Just a thought, because the models at

http://www-graphics.stanford.edu/data/3Dscanrep/

keep coming up, is it worth adding a few of the smaller ones, in mesh2 .inc
files, to the object collection? I know anyone can go here and download/convert
etc for themselves, but not everyone will know they're available, or have the
necessary knowledge to do the conversion. It took me quite a while to hunt down
the relevant tools when I first got hold of them.

I was thinking of the utah teapot, the bunny, the chinese dragon, maybe even the
happy buddha. This of course raises the questions of a) would it be legal? and
b) is there enough space on the server?

Bill

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"Bill Pragnell" <bil### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message 
news:web.4992b3d741d0d9376dd25f0b0@news.povray.org...
> Just a thought, because the models at
>
> http://www-graphics.stanford.edu/data/3Dscanrep/
>
> keep coming up, is it worth adding a few of the smaller ones, in mesh2 
> .inc
> files, to the object collection? I know anyone can go here and 
> download/convert
> etc for themselves, but not everyone will know they're available, or have 
> the
> necessary knowledge to do the conversion. It took me quite a while to hunt 
> down
> the relevant tools when I first got hold of them.
>
> I was thinking of the utah teapot, the bunny, the chinese dragon, maybe 
> even the
> happy buddha. This of course raises the questions of a) would it be legal? 
> and
> b) is there enough space on the server?
>
> Bill

Hi Bill,

So far as I'm aware, space isn't a particular issue, the licensing is. The 
POV-Ray Object Collection is all under the CC-LGPL, which is one of the most 
liberal licenses around, authorising use, modification and redistribution 
with very few restrictions.  Stanford say that "such models or images are 
not to be used for commercial purposes, nor should they appear in a product 
for sale (with the exception of scholarly journals or books), without our 
permission". They also ask that some of their models are not used in 
specific ways (so no exploding Buddhas).

However, they don't exclude specific permissions being granted. So if you 
can get permission to redistribute particular converted POV-Ray format 
models on a CC-LGPL license then that would be fine. They may be prepared to 
do this for the Stanford Bunny and the TeaPot for example as they are pretty 
well everywhere anyway.

Otherwise, you might consider writing up the technique on the Wiki. You can 
of course load any supporting macros, textures or other bits and pieces that 
you have copyright over onto the object collection.

Regards,
Chris B.

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"Chris B" <nom### [at] nomailcom> wrote:
> So far as I'm aware, space isn't a particular issue, the licensing is.
[snip]

Yes, of course, I hadn't thought of that.

> They also ask that some of their models are not used in
> specific ways (so no exploding Buddhas).

Spoilsports! ;-)

> Otherwise, you might consider writing up the technique on the Wiki.

Yes, that's true, I hadn't thought of that either!

It's likely that the utah teapot is a free-for-all, given that it's actually not
part of the scanned objects site, and the patch control points are everywhere. I
think some versions of OpenGL even use it as a primitive! But I'll make sure if
I ever follow this up.

Thanks for clarifying.

Bill

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