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1995-03-30
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FRACTANI is a program to calculate animated fractals with FRACTINT. It
was developed for the FRACTINT version 18.2 but I think it works
with older versions of FRACTINT down to version 16.x. I also changed
the floatingpoint accuracity down to 12 positions after the point
for a compability with the latest 19.0 version of FRACTINT.
FRACTANI creates a FRACTINT-PAR-file which contains the parameters
for all frames of the fractal animation and a batch-file which
calculates all frames with FRACTINT automaticly. The fractals
calculated by FRACTINT are saved in GIF-format and you can put them
together to an animation (.FLI or .FLC) with the help of Autodesk
Animator Pro's POCO-routine 'NUMPIC' or with Dave's Targa Animator
(DTA).
This FRACTINT parameters are changed by FractAni
corners : which enables the zooming and the rotation of the
fractal.
maxiter : to enable high magnifications
bailout,
params : to morph the fractal during a flyin
colors : to cycle the color map in any desired speed
The other FRACTINT parameters are not changed by FractAni, but you
can use them as static parameters.
You are allowed to distribute FractAni on BBSs and computer networks,
if you don't change the files in the archiv. The author is not
reponsible for damages caused by his programs.
─────── ∙ ───────
New Features since Version 2.0
──────────────────────────────
- added a color cycling feature (see ANINEU.PAR).
- added parameter and bailout morphing (see DANCE.PAR and
SALAD.PAR).
- the animation velocity can now be changed during the animation.
(see ANINEU.PAR).
- added smooth in and smooth out for first and the last keyframe, or
for any other keyframe (see ANINEU.PAR).
─────── ∙ ───────
List of files
─────────────
- FRACTANI.EXE The program
- FRACTANI.LNG The laguage file
- GERMAN .LNG The German language file
- ENGLISH .DOC This file
- FRACTANI.REG The order form for the registrated version of
FractAni
- GERMAN .DOC The German documentation
- ANIMA .MAP My favourite color-map (if you like yellow, in
fact it's a rotated version of CHROMA.MAP)
- ANINEU .PAR A parameter file witch shows the new features
- DANCE .PAR color cycling and parameter morph demo
─────── ∙ ───────
Installation
────────────
- Copy all files in your FRACTINT-directory. You can create a
seperate directory for FRACTANI but it's easier this way.
- Kopieren Sie GERMAN.LNG auf FRACTANI.LNG wenn Sie Deutsch benutzen
wollen.
Don't worry if you can't understand this sentence!
- Copy ENGLISH.LNG to FRACTANI.LNG if you want to use the English
language.
─────── ∙ ───────
The Creation of a Fractal Animation
───────────────────────────────────
To create your first fractal animation, just do the following steps.
FRACTINT
────────
1. Run FRACTINT.
2. Choose a fractal type by pressing <T>.
3. Choose a video mode by pressing <Del> or by pressing the right
function key eg. F3 for 320x200x256 of SF6 for 640x480x256.
4. Look for the frame (fractal picture) where you want to start your
animation. Load another color-map if you want to (<E> <ENTER>
<L>).
5. Press <B> to save the fractal parameters of the first frame. If
the input form for the fractal parameter file doesn't appear,
your FRACTINT version is too old. Look for the newest version in
COPUSERVE, INTERNET or any other local mailbox.
6. Enter the name of a parameter file you have not used before. DON'T
press <ENTER> now, press <cursor down>.
7. Enter the name of the first frame (parameter record). Don't use
a name you have used before in this PAR-file because it would be
overwritten. Remember, FRACTINT sorts the parameter records in
alphabetical order but stores them in the order you entered them.
FractAni doesn't look at the name of the records it only loads
them as they are in the .PAR file.
8. Press <cursor down> to enter the FRACTANI animation commands in
the comment line. Enter "#FA " to tell FractAni to interpret the
following characters of this line as animation commands.
This animation commands are now available:
V(x) set the animation velocity to x (see 22.).
S(x) insert this frame x times in your animation.
This will cause a smooth decceleraion and
acceleration at this frame after smoothing.
You can use that feature e.g to make a ping pong
like effect (see Tips).
R(x) rotate the color palette x times to the right if
positive to the left if negative. Default is 0.
This means if entered R(0) or nothing in the last
key frame, FractAni will rotate the palette x
times from the last frame to the current.
This animation commands are only valid for the first key frame
(parameter record).
E(x) set the smoothing enviroment to x (see 23.).
F(x) set the smoothing factor to x (see 24.).
9. You can press <ENTER> now.
10. Look for the next interesting fractal site where you want to zoom
in or zoom out, rotating is allowed but no streching and skewing
(in this version of FRACTANI).
