Preserved Topic: POV-Ray

I really want to get into 3D rendering, but since I can't really afford 3DMAX, and anything less than MAX I hear isn't too good. I thought I'd try to learn POV-Ray. Are there any really good tutorials out for newbies? Or even better, a somewhat graphical GUI for it where I could right click an object and change its XYZ values at least. Or something?

Thanks

-I'm workin' on it damn it!-

Actually, there are some very nice 3D apps that are 'less than Max' (pricewise at least).

I've just ordered the upgrade to Max 4.0 myself, but you can get into the field for much less.
Bryce has an excellent (but very slow) renderer. The modelling is poor, though. $190US
Lightwave is excellent (I hear). I plan on getting it sometime this year. Better renderer than Max, but not quite as strong a modeler. Pricy, though, at about $2250US.
The makers of Lightwave (NewTek) make an entry level product called Inspire 3D. I hear it's a very good entry level product, and it retails for only $450US.
TrueSpace is a decent 3D package (I don't like it, but lots of people do). $790US.
Hash Animation Master is a top notch patch modeller. Very good for character modelling. $250US

As far as POV-Ray, I haven't had the time to mess with it yet, so I'll let someone else answer your questions

i used to use pov-ray. back in the day...at least a decade ago. lost touch with it eventually.

so i have absolutely nothing to contribute to this conversation.

Let's ask Duga....

ROFL

There's actually a good tutorial in the documentation of POV-Ray. If you're on Windows, click the small "scene" button on the toolbar, and you'll get the table of contents for it. Just click the first thing and start going through. It's a bit time consuming, but you'll get a very thorough explanation of things, starting with the simpler stuff. That's how I learned how to use it, at least.

I downloaded and installed the latest version of POV-Ray today, just for grins.
Impressions:
Fairly powerful scene-language
Very nice renders
Sllloooooowwwwww

I'm used to pro packages, which almost exclusively use hybrid scanline/raytrace renderers. POV-Ray uses only raytracing, so it's very slow by comparison. Bryce also uses a pure raytrace engine, so it's very slow as well.

I also found a link on the POV-Ray site to Moray, a modeller for POV-Ray. It seems fairly capable, but it is shareware, rather than free. 30 day trial, though, so you can play with it for a while.

I wanna stick to POV, just 'cause some of the renders I've seen with it are amazing, I have tremendous respect for open source software...and it's free. Maybe when I go to college next year I'll buy some "educational" pro software for cheap. I guess I'll have to wait till spring break, sit down and go through the documentation. Are there any good freeware modelers out there? Moray is shareware (the bastards!)

Check out the links page on the POV Ray site (POV-Links

Thanks for the reviews I'll tryBreeze and Moray...and if i can't stand 'em I'll just code I guess. I found a cool one called Clayworks too, but its still in dev.

Genesis 3d looks descent too maybe (i really have no idea since I've never worked in 3D before)...I'll download it later, I'm downloading breeze right now.

AUGH!!! Who just recommended that he use a WYSIWYG??? No no no no no! Don't use Moray or anything like that! please! learn to write the code by hand! you'll restrict yourself so much if you use a wysiwyg... especially with POV-Ray, there's so much they can't do.

Seriously, go through the tutorials they provide. It's not like real documentation, although such documentation is provided, it's really like a step by step tutorial that starts with the basics. I did it all after school in a few days, I think.

But please, please, please, don't use a modeller for anything other than creating shapes that you can't make with the POV-Ray primitives. Learning to hand code it is so worth your time, eventually you'll be able to visualize 3D shapes and coordinates in your head, it can be helpful from time to time. Depending on how complicated you get with it, you'll improve your math skills, too.

OH ok. But just for you slime.

Hah, thanks. =D

Hm. Different strokes for different folks, I guess. I prefer to use a modeller to set up the scene, then manually script things into the POV file. Both of the modellers I recommended output very clean POV files that are very easy to modify.

It couldn't hurt to learn the manual scripting first, if that's what you want to do though.

One use for the modellers in that case would be to generate some POV files from the modeller, then analyze the POV file to see how it works. Once you're past the tutorials (Slime is right, they're very clear), you might pick up some new tricks from reverse engineering how the modeller is doing things.

Rhino for modelling and Bryce for rendering. Not too expensive, yet very powerful.

Eh. Just be careful that you don't get lazy, ok?

check out www.phong.com ! he has some good tutorials on POV-Ray. also the POV-Ray helpfile is a good starting point for beginners

I'vs started working with pov a tinny bit, I'll get to do more over spring break, but quite by acident I found this: http://www.blender.nl/ I've never heard of it before, but it appears to be quite powerful and freeware. Has anyone else used it or know of it?

i just tried out blender.
it seems to be a very powerful tool (i fyou look at the demos etc...)
but its hard to learn and to understand. besides that it has an ugly user interface...