Complete Bookshop/CompleteWorkshop.iso/lists/reviews/fractals.txt

Text File | 1991-06-20 | 4KB | 57 lines

          FracTools - An Electronic Kaleidoscope of Nature's Geometry
                         Copyright 1990 David Batterson


     Benoit Mandelbrot, an IBM Fellow at the Thomas Watson Research Center,
coined the term Fractal.  It refers to a family of irregular shapes and
patterns around us, such as clouds, coastlines, mountains and trees.
     Major universities, NASA and military research groups have done a lot of
study of this non-Euclidian geometry of nature.  These multi-colored fractal
images, straight out of the psychedelic 60s, are quite spectacular.
     FracTools is simply a way of modifying, creating and viewing fractal
images.  This is not really a practical program, but it's sure a lot of fun.
Of course, you could incorporate a few such images into a corporate slide show
to liven things up a bit.
     The program comes with a number of images ready for viewing, as well as
some very entertaining slide shows.  In the beginning, you'll probably want to
view most of these, just as they are.  Then you can begin exploring how to make
new images and slides, and manipulate them to your heart's content.
     The effects you can accomplish are as good as some special effects we saw
in science fiction films only a few years ago.  There's no sense in even
describing the images; just try to view them at your favorite software dealer.
     You play around with the fractal images by changing the Palettes,
Iteration ranges, Strobe, Stained Glass effect, Kaleidoscope, and Horizontal or
Vertical Pan.
     Since FracTools uses the EGA standard, you get 16 colors out of a palette
of 64.  Use the various palettes provided, or create your own.  Increasing the
iteration ranges creates fatter color bands.  Increasing minimum iterations
adds black to the images.
     The strobe effects can be changed as to speed and direction, either from
the effects menu, or by mouse movements.  Selecting stained glass alters the
image so that each color band is separated from its neighbor by a black line.
     By choosing the Black and White palette, a stained glass fractal image
looks like a paint-by-number painting.  By saving these images as a .PCX file,
you can print them, and then color them with magic markers (great rainy day
activity for kids!).
     The kaleidoscope effect creates four smaller images, mirrored horizontally
and vertically.  The horizontal/vertical pan commands shift the image
left/right and up/down.
     When you put all these tools together, you can change the images quite
drastically, for hours of amusement.  But wait, there's more.  The Generate
menu lets you create new image files, either Mandelbrot or Julia types.
     Since these images take a long time to generate, you can use the Header
Only option, which saves the data necessary to create an image file.  Then you
can produce the image later, when you are at work or asleep.
     Oops, almost forgot the Mouse Movies option.  This creates instant changes
to your images, by simply moving the mouse around the screen.  The only
drawback to this process is that it makes the menus unreadable (black on
black) when you finish.  You have to press <Ctrl> <Enter> to get readable
black-on-white menus.
     FracTools requires 640K, hard drive, EGA or VGA, and DOS 2.0 or higher.  A
math co-processor is recommended for faster performance (you are dealing with
millions of calculations).
     Suggested list price is $59.  For more information, contact Bourbaki Inc.,
P. O. Box 2867, Boise, ID 83701; 800-289-1347 (orders), 208-342-5849 (info).
                                       #
     David Batterson enjoys using and writing about all kinds of graphics
software.  Contact him via MCI Mail: 273-7218.