                            "A Scholler's Tools"
                    Image by Jeff Lee <shipbrk@gate.net>
                        http://www.gate.net/~shipbrk

Here is a bit more information about the objects in the scene, and  some  of
the  techniques  I  employed in creating them.  This may provide more detail
than anyone would ever want to read, but better too much than too little.

In the foreground, moving from front to back, are:

  * Some calligraphy.  The text is copied out of a book entitled _A Treatise
    Of Daunses, wherin it is shewed, that they are as  it  were  accessories
    and dependants (or thinges annexed) to whoredome : where also by the way
    is touched and proued, that Playes are ioyned and knit  togeather  in  a
    rancke  or  rowe  with them_, printed in 1581 and by an anonymous author
    (though I assume he was a Calvinist minister, as they tended to denounce
    in print anything even the least bit fun, but especially dancing and the
    theatre, and it was  published  about  the  time  many  other  Calvinist
    ministers, such as John Northbrooke, were printing similar things).  The
    calligraphy style is an  English  "secretary"  hand,  given  in  Richard
    Field's  1611  book  of  penmanship, and was the most prevalent style of
    handwriting during that period.  The scanned  image  is  mapped  onto  a
    bicubic patch.

  * A quill pen.  These were usually made from the  feathers  of  a  goose's
    wing  (preferably  the  second  or third feathers, or, failing that, the
    pinion feather), or a raven's.  After  being  prepared  (which  involved
    soaking  in  water  for 24 hours, then being "tempered" by being plunged
    first into a bucket of sand soaked with boiling water,  then  into  cold
    water),  the barbs were stipped off, the quill shortened to a manageable
    length, and finally the nib was cut with a pen-knife and  a  cleft  made
    to  carry the ink to the tip.  The cardioid cross-section of the pen was
    modelled using the formula r=a(1-cosA), and projected along the  Z  axis
    with  a  shallow curve in the -X direction, and a shallower curve in +Y,
    to model a feather taken from the right wing of a goose.  This  was  all
    accomplished as a mesh calculated with nested #while loops.

  * Scratch paper.  The "Rules by F.B. for Children to write by",  contained
    in  Field's  book, mentions keeping "brown paper for great hast, or else
    boxe with sand".  While it was used primarily for soaking up  blots  and
    spills,  scratch  paper is also handy for getting past the heavy flow of
    ink after one has just dipped the pen.  This was also  a  scanned  image
    put  onto  a bicubic patch, but by the time I moved it around to where I
    was happy with it, the turned-up corner had moved off the image.

  * A stick of sealing-wax.  Unlike beeswax or candle wax, sealing wax is an
    incredibly hard wax.  Period sources stipulate that it  should  be  hard
    enough  to  require that it be broken in order to open the paper beneath
    it, but sturdy enough that it not shatter immediately.   Period  recipes
    indicate  a  mixture  of shellac, turpentine and rosin, which results in
    a rather shiny substance that bears a surprising resemblance to plastic.

  * A bottle of ink and its cork.  I originally designed  this  as  a  lathe
    object,  but  that slowed down the rendering to such a staggering degree
    that I remodelled it as a CSG object.  This wasn't much better,  but  at
    least  it showed *some* improvement in speed.  The cork texture is based
    on the one in the standard POV-Ray include files, but modified  to  give
    darker bits.

  * A pen-knife.  Used for cutting the quill, pen-knives had a  short  blade
    with  a  curved cutting edge.  In order to get rounded edges, the wooden
    handle is a CSG composed of bits sliced out of superellipsoids.

  * A candlestick.  Loosely modelled on a brass candlestick I  had  floating
    about  my  apartment,  it  comprises two lathe objects, two meshes and a
    couple of primitives.   In  retrospect,  the  bottom  mesh  object  (the
    hexagonal  base)  could  have been more easily constructed using a prism
    with a conic sweep, but since I did that one in the  wee  hours  of  the
    morning,  my  thought  processes were a bit fuzzy.  I had wanted to give
    slightly rounded edges to the mesh object that  makes  up  the  majority
    of  the  candlestick's height, but couldn't quite get the hang of smooth
    triangles.

  * A candle.  The first object I created for this scene.  I wanted to model
    the fact that wax or tallow candles seem to glow at  the  top  from  the
    light coming from the flame.  Unfortunately, the only method that really
    seemed to work made the wax appear to be brighter than the flame itself,
    but overall I think the effect isn't too bad.

  * A piece of bread.  Because they didn't  have  rubber  erasers,  students
    learning  to  write would erase their ruling lines with bread, squooshed
    up the way all children seem to  do   instinctively  when  playing  with
    bread.   It  doesn't  work  too badly when using actual lead, as long as
    the marks are lightly made (the results are  rather  disappointing  when
    trying  to  erase modern graphite pencil marks, but it does work to some
    degree).  Because period "white" bread was only about as white as modern
    wheat  bread,  I made the interior a little tan.  Its inner surface is a
    combination of a "bumps" normal and a CSG difference of lots  of  little
    spheres.

  * Books.  Unfortunately, I didn't have any books from the  time  period  I
    was  portraying,  so  I used the oldest books I possess as models.  They
    are admittedly anachronistic,  but I hope that this  inaccuracy  may  be
    forgiven  me in light of the fact that binding techniques changed little
    between the 17th and 19th centuries.  As the greatest amount of time was
    spent  on  these  books,  specific  comments  on  their construction and
    histories may be found in  each  book's  include  file;  the  _Roxburghe
    Ballads_  are  in  book1.inc and book2.inc, the book in the centre is in
    book3.inc, and the thick, badly damaged book is in book4.inc.

The room in the background is loosely based on the  drawing-room  of  Edmund
Blackadder  (from  the British historical sitcom "Black Adder II").  Because
the room was intended to be very dimly lit, I did not  spend  an  inordinate
amount  of  time  on fine details.  At first, I was worried that the shadows
of the candles on the far wall were unrealistic,  but  experimentation  with
real  candles  convinced  me that my fears were unfounded.  The portraits on
the walls are of myself (centre)  and  two  of  my  friends  in  Elizabethan
clothing, and the Tudor-style house visible through the window is based upon
a building in Winchester, England (near a structure known as "The Cross").

Items that I had originally wished to put into the picture were  a  pile  of
"Stanch graines", used for preparing the writing surface, and black lead for
ruling lines on the paper.  However, I omitted them for the sole reason that
I  didn't  know what they looked like.  For example, I feel fairly sure that
one wouldn't use a plain old hunk of lead, but was there some sort of stylus
used  with  it, like a modern pencil or a silverpoint stylus, or was it just
formed into a stick, as is done with modern artists' charcoal?

The "Rules by F.B. for Children to Write by", upon which I based this image,
was taken from the book entitled, _A NEVV BOOKE,  Containing  all  Sorts  of
Hands vsvally written at this Day in Christendome, as the English and French
Secretary, the Roman, Italian, French, Spanish, high and  low  Dutch,  Court
and Chancerie hands:with Examples of each of them in their proper tongue and
Letter_, imprinted at London  by  Richard  Field,  1611.   The  "Rules"  are
available  on  the  Web  at <http://www.gate.net/~shipbrk/writing.html>, for
those who are interested in such things.

                                                  -- Jeff Lee
                                                     30 April 1997
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