Dave Typinski wrote in
:

I'm shooting for the same final resolution, but then that'll get cut
down for web presentation.

My plan as well. In fact, I recently purchased some video editing
software to help me in such endeavors.


If you want long rendering times, do a full raytrace with caustics
and index of refraction through complex glass objects. snooooooze

No thanks. I've avoided ray traced materials in this project for that
very reason.

I use POVRay as well and I have a project I've been wanting to
render...errr...ray-trace for quite some time. I made a simple
scene of various sized diamonds sitting on a mirrored turntable.
I have done single frame renders and they took forever it seemed,
but look really good.

I want to do a full 360 degree rotation animation, but I think
I calculated that my quad core system would take at least a month
to render it, and that's running 24/7 flat out.


I heard back from the man who made those star map images to which you
linked. Here's the process to create a UV-mappable celestial sphere,
according to him:

Sniopola

Use stitching software like PTGui (payware) or hugin (open source) to
internally wrap the separate images onto a spherical surface and
produce an equirectangular projection of that sphere as the output.

Sweet. Thanks for the info. I have hugin already for my digital
panorama photography. Never even occured to me to use it for this.
That actually opens up a LOT of possibilities.

Now if only I didn't work 50+ hours a week....

Brian
--
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