Just a quick scene to try to get back at “just for fun” raytracing…
The grass is a very old code of mine based on SDL-created meshes, revised now to add uv mapping for the texture (derived from a leaf picture from mayang.com), and also to model the central folding of the blades.
The scene is surrounded with a cloudy HDRI sky, and the lighting as reinforced with just a big area light above.
The drops are blob components traced() from above, using a 4-point construct, to test if they rest totally on the same blade. In total there are 30000 drops, with 2 components each one to try to avoid perfect spheres, forming a big blob: that’s why sometimes they merge if the placement is close.
This image is postprocessed with Gimp to add together two renders: one with just pigments, and another with reflections and micro-normals but without lighting. Combined render time was 2h15m on a Phenom X4.
WIPS
