Greetings! This is the latest version of Fractal Domains. Fractal Domains is a shareware program that generates fractal images. It runs only on the Power Macintosh. Fractal Domains generates color images of the most popular fractal, the Mandelbrot set, and also generates images of the associated Julia sets (other fractal types will follow shortly). Fractal Domains has several options for producing striking variations of fractal images, and includes advanced features for producing high-quality images. Fractal Domains features include:
• Generation of Mandelbrot and Julia sets
• Editable color maps
• Options for generating dwell values
Escape Time
Continuous Potential
Angular Decomposition
Distance Estimation
• Orbit Trap Fractals, including
Stalks (cross- shaped orbit trap)
Imaginary or Real Stalks
Circular
Square
• A multitude of options for dividing fractals into regions with distinct color maps.
• Professional features for quality image generation including:
Full support for 24-bit color images.
Image rendering with anti-aliasing.
Spooling large images to disk (allows the generation of
images too large to fit into available RAM).
Fractal Domains is shareware. Some features are restricted in the unregistered version, although you can do quite a bit in the unregistered version. Details can be found in the user's manual and in "Read Me — Registration."
If you decide to register Fractal Domains, the shareware fee is $20. Please read "Read Me — Registration" for instructions and more information.
File List
The following files are included with Fractal Domains v1.2
Fractal Domains (The application)
Read Me (This file)
Read Me - Registration
Fractal Domains Version History
Fractal Domains User Manual
Selected Parameter Files (A folder with example parameter files)
Parameter Files
In my explorations with Fractal Domains I save any fractals I think are striking or might be worthy of further investigation to a parameter files folder. In previous distributions I included the complete collection of these files, but this has grown to quite a number, and I decided I was not exactly doing a favor to Fractal Domains users by including an enormous collection that mixed some rather pedestrian images with some really exciting images, in some cases with color maps that I devoted some time to tweaking, with no indication of which are the more worthwhile files.
For this distribution I decided to cull out some files and leave the ones I thought were pretty cool. This still leaves quite a few files. Anyone who wants the complete collection can still get them by downloding:
ftp://members.aol.com/fracppc/parameters.sit.hqx
However, there is nothing special about the files in the complete collection; you can generate images yourself that are more worthwhile than many of them. However, I encourage everyone to take a look at the files included with the distribution, especially the files in the "stalks" folders, because they demostrate the various possibilities afforded by the color mapping options, including the various "Regions" options, in Fractal Domains.
The “Selected Parameter Files” folder contains four categories of parameter files. In order to keep track of the rather large number of files I've now accumulated, I use the following naming scheme:
All names have at least six characters of the form:
xxnnnn
The first two letters (xx) mean:
ma — Mandelbrot fractals
ms — Mandelbrot with stalks
mc — Mandelbrot with circle orbit trap
mq — Mandelbrot with square orbit trap
ju — Julia fractals
js — Julia with stalks
jc — Julia with circle orbit trap
jq — Julia with square orbit trap
followed by four numerals which is just an arbitrary index number.
Some files have alternate colorations of the same fractal. These alternate colorations are signified by using the same six letter name as the original fractal followed by cn where n is a numeral.
Sometimes I include interesting zooms of the same fractal. These are signified by the six letter name followed by zn where n is a numeral.
This convention is occasionally extended, so for example if I have a file called ms1234 and a zoom of that file called ms1234z1, then an alternate coloration of the zoom would be ms1234z1c1.
Future Versions
The following features are going to appear in future versions, along with better documentation. I list them in the appoximate order of priority.
• Additional fractal types
• Better color editor
• Copying in PICT format
• Speed-up algorithms
• Extendibility (so the user can add new fractals)
• Generation of Quicktime movies showing fractals when zooming in or morphing as a parameter or parameters are changed continuously
Permission For Redistribution
Fractal Domains may be distributed in its unregistered form to any shareware library or CD-ROM compilation. The only condition is that all accomanying files must also be included in the distribution. The best way to accomplish this is to only distribute the stuffit file containing the original distribution.
For more information, see the Fractal Domains web page at
http:/members.aol.com/ddemars/fracppc.html
or write me at one of the email addresses listed below.
