EMAIL: chris@bluelectrode.com
NAME: Chris Spencer
TOPIC: Gardens
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: Bonsai
COUNTRY: United States of America
WEBPAGE: www.bluelectrode.com
RENDERER USED: POV-Ray v3.1
TOOLS USED: 

	Moray v3.1(scene modeling)
	POV-Ray(scene modeling)
	Photoshop v5.0.2(image maps, file conversion)
	SPatch(bezier-patch modeling)
	Maketree (tree generation)

RENDER TIME: 5 hr 47 min 18 sec
HARDWARE USED: Pentium III, 128.0MB RAM

IMAGE DESCRIPTION:
	Bonsai are one of the most artistic and controlled variations of a garden.  A table by the window with a pair of bonsai trees, some tools, books, and other items.  This is my first real rendering, and at over five hours long in rendering time, by far my most complex.  I'm eager to hear comments.

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:
	The concept and layout were first drawn freehand.  I tried to do as much research on bonsai as I could, since I've never actually owned one.  Now I realize I probably could've done more.
	Gilles Tran's incredible Maketree macro did most of the work on the bonsai.  The trees were saved as includes and placed freehand in POV.  Actually, the hardest part concerning the trees was hand coding their positions, with normal POV coordinates (y up), in a Moray coded POV file...ugh!  The various scales made the work incredibly frustrating at first.  Then I discovered how to include the tree models in separate files and edit them from there.
	The rest of the scene, constructed in Moray, is made with simple CSG, utilizing superelipsoids to a large degree. Bezier patches were modeled in SPatch (wonderful utility) in order to construct the four tools.  Image maps, used for the framed picture, smaller bonsai image, and outside window picture were designed in Photoshop.  The window's image is actually a highly modified picture of Taiwan's Forested Mountains, taken by Bart O'Gara, which I pulled off Encarta.  The framed picture is an old hand-drawn still life of mine that was lying around.  Identical heightfields (one differenced with a cylinder), each with a different texture, were separately rotated to generate a mossy/grass-like effect.  I would have liked to add a few more tools and put in some branch leaf clippings, but these were slightly beyond my time limits.
	All objects are of my own creation.  The scene is lite with three spotlights, one that reacts with the atmospheric media creating the rays through the window.   It was then rendered with radiosity and anti-aliasing.  
On and off this scene took roughly two months to complete, primarily due to endless 1.5 hour-long renders at 800x600 (without the media) to test each slight variation and correction...ah yes, anal retentiveness;)  
	I didn't have enough time or patience to gather together all the dependencies for the zip file, but if anyone were interested in the code I would gladly e-mail it to them.