Posted-Date:  Mon, 21 Dec 92 22:40:04 -0600
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 92 22:40:04 -0600
From: Donovan Kolbly <dkolbly@cs.utexas.edu>
Message-Id: <9212220440.AA08659@skye.utexas.edu>
To: RenderMan List <rman@aero.org>
Subject: prman and alternatives
Reply-To: dkolbly@cs.utexas.edu

RenderMan cohorts:

My understanding is that prman (Photorealistic RenderMan) and qrman  
(Quick RenderMan) are just different "back ends" that follow the  
RenderMan interface.  NeXT has courteously supplied NeXTSTEP 3.0  
users with [versions of] both.  However, prman does not seem to  
support all of the optional capabilities of the RenderMan standard,  
such as bump maps.  Also, prman does not seem to do ray tracing in  
the sense of providing reflections and shadows automatically, and  
reflection maps don't seem to work so well for close-quarters  
convoluted reflecting.

What I am wondering is:  are there any other back ends available for  
the NeXT? (hopefully for cheap.  It wouldn't have to be FAST so much  
as GOOD, although 50 elapsed hours is about my limit for final copy.)   
For that matter, what other renderers of interest are there?

Also, are there any commercial "rendering services" available, which  
for a nominal fee would render our .rib files at 2400 dpi or so.   
Nowdays, you can go down to your neighborhood Kinkos copy center and  
rent time on a Laserwriter.  The next step is obviously to do that  
for rendering.  $5-$10 per page (frame) would seem reasonable -- I'm  
not planning on making any movies!

+----------------------------------------- Donovan Kolbly ---
| School: dkolbly@cs.utexas.edu
| Home:  (512) 219-9288
+----------------------------- (NeXTMail gladly accepted) ---