EMAIL: mraiford@hotmail.com
NAME: Michael Raiford
TOPIC: Future
COPYRIGHT: I SUBMIT TO THE STANDARD RAYTRACING COMPETITION COPYRIGHT.
TITLE: The Quantum Computer
COUNTRY: United States
WEBPAGE: http://www.michaelraiford.com
RENDERER USED: POVRay 3.5
TOOLS USED: POVRay Source Editor, Sodipodi and GiMP for image maps. 
RENDER TIME: 2 days, 5 hours, 14min (approx)
HARDWARE USED: Pentium III 866/ Pentium IV 2.6GHZ (HT)
IMAGE DESCRIPTION:
In the way to distant future a new type of computer has been created. Using 
quantum and 3D holographic display technology a scene is rendered using POVRay 
10 for Windows QE. Total render time: 1/1000th of a second. The computer comes
equipped with it's own cold-fusion power supply, 1000TB internal storage and a
100TB flash card drive

DESCRIPTION OF HOW THIS IMAGE WAS CREATED:
This is what I would probably say is a late entry. First, I took a copy of the
Intel Inside logo and traced it with Sodipodi, to get a nice clean image map. I 
then used Gimp to create a material map to give a brushed aluminum background to 
the logo. From there I created the logo using an intersection of a very thin box
and a superellipsoid. I covered over that thin sheet of metal with a slightly 
raised plastic material, again a superellipsoid. Creating the computer box was a
bit of a challenge. I wanted to make sure the rounded corners of the box weren't 
marred by scaling. All in all the computer model is a very complex and unewieldly
piece of CSG that proved very slow to render. The scene being displayed by the
projector is simply a light group a few thin boxes and a julia fractal. I created
a macro to combine each object's texture with a transparent scanline effect. This
makes the scanlines appear like they wrap around the object. 3D scanlines. I used
fairly default radiosity settings with this scene. 

Some things not visible in the image, but of note: 

Barely visible behind the computer is a bit of blue light. Another failed effect, 
the computer was supposed to have an eeirie blue glow eminating from the seams. 

The label on the card reads "POV Ray Version 1.0 for Windows QE"

On the 30th, I e-mailed the scene to myself and set up my work computer (faster) to 
render the remainder of the scene. If you look closely, you can barely make out the 
switch-over due to the radiosity. 

Things I dislike:

I wish I had more time to work on tweaking this scene a bit. The card is floating above
the table, and the scene needs more elements, possibly. I had originally planned to have
a lighting effect coming from the projector to the scene, but it didn't interact with
media as I would have expected. The glow never came through the seams in the computer. 
The LED's light source went too far, I thought I cut it down enough, but after rendering
full resolution, it turned out to hit the card a bit, giving a slight green cast to the
corner of the label. The perspective camera needed some adjustment, the computer box is a
bit warped. The projector needs some work (the small box-like thing on the top of the computer)

Things I like:

The "Intel Inside" logo turned out nicely, but doesn't look like brushed aluminum as I had
planned it to look (and it DID look that way when I was working on the object itself.), but 
it still looks nice. The scanline effect came out very well, and probably cost a ton of render
time for anti-aliasing. The LED on the front of the drive came out very nice, but see above. 

Things I am comfounded about:

The purplish reflection on the intel logo (where did that color come from). The lack of light 
(even with media on) seeping out of the sides of the box. Trace time on the computer box.