EMAIL: mischa@rainbow.studorg.tuwien.ac.at
NAME: Mischa Magyar
TOPIC: Night
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: Arena
COUNTRY: Austria
WEBPAGE: http://rainbow.studorg.tuwien.ac.at/~mischa/
RENDERER USED: POV-Ray 3.02.watcom.win32 [Pentium optimised]
TOOLS USED:
      sPatch v1.5 (Mike Clifton)

RENDER TIME: 0d04h11m19s
HARDWARE USED: Pentium 166 MHz, 96 MB RAM
IMAGE DESCRIPTION:

The Temple of Orpan, the evil Temple in TiragWaares.
Built by orcs in the time of the opression, the Temple
of Orpan represents their place of refuge and recreation.

A creepy feeling overcomes you as you slowly approach
the temple. The unique thing about it, which it only
shares with dentists and frozen food, is, the nearer you
come, the farther away you wish to be.
'Now I have come so far I cannot possibly retreat,'
you think, 'I have to climb the stairs at least.'

As you cross the empty square aiming for the temple, the
impression becomes yet more frightening. On either side of
the stairs, as if guarding them, two dragons sit and stare
at everyone approaching. Even more fearsome, the dragons'
eyes start to glow and they begin breathing fire,
everytime anyone unwise enough gets too close to the temple.

'Perhaps the first step is enough?!'

You can feel your innards contracting and the throbbing pains
in your brain increases. You have read so much about that.
'The man, who is pure and good in his heart and who
nevertheless tries to enter the Temple of Orpan, will feel
the Might of the Dragons.
His own body will turn against him, giving him the most
excruciating pain he cannot even imagine...'

Feeling pain in limbs you never knew you possessed, you
creep slowly in the direction of the temple. You are tightly
holding a piece of birch-bark in your right hand. This is
part of the ritual. It may not be any bark. It has to be
the bark of an at most three-year-old birch. The first task
is to retrieve the bark. That is not exactly the difficult
part of the ritual in a city with a very beautiful avenue,
which is lined by at least twenty birches. The difficult
part is to set the piece on fire with the flame of the
dragon at the Temple of Orpan.

'He is staring at me. I am sure, the moment I am holding up
the bark, the dragon will turn its head to transform me into
a lump of coal.'

'...And even if he can stand the intolerable physical pain,
it is impossible to ignore the mental menace. The Might of
the Dragons will send him away screaming in fear.'

Ducking from the bursts of flame coming from the dragons,
you take one step after the other until you stand in front
of the temple-entrance. Unable to move, except for the
shaking of your body, you stare into the eye of the left
dragon.

'That is impossible, stone cannot move. Wake up! This is
only an illusion.'

Very cautious and holding the piece of bark as far from
your body as your short arms allow, you approach the dragon
to your left. The birch is almost burning. Just a little
closer.

'Yes! I've got it! I've done it! I am now a full member of
the Priests of Sarha. Nobody will ever again make fun of me.'

As you overexcitedly jump down the stairs, you soon realize
how right you are.
'Nobody will ever make fun of me again!' you think as you
feel the heat of the dragon's breath engulf you, until the
pain of the fire fades away along with your life.



This image fits the topic perfectly well. It is the evil
temple of TiragWaares and it is a dark night-scene.


DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:


At first I created the column, including the leaves. The
base of the column was created with sPatch, the rest is
simple CSG.

The whole temple was constructed using some loops (placing
the columns, the ornaments and the steps) and CSG.

The sky is also created by two nested loops, setting
blob-objects with some random differences.

The lightning-bolt is a box with a texture, which was posted
in the newsgroup some time ago.

The dragon and the templefire was created in sPatch with the
halos added later on. The dragon consists of seven layers, which
can be textured individually for further use.

The torches, templefires and the dragon breath are halos plus
a light source with different fading_distances.