11. Press <B> again and continue at 7. as often as you want.
12. Quit FRACTINT by pressing <Esc>, <Esc>, <Y>.
FRACTANI - Input fields
─────────────────────────
13. Run FRACTANI.
14. Enter the name of the PAR file you entered at 6. Don't forget the
extension. If FRACTANI had found the PAR-file, a message will be
displayed in the output window. Otherwise the message 'Parameter
file not found' will be displayed. In this case , try again and
enter the right name.
15. Enter the name of the batch-file with the extension. You have to
run this file to render the animation. This file should be in the
FRACTINT-directory.
*** With the unregistered version of FRACTANI only ***
*** 50 frames can be rendered ***
16. Enter the name of the PAR-file with extension which contains the
parameter of rendered frames. This file also should be in your
FRACTINT-directory. Don't use the filename of the PAR-file you
created with FRACTINT (6, 13) because it would be overwritten.
17. Enter the first three characters of the fractal pictures. If you
enter 'ANI' for example the GIF-files will be named ANI00000.GIF,
ANI00001.GIF ... Attention!!! if this files already exists they
will be overwritten.
18. Enter the DOS-Path of the directory you want to store the fractal
pictures.
19. Usually the fractal type is read out of the PAR-file, you
shouldn't change it.
20. Enter the FRACTINT videomode key (eg. F3 for 320x200x256). For
help of the available videomodes press <F1>. If you want to use
another videomode which is not specified by a key you have to
redefine the key to another videomode within FRACTINT. How to do
this is described at the end of this documentation.
21. If you haven't defined a color-map within FRACTINT you can do
this now. Enter a '@' in the first position of this line followed
by the file name (eg. @CHROMA.MAP) if you want to use a colormap
file. Otherwise you can enter or change the colormap directly
with the FRACTINT colormap format described at the end of this
file.
22. The animation velocity describes how fast the animation runs if
you assume a constant screen frequency. It is specified in
percent. 10% for example means that the fractal is magnified by
10% per frame if you zoom directly into the fractal or that the
fractal is shifted by 10% of the screenwidth if you move the
'camera' parallel to the fractal. If you want to render a short
preview of the animation 10% is a reasonable value. To make your
animation smooth instead of jerky use lower values eg. 2.5%.
23. The smoothing is a very special feature of FRACTANI. It makes
changes of direction in the animation smooth. It also causes a
smooth in and smooth out acceleration at the beginning and at the
end of the animation. You have to experiment with the smoothing
enviroment and with the smoothing factor to create the right
smoothing effect. But its simply like this: 'greater values make
smoother animations'.
The smoothing enviroment defines about how many frames a change
of direction or what else take place. If you have an animation
velocity of 10% and an enviroment of 30% for example the change
of direction will take place over the 3 (=30/10) preceding and the
3 following frames of the actual current frame. That means that
the change of direction needs 2*3 + 1 = 7 frames. To save DOS
memory FractAni deletes the calculated frames after smoothing.
That means, that you can use only 201 frames for the smoothing
enviroment. This causes a limitation of the smoothing enviroment
to hundered times of the animation velocity. If your velocity is
1.0% e.g. the enviroment is limited to 100.0.
24. The smoothig factor defines how intese farer frames will
interfere with the actual current frame. If you choose a high
value 10.0 and more farer frames will interfere like nearer
frames. Lower values like 1.0 lets further frames interfere with
the current much lesser. 3.0 is a resonable value for the
beginning.
25. For many fractal types additional parameters are absolutly
neccesary. FRACTANI reads automaticly all additional parameters
out of the parameter-file created by FRACTINT but you can change
them wihtin FRACTANI. The additional parameters will not be
changed during the animaton with this version of FRACTANI... One
important thing you have to know: the first parameter must be
'reset'.
FRACTANI - Menu
───────────────
26. To enter the Menu enter [ENTER] (enter, enter?!), [Esc] or [Crsr
Dn] in the last input field. To calculate the frames just type
[ENTER]. The numbers of frames calculated will appear in the
output window. If you want to change the numbers of frames you
have to change the animation velocity. Now the menu items
'SMOOTH' and 'SAVE' will be available.
27. After calculating the frames you can smooth your 'way' through
the fractal. You can also override this by pressing [Crsr left].
28. To save the animation (the .PAR and the .BAT file) press [ENTER]
above the menu item 'SAVE'.
29. 'INFO' just shows a little information about the programmer,
support and the registration.
