4 ms·
POV-Ray <3 Been a while since I used that. I think it's a shame that they stopped developing it. They say things are better, but are they really? The scripting
by kebman 5y ago
POV-Ray <3 Been a while since I used that. I think it's a shame that they stopped developing it. They say things are better, but are they really? The scripting language for it is really cool IMHO.
- dTal 5y agoPOV-Ray has a special place in my heart. For the vast majority of artistic tasks, Blender is a hugely superior environment that will produce better images, faster. And you can generate meshes to import into Blender with OpenSCAD if you really like CSG. It doesn't have the precision of raytracing the mathematical specification directly, but you don't really need that ever. However, for certain very narrow categories of things, it's probably still the lowest-impedance tool for the job. Want to make a website that shows a static image of the current cloud cover + illumination of the Earth, updated every minute? Want to make some geometrical visualizations for a math textbook? Want to experiment with extremely weird and exotic camera projections? POV-Ray!
- kebman 5y agoI really like the scattering media, and the mathematical figures you can do with it, such as 3D Julia fractals and noise patters to model really rough "stony" surfaces that aren't just bump maps. On top of that I don't think I've found a better way to generate various patterns and textures, even for simple 2D work. It's just such a versatile set of tools you almost wouldn't believe it's free! And the fact that it's entirely scripted (unless wysiwyg megapov etc) just makes it better IMHO. It's a scripting-first modelling language, and I really, really like that. With that comes things such as inverse kinematics and gravity (for animations) without having to learn specialized GUIs or buy expensive software.