News items from www.povray.org main page

povray.org and related sites unreachable to parts of the internet

Wed, 3 Dec 2025 14:01:08 GMT

The datacenter in which the dedicated server hosting POV-Ray recently changed. As we have our own class C (/24) subnet, this (in theory) should not have affected us (outside of a few hours of downtime as the machine was physically transported) as no IP addresses needed to change: our host only had to alter the appropriate BGP announcement to indicate the new route to/from our network.

However it has since come to our attention that many parts of the internet are unable to access resources on our server. Sites such as wiki.povray.org and www.irtc.org continue to work as they are cached by Cloudflare, and Cloudflare can still talk to our server. The problem lies in the fact that whilst we are receiving the incoming traffic sent our way, outgoing traffic that needs to pass through Comcast is black-holed only four hops from our server. This means anyone who is behind Comcast addresses are unable to access anything on our server.

We have used our class C network for more than a quarter of a century with no real issues; this is the first time we've been black-holed by a major transit point in the US and we have no explanation for it. A request has been lodged with the Comcast NOC to fix this but as of the time of writing it remains in place.

We're posting this message on our front page primarily to raise awareness amongst those who are not affected but are in communication with those who are (via means outside this site) to let them know why they can't connect, since of course affected users aren't able to read this message right now. Additionally once the issue is resolved, this will serve as an explanation as to why we were "down" for so long.

Development Status (November 2024)

Sat, 2 Nov 2024 09:01:03 GMT

After a long break in releases of 3.8 beta test candidates, development is resuming, though not at the pace of past releases.

One impediment we have yet to overcome is code signing for the Windows platform. Currently we have no means of doing so as our previous key has expired. The difficulty is both cost and the need for flexibility in verifying us as an organization. Despite the fact that we have a company registered in Australia (Persistence of Vision Raytracer Pty. Ltd.) and it is visible on the ASIC website, it is our experience that the verification process gets hung up by the fact the company doesn't sell anything, have a street address, or have a phone number.

While we do not generally sign beta releases, it is our policy that official releases for the Windows platform are expected to be signed.

DKBTrace (foundation of POV-Ray) creator has kickstarter for educational IDE

Thu, 2 Dec 2021 04:00:05 GMT

David K. Buck - the creator of DKBTrace, the pioneering raytracer that was the genesis of POV-Ray - has created a KickStarter campaign to fund creation of an open-source IDE for PigeonTalk (PigeonTalk is a smalltalk implementation created by David that is aimed at being a programming environment to explore computing).

"I chose Smalltalk as a language because it provides the most immersive experience I've encountered. Smalltalk allows you to create, use, and explore software in a very hands-on way. It's an ideal environment for learning and playing with software. This Kickstarter project is to provide a development environment for this Smalltalk which I'm calling PigeonTalk. The development environment would run in a web browser and would communicate with the Smalltalk engine using WebSockets. Once this is available, PigeonTalk becomes a viable programming environment that others could use."

We wish David the best in this endeavor and are hopeful the Kickstarter will meet its goal as POV-Ray itself would not exist if it were not for David's kind contribution of the DKBTrace source code.

POV-Ray v3.8.0 beta tests available

Wed, 9 Dec 2020 07:00:05 GMT

POV-Ray 3.8 is now in beta-test. You may obtain beta releases via our GitHub repository. Discussion regarding the betas should be directed to the beta-test group in our forums.

POV-Ray turns 30

Tue, 8 Dec 2020 05:01:03 GMT

30 years ago today, on July 29 1991, the first beta of what would become POV-Ray became available in the GRAPHDEV forum on CompuServe. See "The Early History of POV-Ray", "The Original Creation Message", "The Name" and "A Historic Version History" in our v3.6 documentation for more details about the early days of this project.

Wiki back online

Fri, 4 Dec 2020 12:00:06 GMT

The POV-Wiki is now back online and is running the latest version of MediaWiki. Additionally we have restored our legacy bugtracker, which tracked issues prior to moving our source code to GitHub.

Forums back online

Fri, 4 Dec 2020 04:01:00 GMT

Following more recovery work since the server crash we're happy to say our user forums are now back online in read-write mode.

Server Recovery

Thu, 3 Dec 2020 21:00:08 GMT

The www.povray.org site is now back in read-write mode. User logins should work, however please note the forums are still offline.

We'd like to give a massive THANKS! to Netplex for going above and beyond in getting us back up on new hardware.

