TITLE: Carson NAME: Jim Charter COUNTRY: USA EMAIL: jrcsurvey@aol.com TOPIC: loneliness COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT. JPGFILE: carson.jpg RENDERER USED: POVray TOOLS USED: Maya, Photoshop, UVMapper, 3dwin4, PlantStudio RENDER TIME: 34 m HARDWARE USED: Athlon 650, 512ram IMAGE DESCRIPTION: In 1940 Carson McCullers was only twenty-three when she published her first novel, "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter". She became an overnight literary sensation. The novel, set in a southern mill town, explores the lives of several town inhabitants who revolve around a deaf-mute with whom each imagines they share a special relationship. The novel "...takes us on shattering voyages into the depths of the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition." As an approach to the topic of "loneliness", I have chosen to depict Carson as she appears in a photograph by Cartier-Bresson taken in 1946. I am attempting to recognize loneliness in several ways. First there is the external evidence of loneliness in McCullers' creative achievement. Then there is the question of the makeup of such a writer. Must one be lonely to write about loneliness? Finally there is the process of portraiture itself, careful portrayal that tries to bridge the isolation that separates artist and subject. DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED: The bust was modelled from scratch in Maya. Standard polygonal modeling techniques were used in a depictional process analogous to sculpting. The body was posed in Poser then imported to Maya. The clothing was then modeled from polygons. The figure was imported to POVray via 3dwin4. Image maps for the hair and skin were created with UVMapper then edited in Photoshop. Procedural textures are applied to the clothing. The surrounding plants were created in PlantStudio.