30. With 'QUIT' you ... FRACTANI. You can ... FRACTANI also by
pressing [Alt]+[X].
Back to FRACTINT
────────────────
31. Change to the FRACTINT-directory, if you are not already in this
directory.
32. By executing the BATCH-file you entered at 15., FRACTINT renders
the animation to GIF-files. You can now drink a tea, smoke a
cigarette (european version only) and look how your computer does
the work for you.
Autodesk Animator Pro
─────────────────────
33. Start Autodesk Animator Pro
34. Choose menu item 'NUMPIC' in menu 'POCO'
35. Click on '2 LOAD PICS AS FLIC'
36. Change to the directory of your GIF-files and click on the
GIF-file ending with '00000.GIF'.
37. Click on 'REPLACE' and wait ...
─────── ∙ ───────
Dave's TARGA Animator (DTA)
───────────────────────────
33. Using Dave's .TGA Animator you can convert the GIF-files into a
FLI. Simply type
DTA filenames /Ofliname /C##
at the DOS-prompt. Where filenames is the name of the GIF files
with wildcards, e.g. ANI*.GIF. Fliname is the output filename of
the FLI. The /C switch tells DTA to use the color palette of the
first GIF for the next ## GIFs. This option just saves a little
time because DTA haven't to rebuild the color palette. A example:
DTA ANI*.GIF /OANIMA /C46
─────── ∙ ───────
FRACTANI - Online help
───────────────────────
FRACTANI contains a little online help which appears whes you press
F1. If you are in an input field for filenames the F1 key lists the
contents of the directory you have entered, otherwise you get
information about the input field e.g. the available FRACTINT
videomode keys. You can edit the help text by editing FRACTANI.LNG
with your favourite text editor.
─────── ∙ ───────
The FRACTINT color palette format
─────────────────────────────────
FRACTINT v18.2 doesn't contain the description of this format, maybe
I haven't found it, I added a little description of this format.
One R-, G-, B-value is in the range from 0 to 64. FRACTINT uses
therefore 64 characters
0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
where '0' means 0 and 'z' means 63. Three values defines one colour.
The colour black RGB(0,0,0) is represented by '000' and white
RGB(63,63,63) by 'zzz'. Continous colour palettes are described with
<###> where ### means the number of continous colours. A continous
grey palette from white to black which uses all 256 colours e.g. is
described by zzz<254>000.
─────── ∙ ───────
Redefine a FRACTINT videomode-key
─────────────────────────────────
If you want to use a TARGA display, you have the problem that
FRACTINT haven't defined a key for this special video mode. But you
can redefine a existing key to another videomode within FRACTINT by
doing the folowing steps:
- Start FRACTINT and press <Del> to enter the videomode selection
menu.
- Select with the bar the videomode which you want to use in future,
don't press [ENTER].
- Press the [+] key on your number pad
- Press the key combination you want to use in future for this
videomode. [Ctrl][F6] (=CF6) for example. CF6 is the former
Herculesmode (720x348x2).
─────── ∙ ───────
How to use non-standart VGA resolutions
───────────────────────────────────────
Do want to render an animation with a different resolution like the
VGA screen you have to define the viewport in FRACTINT.
Type <v> in FRACTINT and set preview to 'yes'. Enter the your image
resolution in last two lines. The additional parameters in FractAni
should now contain the static parameter 'viewwindows=4.2/0.75/...'.
Tip: You can use this feature to make a quick preview or to use video
resolution.
─────── ∙ ───────
The language files (*.LNG)
──────────────────────────
You can edit nearly all helptexts, menus and prompts in FRACTANI. Just
edit FRACTANI.LNG with your favourite text editor. Don't forget to
regard the adwises at the beginning of FRACTANI.LNG.
Other software poducts
──────────────────────
To play FLI animations you can use many public domain software like
AAPLAY for Windows and DOS. There is also the possibilty to play the
animations within YOUR software product with the help of the
AAPLAY.DLL.
─────── ∙ ───────
Credits
───────
Thanks to ...
the beta testers : Joerg Bergemann and Roland Schmutzler
Conact for problems, ideas, registration
─────────────────────────────────────────
Kai Mysliwiec Jörg Bergemann
Siegfriedstr. 18 c/o media tools
80803 München Barthstr. 24
80339 München
Tel: +89-34 54 12 Tel: +89-502 49 50
Fax: +89-502 53 70
CompuServe: J. Bergemann: 100270,356
The address of media tools will change around the middle of 1995.
The registration fee including shipping is $40.
─────── ∙ ───────
End of FRACTANI.DOC
Kai Mysliwiec 03/25-1994
─────── ∙ ───────