EMAIL: irtc_mail@yahoo.co.uk
NAME: Richard Webster
TOPIC: Journey
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: Dry Run
COUNTRY: England
WEBPAGE: None
RENDERER USED: POV-Ray 3.5
TOOLS USED: cmpeg
RENDER TIME: 10 hours
HARDWARE USED: AMD Duron 1.1GHz 128MB
VIEWING RECOMMENDATIONS: Tested in Windows Media Player and mpeg_play

ANIMATION DESCRIPTION:

 The idea behind this was making a journey seem shorter by taking
 detours along the way. The action here is just variations on a basic
 forward-kinematics run cycle.

 The figures are divers because they wear masks, which is
 a way of avoiding detail, and they wear flippers, which is good
 for showing ankle movements. The whole thing is in a desert because
 it gives the divers a reason to head for water and is quick to model.

 The method used to animate the figures allows transitions between
 cycles with similar rhythms. Transitions between cycles with
 different rhythms look bad and so have to happen off-screen.

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS ANIMATION WAS CREATED:

 The figure model is a simple skeleton with a pose controlled by a set
 of joint angles.

 Making each angle oscillate with time gives a cycle. Getting a set of
 angles for two different cycles at the same time and interpolating
 between them gives a transition between the two cycles.

 All frames were rendered at 320x240 with anti-aliasing. The full source is
 in the zip file.