadin Lens Effect Flare
> >rendered in Video post.
> 
> Can we have a clarification on the question of whether
> postprocessing being "built in" to your renderer makes it legal?
> Should I start working on that Photoshop plugin patch for POV-Ray now?
> 
> And please note that this is not sour grapes.  I didn't enter the
> competition this round.  I'm just disappointed to see a bunch of
> imagemaps rendered with a scanline renderer in seven minutes win this
> round when there were so many more deserving entries.

	If you don't mind my saying, I have been thinking of testing the
envelop or pushing the loophole to see what happens. I can make
PS sit up and beg and I have been thinking of exactly that. Do as
much as possible in PS and then run a two minute render and see
how it fares. 

	My original interest in POV was to do things that are hard in PS
and got addicted. No more struggling with textures just crank
them out. This time (six foot cockroach) I got a compliment on
the wallpaper and I stated that it was created in PS. 

	Anyone else feel like testing the limits? As long as it crawls
through a renderer at some point it appears to be acceptable. And
then renderer appears to mean that the package uses the word
render in its sales brochure. 

-- 
http://www.giwersworld.org/artiii/

Oh my God! They've rendered Kenny!

How to profit from the end of civilization as know it available
here 
soon.

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David Wilkinson wrote:

>  I suspect that many people, like me, find it difficult to judge technical merit
because
> 1) the entrants don't give enough technical detail (fair enough if you first
language
> isn't English)
> 2) my experience is limited to ray tracing with POV and I don't know how easy, or
hard it
> is to generate scenes using other methods such as line scan rendering.

	The following took about 10 minutes (start to finish) with
photoshop. 

http://giwersworld.org/artii/nraol.jpg

	This one about an hour total including modifying the psi
charcter

http://giwersworld.org/artii/psicorp.jpg

	It takes some hours in hell with PS and the plug-ins to learn it
and I have some thousands of those hours. But I get feedback on
my attempt in a couple seconds not hours regardless of
complexity. I can gat a new trial and error faster than I can
change the code in POV. 

	And anyone try this in POV

http://giwersworld.org/artii/perspec.jpg

	and that was just noodling around with one of the plugins. I
don't remember how long it took. 

	So that is the difference to me. 

	Now look at this one. 

http://giwersworld.org/artii/pattack.jpg

	The pyramid and the flyers are POV. The rest is PS and plugins.
The benefit I first expected from POV is that I can get different
perspectives and viewpoints on the POV parts trivially. But in PS
I cannot move the ground plane without planning way ahead to want
to move it and duplicating it without planning to do so is
essentially impossible. But this was also just playing around one
night, maybe a couple hours with a dozen variances and no
planning at all. 

	OK, I have bored you and bragged but those are examples of the
differences between POV and raster rendering. 

	So yes, once raster rendering is considered the same as
raytracing we might as well shitcan POV usage in the IRTC. And PS
5.x has added animation features such that if characters don't
turn or the camera does not change distance POV is out for that
also. 
 
> One positive suggestion I make is that entrants should have to provide two images of
the
> same scene from different viewpoints.  

	An outstanding suggestion! It would wipe out the raster
renderers completely. 

-- 
http://www.giwersworld.org/artiii/

Oh my God! They've rendered Kenny!

How to profit from the end of civilization as know it available 
here soon.

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Ken wrote:

> Not to mention that it would nearly double the storage space requirments
> at the contests server and it would require greater bandwidth to download
> double the number of images. I don't think this is practicle at all.

	Not impractical as the famous last words of someone who doesn't
have to do it. 33.6k is finally falling so 56.6k can become the
most common dialups so switching to doubling (by the time it is
done) should not harm the download time per voter. The second can
be smaller size and lower quality as it would just be a proof
against raster rendering so both storage and bandwidth are not
really harmed. 

	But then it gets complicated and technical requirements to
english speakers often fail. Language barriers are still real
barriers. But I did just find a dutch site yesterday announcing
the dutch version of the site would no longer be updated. The
common internet language wouldn't bother me if it were Italian or
Swahili -- only if it were French. Just wish there were only one. 

-- 
http://www.giwersworld.org/artiii/

Oh my God! They've rendered Kenny!

How to profit from the end of civilization as know it available 
here soon.