POV-Ray Server Downtime

Thu, 3 Dec 2020 15:00:08 GMT

Our server recently experienced a catastrophic hardware failure, resulting in the need for a replacement and recovery from backup.

No data has been lost but as the new system uses a newer version of PHP and MySQL, plus has other related changes, the restoration will be done in steps. Currently the site is running in read-only mode without a database. We will restore services as soon as we can.

Please note this also affects other sites hosted here such as news.povray.org and irtc.org. We will bring them back up once the main site is back to normal.

Blender to Persistence of Vision

Sun, 8 Dec 2019 01:01:01 GMT

The Blender to Persistence of Vision add-on's next release is slated for August 2nd 2020. See also: next day live Q&A session

white_dune VRML/X3D editor adds POV-Ray export

Sat, 7 Dec 2019 23:00:09 GMT

The folks at the open-source white_dune 3d editor project let us know that they've added POV-Ray export capability. Neat! It looks like a useful tool, definitely worth checking out.

You can find their github repo here or if you prefer you can go straight to their project website for downloads.

Call for papers: Ray Tracing Gems

Thu, 7 Dec 2017 01:01:05 GMT

Eric Haines dropped us a line to let us know that there is still time to submit proposals to Ray Tracing Gems, with the final deadline being final October 15th 2018.

Eric also commented "They don't have to be about DXR, they could be survey or reference articles, or general principles worth writing down in one spot. We hope people will contact us informally about ideas for proposals before the paper deadline."

POV-Ray 3.7.1 enters beta phase

Thu, 1 Dec 2016 13:01:04 GMT

POV-Ray 3.7.1 has officially entered public beta testing phase.

Source code and a Windows installer can be found on our GitHub repository. For more information and feedback please visit the povray.beta-test newsgroup (also accessible via our web interface).

An unofficial Mac version can once again be found on megapov.inetart.net.

Converting POV-Ray scenes into 3D-printable STL meshes

Sun, 1 Nov 2015 09:01:01 GMT

Former POV-Ray developer and team coordinator Chris Young has been working with 3D printing in recent times and wanted to be able to convert a POV-Ray scene into something that he could touch & feel. This isn't as easy as it sounds since POV-Ray works with solids but consumer 3D printers expect triangle meshes.

He has written a blog post explaining the issue and how he approached it, and another interesting and quite detailed post explaining the process he used to get from .POV to .STL.

Chris has made his pov2mesh code available on GitHub under the Creative Commons license.

POV-Ray turns 25 (or 30)

Wed, 9 Dec 2015 07:00:07 GMT

It was "back in 1986 or so" that David K. Buck started work on DKBTrace, and it was in July 1991 that the first version of its successor project saw the light of day. What was then called STAR-Light, and later renamed to PV-Ray and ultimately POV-Ray, has therefore been on this planet for a whopping 9,190 (or 11,000) revolutions by now (plus another guesstimated 150 above it). Of course we faithfully continue our effort to keep it that way, and although this website has been rather silent since the official release of POV-Ray 3.7.0 in November 2013, that's only because work has been proceeding elsewhere:

Ever since the 3.7.0 release, development has been revolving around or GitHub repository.
Pre-release builds are also published there, on a semi-irregular basis, in the releases section.
The most up-to-date documentation is being maintained on our Wiki.

The only odd one out is probably the interaction with our user base, which faithfully continues to revolve around our newsgroups at news.povray.org (also accessible via our web interface).

Python modeller for POV-Ray

Wed, 9 Dec 2015 07:00:07 GMT

As an alternative to POV-Ray's inbuilt scene description language, Laurent Evian has developed the free "Pycao" tool to describe scenes using the Python language. For details, see Laurent's website.

Routing problems for some users in Sweden and Finland

Wed, 9 Dec 2015 07:00:07 GMT

We've become aware that since late November 2015 some visitors in the Scandinavian region have been unable to access povray.org and its related sites via their broadband connection, but find that when using a mobile connection the site works fine.

This issue affects visitors whose ISP's rely on TeliaSonera for transit or routing information (while there may be other backbone providers affected, we have not received examples other than Telia). Basically Telia are not receiving (or not accepting, we are not sure which) routing information for the network that povray.org is hosted on (203.29.75.0/24, advertised on AS6062).

At this point the matter is out of our hands as it involves backbone providers and how they exchange BGP routing information. The issue has been brought to the attention of providers in both the USA (where our network is hosted) and Sweden, and we can only wait to see if or when they will resolve it.

