Ray Tracing Transparent Surfaces
Hello, Is it possible to raytrace a transparent surface in Chimera? I tried raytracing the frames of a movie where I fade in a surface, but the surface just appears abruptly, solid and black, then fades to the desired colors as the transparency approaches zero. Do I need to fiddle with the POVray settings or what? Any suggestions/work-arounds would be appreciated! Thanks, Damian Ekiert
Hi Damian, It is definitely possible, and should happen without your changing any settings -- it just takes longer to raytrace when something is transparent. I tried it just now in version 1.5.2 and a recent daily build, and the raytraced surface was indeed transparent. <http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/raytracing.html> Unfortunately I don't know what may be happening on your system, or how to get around it. Our main graphics expert is gone this week, but perhaps some of the others will have suggestions. Elaine ---------- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco On Feb 21, 2011, at 12:23 PM, Damian Ekiert wrote:
Hello, Is it possible to raytrace a transparent surface in Chimera? I tried raytracing the frames of a movie where I fade in a surface, but the surface just appears abruptly, solid and black, then fades to the desired colors as the transparency approaches zero.
Do I need to fiddle with the POVray settings or what?
Any suggestions/work-arounds would be appreciated! Thanks, Damian Ekiert
Maybe this is a bug in an older Chimera version. I also tried raytracing a movie with a transparent surface fading in in Chimera 1.5.2 and it worked. Tom
Hi Damian, It is definitely possible, and should happen without your changing any settings -- it just takes longer to raytrace when something is transparent. I tried it just now in version 1.5.2 and a recent daily build, and the raytraced surface was indeed transparent. <http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/raytracing.html>
Unfortunately I don't know what may be happening on your system, or how to get around it. Our main graphics expert is gone this week, but perhaps some of the others will have suggestions. Elaine ---------- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco
On Feb 21, 2011, at 12:23 PM, Damian Ekiert wrote:
Hello, Is it possible to raytrace a transparent surface in Chimera? I tried raytracing the frames of a movie where I fade in a surface, but the surface just appears abruptly, solid and black, then fades to the desired colors as the transparency approaches zero.
Do I need to fiddle with the POVray settings or what?
Any suggestions/work-arounds would be appreciated! Thanks, Damian Ekiert
Elaine and Tom, Installing 1.5.2 initially had no effect, but deleting my .chimera directory and trying again fixed the problem (and the raytracing took a lot longer than before when I was getting only solid surfaces!). Actually this worked in version 1.4 as well, so it doesn't seem to be a version issue. For reasons I don't understand, I can then replace the newly generated .chimera directory with exactly what I had before without a problem--and I can still raytrace transparent surfaces using all my old settings. Hmmm..... But anyway, it works now! Thanks, Damian On Feb 22, 2011, at 9:39 AM, Tom Goddard wrote:
Maybe this is a bug in an older Chimera version. I also tried raytracing a movie with a transparent surface fading in in Chimera 1.5.2 and it worked.
Tom
Hi Damian, It is definitely possible, and should happen without your changing any settings -- it just takes longer to raytrace when something is transparent. I tried it just now in version 1.5.2 and a recent daily build, and the raytraced surface was indeed transparent. <http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/raytracing.html>
Unfortunately I don't know what may be happening on your system, or how to get around it. Our main graphics expert is gone this week, but perhaps some of the others will have suggestions. Elaine ---------- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco
On Feb 21, 2011, at 12:23 PM, Damian Ekiert wrote:
Hello, Is it possible to raytrace a transparent surface in Chimera? I tried raytracing the frames of a movie where I fade in a surface, but the surface just appears abruptly, solid and black, then fades to the desired colors as the transparency approaches zero.
Do I need to fiddle with the POVray settings or what?
Any suggestions/work-arounds would be appreciated! Thanks, Damian Ekiert
participants (3)
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Damian Ekiert -
Elaine Meng -
Tom Goddard