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Ken wrote:

> Perhaps instead there should be two competitions. One for the novice and
> one for the advanced.

	And who is a novice? asked the doubting Pilate before the
creator of Mortal Combat could give him an answer.

-- 
http://www.giwersworld.org/artiii/

Oh my God! They've rendered Kenny!

How to profit from the end of civilization as know it available 
here soon.

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Matt Giwer <mgi### [at] giwersworldorg> wrote:
: 	And who is a novice?

  The one who gets less than 10 points in the hardcore povrayer test :)

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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On Sat, 20 Nov 1999 05:05:41 -0500, Matt Giwer <mgi### [at] giwersworldorg> wrote:

>	The following took about 10 minutes (start to finish) with
>photoshop. 
>
>http://giwersworld.org/artii/nraol.jpg
>
>	This one about an hour total including modifying the psi
>charcter
>
>http://giwersworld.org/artii/psicorp.jpg
>
>	It takes some hours in hell with PS and the plug-ins to learn it
>and I have some thousands of those hours. But I get feedback on
>my attempt in a couple seconds not hours regardless of
>complexity. I can gat a new trial and error faster than I can
>change the code in POV. 
>
>	And anyone try this in POV
>
>http://giwersworld.org/artii/perspec.jpg
>
>	and that was just noodling around with one of the plugins. I
>don't remember how long it took. 
>
>	So that is the difference to me. 
>
>	Now look at this one. 
>
>http://giwersworld.org/artii/pattack.jpg
>
>	The pyramid and the flyers are POV. The rest is PS and plugins.
>The benefit I first expected from POV is that I can get different
>perspectives and viewpoints on the POV parts trivially. But in PS
>I cannot move the ground plane without planning way ahead to want
>to move it and duplicating it without planning to do so is
>essentially impossible. But this was also just playing around one
>night, maybe a couple hours with a dozen variances and no
>planning at all. 
>
>	OK, I have bored you and bragged but those are examples of the
>differences between POV and raster rendering. 
>
 
The thread you just responded to, Matt, is two months old and I've nearly forgotten
why I
got so heated about things then.

I've had a good look at all the images you mentioned (and had a good browse around
your
web site :-)  I like to make positive comments about peoples' images (or suggest how I
think that they might be improved)  I had penned some comments on your images, but
have
decided not to post them as I am unable to be positive and cannot suggest any
improvements.

Thanks for getting me to look at them anyway.

It still doesn't help me much with my quandary of not being able to judge technical
merit
in an image when I haven't had experience in using methods other than POV-Ray.  Well I
suppose that's not entirely true as I have created images using Corel and similar
packages, but unlike you I have not spent hundreds of hours getting to know how to use
them best.  If and when I next enter the IRTC I suppose I shall just have to do as
before
and rely on fallible human judgement when voting on the other entries.

CU in another two months.

David
------------
dav### [at] cwcomnet
http://www.hamiltonite.mcmail.com
------------

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Nieminen Juha <war### [at] punarastascstutfi> wrote:
> Matt Giwer <mgi### [at] giwersworldorg> wrote:
> : 	And who is a novice?

>   The one who gets less than 10 points in the hardcore povrayer test :)

Actually, I'd do it like they do for costuming competitions at SF cons I've
been to.  You're a novice until you've won an award in the novice category,
then you're a journeyman.  When you've won 3 awards as a journeyman, you
become a master/advanced user.  Mind, this would be three categories, but
it'd work for 2 as well.  You could also do something of the form of "n
points where first gives you 4, 2nd 3, 3rd 2, and each category mention 1"
jumps you a rank.  It would require a bit of bookkeeping on someone's part,
though (could write a script to do it)

Geoff

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So you will write a script that tracks all of our POV knowledge in the style
of a Sci Fi Convention costuming competition?  I'll come as the Y axis --
and later, when I've had a bit to drink, the Z axis.

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Ian Witham <ian### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> So you will write a script that tracks all of our POV knowledge in the style
> of a Sci Fi Convention costuming competition?  I'll come as the Y axis --
> and later, when I've had a bit to drink, the Z axis.


Er, not exactly.  You track based on how well people have done previously in
the competition.  So everyone is considered a novice until they've proven
otherwise.  I'm not sure there's enough people entering the competition each
time, though.

Geoff

(and yes, I know you were just having fun, but...)

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