Please also note that affected visitors will probably not be able to successfully email us regarding the issue if they use their ISP-provided email accounts as these will generally use the same routing tables as used for general web browsing. Using GMail or other non-ISP-specific services ought to work.

We will update this post as more information becomes available.

Update: As of July/August 2016 this issue seems to have cleared up.

POV-Ray 3.7 released

Thu, 1 Nov 2012 08:00:08 GMT

POV-Ray version 3.7 has now been officially released. Please see our download page for more information.

Lathe and Prism Utility Available

Sat, 8 Dec 2012 03:01:09 GMT

Epspline (as in Edit-Povray-SPLINE) is a utility for POV-Ray users: a simple 2D graphical editor of lathe and prism objects. Visit the website for download links, and a few samples.

Viewshed Analysis with POV-Ray

Sat, 8 Dec 2012 00:01:03 GMT

A viewshed is an area that is visible from a specific location. Viewshed analyses are a common function of most GIS software. See this blog post for more information.

POV-Ray Helps Visualize Bee Keeper Data

Tue, 4 Dec 2012 18:02:01 GMT

See this blog post to read more about how POV-Ray was used to visualize bee keeper data for Norfolk County Massachusetts.

POV-Ray, Export & View, for Mathematica

Tue, 4 Dec 2012 06:02:00 GMT

For use with Mathematica. View or animate in front-end or otherwise. Has a partially supported POV-Ray exporter. See their website for more details.

Koppi's Bullet Physics Playground

Wed, 2 Nov 2011 06:01:04 GMT

Filling containers with objects has just gotten a whole lot easier! POV-Ray users can now easily fill containers, or place many objects, with collision checking, into their scenes. The application has a rudimentary POV-Ray export feature, so some post-processing is necessary. See the website to get started!

Parallella supercomputer kickstarter nearing end

Tue, 1 Nov 2011 01:02:02 GMT

The Parallela platform seems to have potential in the future for use with raytracing as Adapteva are coming out with a double-precision version early in 2013. Given their kickstarter is approaching its end date and they are still a little bit short of their target we thought we'd mention this in case any POV users are interested in it.

Once the appropriate hardware is available the POV team will take a close look at it to see if it's a suitable target for a port of our software.

Spectral Rendering with POV-Ray

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 03:01:00 GMT

Users can now do Spectral Rendering with POV-Ray. For more details, see the contributors website for a description of how the process works, and all the Scene Description Language files that you will need to get started!

ANIMUSIC 3 kickstarter campaign in its last week

Fri, 9 Dec 2011 05:01:01 GMT

While not directly related to POV-Ray, many POV-Ray users will nevertheless be familiar with the ANIMUSIC series of renderings synced to music. Many of us think it's rather neat :-). If you've never seen their work before, check out this demo video, or the below kickstarter page (where they give a little more info about their rendering pipeline).

They are in the last week of a kickstarter campaign to enable the completion of the third release in the series, and have 75% of the funding needed. For those not familiar with kickstarter, they will only receive the pledges if they meet their target by the end of the campaign (which is September 5).

If you are interested in this sort of work you can pre-purchase ANIMUSIC 3 (or make a pledge) via their kickstarter campaign page.

Update of Insert Menus Add-on

Thu, 8 Dec 2011 17:01:02 GMT

The popular Insert Menus Add-on by Friedrich Lohmueller has been updated. See the download page. A collection of shape macros was also extended. Since these shapes are integrated into the add-on, look here for more details.

Caedium Version 4 Available

Thu, 8 Dec 2011 17:01:02 GMT

Caedium can now simulate free surface flows using a volume of fluid Computational Fluid Dynamics solver. View this animation rendered with POV-Ray, or visit their website for more details.

Another PoseRay Update

Wed, 7 Dec 2011 07:02:01 GMT

The main changes include some AMD video fixes, very basic SSLT support. There were also some miscellaneous bug fixes. It's compatible with POV-Ray 3.7 RC6. You can download it here!

Making of a Rose

Mon, 5 Dec 2011 11:01:03 GMT

This HD video animation by Robert Alzinger was rendered entirely with POV-Ray. It features a demonstration of several Constructive Solid Geometry techniques. See the website to view his clever presentation

Colored Leaves

Mon, 5 Dec 2011 10:02:03 GMT

Regular news group readers have already seen the colored leaves trick by Norbert Kern, so in case you missed it, here's the discussion ... there's also a sample scene file.

