Anton,
Povray isn't very difficult, but it does take some time to get things
working and looking good. If you are trying to make a quick figure for
a talk this afternoon I suggest forgetting about it, but if you have
some time to mess around...go for it. With that said I'll tell you how
I do it.
make a file called "make_pov.py" containing the following line:
# make_pov.py
# Do "run make_pov.py" from within pymol and then execute the script
# with "make_pov('povray.inp')" to create the povray.inp file.
#
from pymol import cmd
def make_pov(file):
(header,data) = cmd.get_povray()
povfile=open(file,'w')
povfile.write(header)
povfile.write(data)
povfile.close()
Then make your scene in PyMol. I usually use scripts so at the end of
my script I'll have a couple of lines like this:
run make_pov.py
make_pov('my_bad_ass_molecule.pov')
If I recall correctly this *.pov file only has a list of the shapes in
your scene and a basic light. You will want to do most of your color
tweaking and addition of lights to the *.pov in an editor of your
choosing. For complicated scenes I would write out a *.pov file for
each object (i.e. one for the surface representation, one for the CPK
of a ligand, and another for the ribbon representation.). Then I would
cat them together after having edited them to contain the proper lights
etc.
then run povray
povray +I.my_bad_ass_moleculepov +FN +A0.3 +AM2 +H2657 +W2539
+Omy_bad_ass_molecule
This will use antialiasing to make a whopping huge
my_bad_ass_molecule.png file. You will definitely need to read the
povray manuals (www.povray.org) to understand all the options available
to you when rendering.
I wanted to include an example figure, but it was too big for the PyMol
list.
Good luck,
Scott
On Sep 8, 2004, at 11:47 AM, av...@lbl.gov wrote:
Hi Scott,
Thank you for the help. I'm totally unfamiliar with PovRay. When you
say "You
can write out the primitives from PyMol" what do you mean?
Anton
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Scott Classen, Ph.D.
ACS Postdoctoral Fellow
Department of Molecular & Cell Biology
University of California, Berkeley
237 Hildebrand Hall #3206
Berkeley, CA 94720-3206
LAB 510.643.9491
FAX 510.643.9290
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
