Amazing Seattle Fractals
Experience The Art of Infinity!
Julia Fractals Tutorial - "Beginning Changes"
Let's get started! I'm going to assume you have already downloaded, and unzipped, the Tiera-Zon fractal program since this is what I will be using to create these fractals. If you have not yet downloaded that program you can download it from this page, or from Stephen's site. Open up the program by double clicking on the program icon within the folder where you unzipped the program.
1) I will start with a basic fractal image that I have created. (You can open any image that you already have, to work along with this.) I then draw a square using the cursor over a portion of the fractal image. The point you zoom to, in the julia mode, may create a dramatic difference in the image you get. (Again making for an incredible degree of experimentation.) Try zooming to different areas of the original fractal image, and see what changes occur, and how they differ, depending on what area you use. This also can vary greatly depending on the original formula that is used.
2) Once you have selected an area with the cursor, click on the Julia button, which is on Tiera-zon's left toolbar, to generate the new Julia fractal.
An alternate way to access this function is to right click directly over the fractal and select "Draw Julia".
This image illustrates the location of that button on Tiera-zon's left toolbar.
3) The fractal you see here is the result of my Julia zoom. As you may have noticed from most of my fractals, I like symmetry. But whether you like asymmetrical or symmetrical images, the parameters you can change here will help you discover a new world of fractals!
This rather chaotic image does not have that much appeal to me, so I will first start by trying to create a more symmetrical form. This is accomplished by changing the Julia "Y" dimensions under parameters. To access this menu, RIGHT click your mouse over your image and select "Fractal Parameters".
4) You should now see this example of the parameter window.
(This is not the entire paramters box, but the part we will be using. I have reduced the size of some of these images to facilitate faster download times.)
Notice where the cursor is pointed to, the "Julia Y" field. In general, the higher this number the less symetrical the image. The lower the number, the more symmetrical. This may not be universal, but I think you will find that generally this is the case. So, if you want a symmetrical image, lower this number, more abstract, increase the number.
