POV-Ray has a text-based interface; essentially a programming language for graphics.
This makes it ideal for technical illustrations, simulations, and virtual prototyping of projects.
These factors make POV-Ray an all-around useful tool for both hobbyists and professionals.
To get the most out of this workshop, bring your laptop (Mac, Win, Linux, etc.)along and get your hands “dirty” coding some interesting looking objects. For a head start, download and install POV-Ray from
In the first part (Saturday, March 31, 2007), you’ll get a flavor of how the program works, what it is capable of, and how make simple and complex objects in POV-Ray's scene description language.
In the second part (Saturday, April 7, 2007), you’ll learn how to make things look realistic in POV-Ray, how to make animations, how to render efficiently, as well as some advanced tricks and techniques.
In this two-part hands-on workshop, I'll help you jump right in and get a running start at 3D illustration and animation.
On the examples page, you can see a few of the images that I’ve made with POV-Ray over the last couple of years.