Jeffrey Ely
"Nearly Normal"
translucent film, 24"x20", 2005
Jeffrey S. Ely, Mathematical Sciences, Lewis & Clark College, Portland, OR
This image is the raytracing of just two objects, a sphere and a surface.
The texture on the sphere is also related to such a sum,
hence the title, "Nearly Normal." I wrote the raytracing
code to first principles in the "C" programming language.
The raytracing of F(x,y) employed an interval arithmetic
based variation of interval bisection to solve the 43,200,000
equations involved. It took a 2.0 GHz Athlon 64 processor
about 10 hours to render the 24'' x 20'' image at a resolution
of 300 dots per inch. The translucent film on which the image
is printed looks as good as photographic paper in normal
lighting but looks especially vibrant when the lighting is
behind the film and shining through it.
email: jeff@lclark.edu