Hi there

OK, this is basically how to use the clock variable - how it works is,
if you tell POV-Ray to render multiple frames, it renders the first
frame with the variable 'clock' set to 0, the last one with clock=1, and
automatically works out the clock values in-between.

This piece of code creates a box rotating around the y-axis:

object {
  box {<-1,-1,-1>, <1,1,1>}
  texture {
  pigment {colour Blue}
  rotate <0, clock*360, 0>
}

- to render it across twenty animation frames, use the command line
switches

POVRAY <other switches> +KFI1 +KFF20

(KFIn = initial frame number n, KFFn = final frame number n)

A useful tip for animation loops is to render one more frame than
needed, ie. render 21 frames rather than 20, and then delete the last
frame file before you 'compile' the animation, since if you just compile
a normal frame sequence the first and last frames are identical and
there's a noticeable stutter in the animation loop.

Hope this is some help to you.

Dylan

Post a reply to this message

On Wed, 05 Nov 1997 17:02:09 +0000, Dylan Beattie
<dmb### [at] ecssotonacuk-NOSPAM> wrote:

>A useful tip for animation loops is to render one more frame than
>needed, ie. render 21 frames rather than 20, and then delete the last
>frame file before you 'compile' the animation, since if you just compile
>a normal frame sequence the first and last frames are identical and
>there's a noticeable stutter in the animation loop.
>
>Hope this is some help to you.
>
>Dylan

An alternative to this method is to use the POV-Ray +KC switch to turn
on POV's awareness of cyclical animation. i.e., it will do essentialy
what you described.. if you ask for 20 frames, it calculates 'clock'
as if it were doing 21 frames but only renders 20 frames.

Post a reply to this message

OOPS - I just noticed that I screwed that code up, it SHOULD read:

object {
  box {<-1,-1,-1>, <1,1,1>}
  texture {
    pigment {colour Blue}
  }
  rotate <0, clock*360, 0>
}

Sorry!

Dylan

Post a reply to this message