"PerFnurt" <per### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> Hiya,
>
> I'm really new to MegaPOV, and I have some trouble understanding how to get
> the mechism thingie to work as I want it to ;-)
>
> For example, using the cloth.pov sample, is there a way to generate the
> final image (or an arbitrary frame) without having to render all previous
> images between the first and the last?

if you have the saved simulation data: (*.dat)
render a still image(no animation) using this:
global_settings {
  mechsim {
    step_count 0 // disable simultion
    collision { off }
    topology {
      load_file "your_final_simulation_data.dat"
    }
  }
}

to simulate all the way to the final image, and then render the result:
set time_step as usual, and multiply step_count by the frame number you
want.
(step_count = the number of simulation steap between rendered frames.)
do the above while rendering a single frame animation.
(note: simulation will still take as long as simulating all separate frames
did before, it only saves the rendering time)

disadvantage:
-at least the windows GUI version has trouble stopping the simulation (can
 only be interrupted during actual rendering, witch you do after a long
time)
-no way to check if things are simulating as expected.

what i do:
render with really low resolution and no aa and cancel the animation at the
point i thing it has simulated what i need.
(you can rename the .dat file, to prevent overwriting it by accident)

then make a slightly changed pov file, (as above) to render the result in
hi-res, with radiosity/HDR, nice textures, etc.

(i also experimented with replacing simulated objects with pov objects)
http://jwstolk.afreehost.net/image.htm

hope this helps.
jaap.

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