The Sphere Maker 2 has instructions for use available on their page. The object of this tutorial is not to rewrite or improve on those instructions, but to help you better understand the functions of the Sphere Maker 2.

Rather than try to explain the results of the various Colors, Bump Styles, Environments, and Types of Reflections it's better to show you what the results are. You can see for yourself at the Sphere Maker 2's Color List.

Now that you get an idea of what the different colors, textures, environments and reflections, let's move on to the other parts of the Sphere Maker2.

First, you will select the Size of the image you would like to create. You can choose from 11 sizes ranging from 12 x 12 being the smallest to 512 x 512 being the largest.

The next step would be to choose a Shape for your image. You can choose from 5 shapes: sphere, cylinder 1 (vertical), cylinder 2 (horizontal), plane (can be used as a background), and border (tubular line).

Your next decision will be to choose the Rotation of your image. This is not an animation command, but determines which "side" of the image you see. The most vivid example of this is on the "earth" color... on the other options, it is not as noticeable an attribute.

The Bump and Depth are next and work together. You can give your image "texture" by choosing 1 of the 7 choices: leather, stucco, krinkle, ripple, water, dragon, or skin. Then specify the depth to increase or decrease the texture.

Now it's time to choose your Color. You have 9 colors and 9 "patterns" to choose from. They are: black, red, yellow, green, cyan, blue, magenta, white, gray, granite, wood, fire, earth, paper, mesh, checker, clouds, rainbow. Again, for examples of what the Colors and Textures look like, refer to the Color List .

The next attribute is the Intensity of the lighting of the image. There are 3 types of brightness to be determined. They are:

Ambient - The brightness of the shadowed area of the image. Choose a value from 0.0 to 1.0 (Note: Choosing 0.0 actually makes the "dark" portion of a sphere disappear....1.0 makes the entire image lighter).

Diffuse - The brightness of the lighted area of the image. Choose from a value from 0.0 to 1.0 (0.0 being less bright than 1.0).

Specular - The brightness of highlighted area of the image. Choose a value from 0.0 to 1.0 (0.0 being less bright than 1.0).

The next attribute to be determined is the Highlight. This determines the sharpness of the highlighted area. The recommended value ranges from .01 to 100... keep in mind that the larger the value, the sharper the highlight (the smaller the area); the smaller the value, the larger and more dull the highlighted area.

To see examples of the effects of these parameters, go to the Lighting Extremes gallery.

Type is next. This is actually the Type of Reflection you would like for your image. The choices you have are: normal, metallic, interference 1 and interference 2. For an idea of what these reflections look like, refer to the Color List.

The next attribute to determine is the Environment of your image. Your choices are: Normal, Marbling, Clouds, and Rainbow. Again, you can refer to the Color List to see what these variations look like.

You will then choose the Intensity of the environment you've chosen. The recommended value ranges from 0.0 to 1.0.