EMAIL: somersj@aya.yale.edu
NAME: David S. Johnson
TOPIC: Childhood
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.

TITLE: The Toy Left Behind

COUNTRY: USA

WEBPAGE: http://www.oursquare.com/members/somersj/

RENDERER USED:  Povray 3.0
TOOLS USED:  SPatch and Texture Magic

RENDER TIME: Sometime between 5 and 6 hours (the save energy mode was on and blanked the
 screen which for some reason I was unable to unblank and so I couldn't see the POV stats)

HARDWARE USED: Pentium, 133 Megahertz

IMAGE DESCRIPTION:  The image is of a crazed clown driving a wooden toy train which
 carries some alphabet blocks which have seen better times.  The action takes place 
in an empty room in an empty house.  It was inspired by a childhood memory and fantasy 
of a toy that was left behind in an empty house after we moved.  After we moved I often 
fantasized the toytrain taking on a life of its own and moving throughout the house in 
search of its missing master.

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:  This is my first submission and also includes 
a lot of POV firsts for me (use of bezier patches, spotlight, atmosphere, halo, and layered 
textures).  I would have liked to have added more detail but ran out of time.  The window 
and windowframe needs work although a more developed window frame would perhaps distract 
attention from the train and the clown.  It would be nice if the smoke coming out of the 
smokestack was more substantial (billowing) but this was my  first experience with halos 
and there was not enough time to experiment.  Also the headlight on the train could use 
some more detail which I did not have time to finish.  The clown and the bell were made 
using the excellent freeware modeller SPatch.  This was my first experience at trying to 
make a human like form and face and took quite a while to do although I could definitely 
use more practice in this area.  Unfortunately the clown face is too far away in the picture 
to see all the details and textures clearly.   The face itself is made up of three separate 
objects: a long  nose which fades from red to white, the smile and the rest of the face.  
Anton Matkovic's SPatch tutorial for drawing heads was a great help.  The nightcap attached 
to the clowns head could use more work.  It is not that visible and perhaps the clown costume 
itself could use a more striking texture .  Most of the textures were created using the 
Shareware Texture Magic which was a great help.  (Now that I have finished the picture I can 
send in the registration).  The alphabet blocks have the most interesting texture although you 
cannot see them that well since they are obscured by the atmosphere.  The white portions of the 
blocks are stained perhaps from spilled coffee and the blue portions look as if some of the 
blue paint has been rubbed off revealing the wood underneath.  A clearer view of the blocks 
by themselves can be seen on my graphics page at 
http://www.oursquare.com/members/somersj/graphics.html.  The rest of the train was created 
using CSG.  You can look at the pov scripts in the zip file lftbehnd.zip.