EMAIL: jsilveira@fibertel.com.ar
NAME: Javier Silveira
TOPIC: Architecture
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: The Petrona Towers
COUNTRY: Argentina
WEBPAGE: I don't have one...
RENDERER USED: 3d Studio Max 4.0 with Finalrender Stage 0
TOOLS USED: Corel Photopaint 9 for some textures
RENDER TIME: 1 hour 30 minutes
HARDWARE USED: Pentium III 1Ghz, 256 RAM

IMAGE DESCRIPTION:

First of all, forgive my english (my native language is spanish) Well, I have always admired the Petrona towers, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. They are currently the tallest towers in the entire world (with a height of 450m). Finished in 1996, for me they are a great symbol of the astounding development architecture has reached in the last century. I had never sended anything to the Pov-Ray competition, and when I saw this topic, I thought it was perfect for my first work. I didn't think twice what I was going to portrait (or at least try...): this huge monument to architecture, engineering and civilization located in Malaysia had always been a source of inspiration for me and a "pending task" in my list....

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:

Basicly, I created everything in 3dMax (both the model and the materials). There are only two bitmaps as textures (actually, as opacity maps for a mix of two materials), one that delimitates the "metalic" part of each floor from the other part (done in Photopaint), and another one for the ground (one of max's standard libraries). The rest is all modelling, procedural maps, reflections and ligthing.ç
First of all I downloaded from the internet (trhough google's image search) like 50 pictures from the real towers. I found some basic measures (although very few and "general") and the rest of the model was made trying to "guess" which was the precise structure and shape of the building (it was a very intensive work). Once I finished the model, I started with the materials and illumination part. I spend most of the time doing this. I drove myself crazy trying to achieve a realistic look, changing the background the light, the level of reflection the materials. I finally decided on a "cloudy day", combining point lights and finalRender global illumination. Another complicated issue was the camera angle: the towers were so big and tall, that it was very dificult for me to find a point of view where you could see some details and at the same time that showed the entire building. I must admit finalRender helped a lot making the reflections rendering much faster than 3dmax scanline or raytrace renderers.
So, here it is what I got... I did my best, and I recognize it has a lot to be done yet, but I am still happy with it. It's my first work, my hardware didn't helped too much and I can't complain.
I didn't send the model files because they were too heavy, but if anyone woud like to have it (as if it worths ,something...) you can send an email and maybe I could see how to send to that person the model.