Most of the images in this book were computer generated using freely available software written by the LEGO user community. The core software, LDraw, was originally developed in 1995 by James Jessiman with a DOS interface. The LDraw file format is still used today to maintain a library of thousands of LEGO parts modeled by users. I used the LDraw editor MLCad (created by Michael Lachmann) to assemble the virtual parts for the images in this book. The models were then imported into a viewer called LDView (created by Travis Cobbs), which I used to find just the right orientation and perspective for each picture. LDView then converted and exported the LDraw files into a form that could be read by POV-Ray (Persistence of Vision Raytracer), an open source 3-D rendering package. This tool was used to adjust lighting, colors, and reflections to make the photorealistic images you see in the book. Among the advanced features used were radiosity and HDR (High Dynamic Range) lighting. On average, each image rendered for about 20 minutes on a modern computer. More complex models are possible, and more sophisticated images can be created by using such advanced features as fog, focal blur, motion blur, and complex backgrounds. These can take hours or even days to render.

All of the software mentioned above can be downloaded from http://www.ldraw.org/. Many more examples of rendered LEGO images can be found in my Brickshelf folder at http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=353519.