PoseRay Beta Release

Mon, 5 Dec 2011 10:02:03 GMT

A versatile application that should be in every POV'ers work-flow has a new beta release. It's compatible with POV-Ray 3.7 RC3, so see their website for more details.

Four POV-Ray-created Music Videos on DVD

Mon, 6 Dec 2010 15:01:06 GMT

Former POV-Ray developer Eduward Schwan has released a DVD containing four POV-Ray-generated music videos.

"Journey through four different surreal worlds, each one offering artistically-crafted computer-animated scenes, some playful, some mysterious, all thought-provoking. Each video has its own original music soundtrack composed to go hand-in-hand with the video experience. The computer-generated ray-traced videos were designed bit-by-bit (and the music note-by-note) by SchwanSongs for your enjoyment."

POV-Ray work by Holger Karsten

Mon, 6 Dec 2010 07:00:08 GMT

Long-time POV-Ray user, Holger Karsten, has recently created a blog of graphical work and experiments with POV-Ray. Check out his site at lightspeed.byethost24.com!

Y.A.P.R.M. 0.7.1 released

Fri, 3 Dec 2010 03:00:05 GMT

A new release of Y.A.P.R.M., "Yet Another POV-Ray Modeller", has been released. 0.7.1 is a bug fix release to correct many small issues and to introduce some enhancements for usability. Joëlle Cornavin has contributed a French translation and Debian packages will follow in the next few days.

HTTPov updated

Wed, 1 Dec 2010 09:00:01 GMT

HTTPov, a distributed rendering system for POV-Ray which runs over HTTP, has been updated to include new features and a new Python client. Also supports the POV-Ray 3.7 beta.

Blender Project Needs Help

Wed, 1 Dec 2010 04:01:00 GMT

Some of you may not know this, but the latest release of Blender has a POV-Ray exporter. Interested POV veterans that know how to program in Python should consider getting involved. This could be a great way to raise POV-Rays profile, by exposing it to more users. See their wiki for more details.

Leveller 4.0 Available

Mon, 2 Nov 2009 05:00:02 GMT

The Leveller heightfield modeler has been updated. Version 4.0 (Windows ONLY) includes true 3D scene objects, contour lines, elevation labeling, cut/fill analysis, cross section reporting, shape texturing, etc. and exports formats suitable for use with the POV-Ray height_field object.

LionSnake v1.7.16

Sun, 1 Nov 2009 09:01:01 GMT

A new version of LionSnake is now available, and you can get it here. Note: The download host has changed.

Penrose tessellation in POV-Ray

Wed, 9 Dec 2009 06:00:04 GMT

Maurizio Paolini and Alessandro Musesti of the Department of Mathematics and Physics, Catholic University of Brescia, Italy, have created an interesting 15 minute animation in POV-Ray showing properties of the Penrose tessellation. Check out the Matroska 1280x720 render at the Animated Penrose Tiling website (video available in multiple languages).

Faster CFD as Caedium goes Parallel

Tue, 8 Dec 2009 10:02:02 GMT

For details see the press release. See also this example of a Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) simulation performed in Caedium and rendered by POV-Ray.

Bishop3D 1.0.5.0

Tue, 8 Dec 2009 03:01:00 GMT

Bishop3D, a POV-Ray modeler and animation system for MS-Windows platform, is proud to announce the release of Bishop3D 1.0.5.0 This new release includes a long-waited Texture Library Manager, a new plugin for creating grass patches (inspired by Gilles Tran MakeGrass macro) as well as general improvements and bug fixes. Visit the "new look" Bishop3D website for more information.

Version 3.3 of SU2POV (Sketchup to POV-Ray converter) available

Tue, 8 Dec 2009 07:02:00 GMT

Version 3.3 of SU2POV is now available.

SU2POV is a freeware converter to export SketchUp models to POV-Ray. It has been designed so few actions are necessary to run POV-Ray and generate images of your SketchUp models. It runs on PC and Macintosh platforms.

LionSnake 1.7.15

Mon, 7 Dec 2009 16:00:05 GMT

A new release of the LionSnake modeller is now available. The latest version includes several bug fixes and many enhancements to allow easier editing. A complete list of changes can be found on the new LionSnake website.

Visualization Library

Sun, 6 Dec 2009 03:01:09 GMT

Visualization Library is a C++ middleware for high-performance 2D and 3D graphics applications based on the industry standard OpenGL 2.1, designed to develop portable applications for the Windows, Linux and Mac OS X operating systems.