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From: mark@calvin..westford.ccur.com (Mark Thompson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Toaster NOT! shipped
Message-ID: <61234@masscomp.ccur.com>
Date: 5 Oct 90 16:36:42 GMT
References: <32459@nigel.ee.udel.edu>
Sender: news@masscomp.ccur.com
Reply-To: mark@calvin.westford.ccur.com (Mark Thompson)
Organization: Concurrent Computer Corp. Westford MA.
Lines: 55

In article <32459@nigel.ee.udel.edu> S36666WB%ETSUACAD.BITNET@ricevm1.rice.edu (Brian Wright) writes:
>Well, according to AmigaWhirled, the Toaster's Light Wave 3D will only be
>a phong shading 3D program.  It will have ray-traced like shadows, but that's
>as far as it goes with the ray-tracing.  It will be much like the Caligari
>method of tracing using 24 bit color.  Also the paint program to be included
>isn't real-time 24 bit, rather it uses a superbitmapped HAM screen to simulate
>24 bits and then you have the Toaster render it whenever you wish to check the
>results.  Both were disappointing to hear after all the hype.  I assume you
>could use something like Imagine and render those results to the toaster,
>but then you have to buy Imagine don't you. :-(  As if I can afford a toaster
>anyway plus Imagine anyway.

Whoa, hold on there. You OBVIOUSLY have not seen any images rendered with
LightWave 3D because if you had, you would realize that even without
ray-tracing, it produces the best images of any Amiga 3D product in
a fraction of the time. You have complete control over the following
surface properties:

color                   luminance
diffuse lighting        specular lighting
glossiness              image reflection
background reflection   transparency
bump/texture            smoothing

These properties can be assigned values via:

a fixed value                   planar mapped image
cylindrical mapped image        spherical mapped image
fractal noise                   ripples/waves
wood                            marble
grid                            checkerboard
fire

On top of this, these properties may be animated with keyframes.
These are only a few of the features of LightWave. There is also the
ability to add fog, background haze, motion blur, variable polygon
size (for simulating explosions), various light sources, etc, etc.

There is a misconseption that scan-line phong renderers pale next to
ray-tracers. That is merely because most Amiga users have not seen a
good scan-line renderer. LightWave 3D is excellent and I highly
recommend you see what it can do before you write it off. Ray-tracers
are interesting to play with, but they are not practical for serious
animation. I do not not work for NewTek but I have been beta-testing the
Toaster and I assure you it is worth every penny of the $1595 price.

I will agree that Toaster Paint is a disapointment, but a real 24bit
paint program is in the works. They just didn't want to delay the Toaster's
release any further.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  Mark Thompson                                                           |
|  mark@westford.ccur.com                                                  |
|  ...!{decvax,uunet}!masscomp!mark   Designing high performance graphics  |
|  (508)392-2480                      engines today for a better tomorrow. |
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