EMAIL: veijo.vilva@animal.helsinki.fi
NAME:  Veijo Vilva
TOPIC: Future
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: The Abode of Grand Master Deep Ruby
COUNTRY: Finland
WEBPAGE: http://www.animal.helsinki.fi/people/vilva/
RENDERER USED: POVray 3.5
TOOLS USED: Gimp for down-scaling, jpeg conversion
RENDER TIME: 100h (5000x6000)
HARDWARE USED: P4, 2.4GHz, 1Gb

IMAGE DESCRIPTION:

The future isn't what it used to be, the world today is not what
I in my late teens some forty odd years ago thought it would be,
we are not there yet and we are far beyond it in many respects.
So I think an image of the future ought to contain both familiar
objects and objects the purpose of which we cannot perhaps even
begin to guess. And so it is with this image.

I have tried to depict the abode of chess master Deep Ruby as she
herself might "see" it. It isn't entirely clear which parts of the
image reflect a physical reality - if any. Everything may be virtual
or a mixture of real and virtual or even just symbolic. The thingies
with eyes may be real images of physical perimeter sentinels or some
arbitrary representations of them or perhaps icons of antiviral agents
roaming within the memory space of the AI. The harpsichord may be an
operational music instrument or a nostalgic piece of furniture or an
input device with the transparent sheet of music serving as a display
device, or it might be just a part of 3D wallpaper. The visualization
in the sense of both physical and virtual design is a matter of purely
aesthetic choice as is the nature of the presence of objects.

The future has many aspects: there is the hope, and there is the
everyday, and there are the more sinister undercurrents requiring
constant vigilance. I have tried to include all these moods in a
single image, intentionally making the relationships between objects
somewhat vague and fluid in this 2D snapshot.

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:

The image was created just adding one tiny detail or set of details
after another around the ruby sphere representing the AI core,
grafting, pruning and rendering views from various angles till
I was fairly sure I was there.

Technically, the most notable thing is the texturing as most of it
consists of CSGs. The layering of the clouds and the ground fog is
a result of reflections from two thin sheets of glass, which also
reflect some of the objects in quite devious ways. I didn't use
radiosity as it was extremely slow in this image and also changed
the mood of the lower part of the image in a way which contradicted
my aims. The interaction of photons and the small spheres around and
within the ruby sphere produces quite interesting effects in various
parts of the image and also causes some problems in targeting - some
of the objects have to be OFF during the collecting phase and ON
during rendering in order to avoid most of some unwanted phenomena.

The harpsichord and some other features of the image are a kind of
my trademark or signature and certainly haven't been used out of
laziness.