You say you'd like to play around with 3D computer graphics? You wish you could draw in 3D, but you don't know an orthographic projection from orthopedic shoes? You think it would be cool to create realistic images with shadows, highlights, reflections, refractions, the works - but you don't want to shell out hundreds of bucks for those commercial modeling/rendering programs? In that case, Welcome to RenderBoy!
In techno-babble, RenderBoy is an integrated, parametric, 3D, object based modeler and photo-realistic ray-tracing renderer. Yeah, whatever - it's a lot of fun and easy to use. And it doesn't cost much!
An example of an image created by RenderBoy appears in the application's "About RenderBoy..." dialog box, as well as in the first page of this manual. Check it out, and if the ability to create images such as this on your Mac sparks your interest, read on. For the user, creating an image such as this is relatively easy. You only need to define the geometry of the objects in the scene, their surface properties, and how the scene is illuminated. RenderBoy then takes on the magical task of rendering (creating) the image, showing you exactly what your design will look like from any perspective you choose. This includes the automatic generation of shading, shadows, illumination, fog, textures, glinty spots, reflections and refractions.
Rendering Your First Image
Now lets see how easy it can be to render an image! Launch RenderBoy by double-clicking its application icon in the finder. As RenderBoy starts, a new untitled design document will be created automatically. You can create an object to render by selecting a "New Object" from the "Design" menu. For now, avoid the negative objects in the bottom half of the menu. Pick one of the positive objects, such as a sphere, tube, block, etc, and it will be immediately created for you. Simply choose "Render Image" from the "Render" menu. RenderBoy will hide all of its windows and begin working. Within a few seconds (if you followed these instructions), RenderBoy will have completed your first rendered image! True, it's not as fancy as the one in the "About RenderBoy..." window, but it can be! Just read on...
Where To Go From Here
The next nine chapters in this document can serve as a training manual. They present the functionality of RenderBoy in a logical order, with references forward and backward as needed. If you have never used a three dimensional modeling or rendering application, you will probably want to read them. When appropriate, the ends of these chapters contain some recommended exercises. As you read them, feel free to experiment and have fun. The final two chapters were designed to be used as a reference.
If you feel like you have a pretty good idea of what RenderBoy is all about, you can probably just experiment, referencing this document as needed.
There are several demonstration design documents bundled with this package. These were carefully constructed to demonstrate the versatility and capability of RenderBoy. Each document includes a "Read me" document (in "Simple Text" format) which explains the purpose of the documents and how they were constructed. Hopefully, they will provide some inspiration.
Finally, a simple request. If you know of other Mac users who might be interested in RenderBoy, please give them a copy. Better yet, feel free to plop the demo (in it's original compressed form) on any bbs, ftp, or web sites you might have access to. I would really appreciate it!
Some Words About RenderBoy, Shareware, and the Mac
RenderBoy is shareware. Being shareware, it is not free. The Macintosh platform is still better than Wintel, and I would like to keep it that way! If you continue to use RenderBoy, please support the Macintosh platform and the shareware concept by paying the one-time $25 registration fee. This will insure I continue to enhance RenderBoy, and it's quite a bargain considering the thousands of hours I spent developing it.
To register, just run the "Register" program included with RenderBoy and follow the instructions. We use the Kagi Shareware registration service to handle registration. Kagi supports many different forms of payment, and it only takes a few minutes.
