TITLE: Mars
NAME: Simon de Vet
COUNTRY: Canada
EMAIL: sdevet@istar.ca
WEBPAGE: http://home.istar.ca/~sdevet
TOPIC: First Encounters
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
RENDERER USED: POV-Ray
TOOLS USED: Moray, Leveller, sPatch, HF-Lab
RENDER TIME: 1 hour, 38 minutes
HARDWARE USED: Pentium 266
IMAGE DESCRIPTION:
First person on the surface of Mars.
DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:
The entire image was made using POV3.1 and Moray 3.1 (the new release.. I didn't use any of the new features in this pic, but it looks very cool).
The face is an spatch model made by Anto Matkovic. I was planning to make my own head model, but time got in the way. It is a modified version of his 'Ona' model, available for free from his site (http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/7415/tutorial1.html)
The ground (fuzzy, but it is detailed) was generated using HF-Lab, by John Beale (http://www.best.com/~beale/) The tiled hf's, and nice craters make this a great tool.
The mesas in the background were made using Leveller, another wonderful tool (http://www.daylongraphics.com/)

Some Q and A:

Q: Why Mars?
A: I love mars. Facinating place. Plus, it was the best idea I was able to come up with. This image evolved a lot from what I first had in mind. First idea was a mars base. Then, person stepping out of mars lander. Then, bootprint in red soil. For the longest time, I was planning to make a full body figure on mars (ended up being "First Pants on Mars!":), but I was unable to do so, in time for the competition. My final result was this, a head and shoulders portrait, with a fuzzy background. I must admit that I rather like it :)

Q: China?
A: Yeah. I knew when I made the pic the cosmonaut would have to be from somewhere. I didn't want an american, because I wanted something different, original. Russia, with their economic problems, are out. UN is a good idea, but a cliche. France and Japan are candidates, but I find their flags boring. China has a small space program, and they are interesting. I don't seriously think that the first Mars mission will be chinese, but the flag looks cool. Oh, and before I forget, I am obligated by some law or another to give credit for the tiny little flag imagemap. Thank you "FOTW Flags Of The World website at http://fotw.digibel.be/flags/"!

Q: Focal blur?
A: 2 reasons. First, it brings the focus to the head, giving a better sense of loneliness, or isolation. Secondly, it masks my backgrounds, which look poor in detail.

The .zip file contains the .pov and .ini files created by Moray, the .mdl file, and the modified spatch file. It does not contain the flag imagemap, or the images used for the heightfields. Sorry.

Thanks for reading all this! I enjoyed making the pic alot!