[Radiance-general] Re: Rendering Panoramas

[Greg Ward]

Hi Lars,

Rob has some good tips about using rad to generate rendering options 
using the OPTFILE setting, and I use this feature a lot, myself.  There 
are many ways to run the rad command, and the man page is the best 
place to look for understanding these.  In its most basic form, it acts 
like a simple makefile to build an octree, optionally running mkillum, 
and maintain a set of rendered and filtered pictures.

However, if you're doing a set of runs over different lighting 
configurations, scene alternatives, etc., you often need a lot more 
than rad can offer in terms of scene building.  I sometimes use a 
makefile to maintain the various octrees I use based on scene input, 
then employ a rad input file that specifies only the OCTREE setting -- 
no explicit scene files.  This can also be specified on the rad command 
line, so a single rad input file can suffice for many scene 
alternatives.

For generating animations, the ranimate program does a reasonable job, 
though it really needs updating for running animations over a network 
now that rsh no longer exists....

With regard to fisheye projections, the -vta option can go up to a 360 
degree field of view, where you get a circular image whose 
circumference is essentially a single value corresponding to the 
direction opposite the -vd parameter.  I don't know anything about 
ptviewer, or the kinds of projections it uses.  You may need to write a 
script and pass it to rtrace with the -fac (and -x & -y) options to 
take ray origin and direction on the input and produce a color picture 
on the output.  Using this method, you can get any projection onto a 
rectangular image that you can describe mathematically.

-Greg