The Frosty design file in this folder contains Frosty The Snowman by his sled and a Christmas tree in the middle of a snowy forest. To render the image, simply complete the following 3 steps:
1. Open the design document by double-clicking the "Frosty" document icon.
2. Select "Estimate Render Time..." from the "Render" menu to see an estimate of how long the rendering will take on your Macintosh. Click to continue.
3. Select "Render Image" from the "Render" menu, and RenderBoy will hide all of its windows and begin rendering. The windows will reappear when the image is completed. The "Rendering In Progress" menu is available to abort the image or to check on its status.
THINGS TO NOTICE...
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This document demonstrates several important points which are worth noting.
FOG USAGE:
This image is unique in its use of fog. A fog bank has been defined which partially obscures the trees in the back. This enhances the indication of depth and gives the entire image a very wintery feel about it. For those of you who are both fortunate and unfortunate enough to live in a southern climate, fog in the winter time is fairly common. The width (or thickness) of the fog bank is 1000 units. This is roughly the distance from the nearest tree to the farthest tree. In general, it is usually acceptable to set the fog bank thickness so that it is about equal to the front to back distance of the design. The maximum visibility is 100% so that everything on the near side of the fog bank is crystal clear. The minimum visibility is 10%, therefore everything on the far side of the fog bank is only 10% visible.
DESIGN TIPS:
The ground is just a pattern of large egg objects which overlap. Most of these eggs are white, except for the one in front which has a texture applied to it which makes it look like dirt/rock. The white eggs are 20% reflective so that they reflect like ice-glazed snow. Frosty is just three white eggs stacked up. His eyes and nose are three eggs. His corn-cob pipe is a rod and a cone, and his magic hat is just a rod and a very flat egg. The various trees are made up of a rod and a cone. A texture is applied to the trees from the top so they look like Christmas trees. Note that the same texture is used on each tree although each tree is a different color. This was done by tinting the texture with the color of the object that it is projected onto. And last but not least, there is one light source object back and to the right, providing a hint of illumination and shadows.
This is a fun design, and there is a lot more which could be done with it: more trees, perhaps a night-time image with a moon, etc. I hope you have fun with it!
