POVRay mosaic: brief description

POVRay mosaic project is a set of programs, which read every pixel of source image and convert it into a virtual 3D object, packed side by side with objects created from other pixels, thus forming a grid of 3D-mosaic in POVRay format.

Currently POVRay mosaic spans all three regular plane partitions for Euclidean tilings, namely 3⁶, 4⁴, and 6³.

POVRay mosaic are free open source Python programs, so you can download POVRay mosaic from GitHub together with detailed help file and some presets/extensions.

POVRay mosaic is a sort of lab for exploration: while default exported scenes show primitive objects like spheres packed into planar grid, they contain numerous options, grouped into human-editable form, to easily redefine almost anything.

Update: In version 1.11.1.1 texture syntax changed to fully blown texture, thus providing a capability to build layered textures.

POVRay mosaic output scene files contain several predefined 3D objects description, along with finishes and normal modifiers for them. Object properties may be mapped (i.e. linked to) source image pixel brightness via any of predefined transfer functons.

Surely you can not only switch between predefined stuff and edit parameters like rotation and size (although this alone will give you numerous combinations), but also insert your own objects, functions and values. The easiest way to do so is using external "preset.inc" patch files which, upon importing into main scene file, will override all previous settings. For example, preset file "44_dice.inc" (included in distribution) for rendering image below is about only 2,51 kb, yet contains both dice 3D object and all necessary "flip" instructions, and may be plugged into your scene with editing just one line.

Now it's time to download POVRay mosaic from GitHub and start building your own mosaic scenes. And, surely, once you manage to build something interesting, don't forget to show it to other humans and lesser species.