Welcome
Note: Make sure to visit the pictures on the Stereo Exhibition page! They are presented in a wonderful Page Flip plugin.
The Apophysis program has always provided a fascinating range of fractals that while infinite, are also unique compared to the original Mandelbrot fractals and the related Julia sets. Until a few years ago, Apophysis only created fractals as 2D images. The shapes and patterns it creates are called flames because of the resemblance of many of them to various flame like shapes. The name for the program means to protrude a shape so it seems to me that it got that name for good reason, the patterns suggest shapes!
Classic Flame Fractal Shapes
To begin with that suggestion of shape was as far as it went. People love looking at the images that were rendered and imagining what shapes were present. It’s similar to cloud watching and imagining animals and figures in the cloud patterns. The intrigue of suggested shape is part of the attractiveness of this class of fractals.
When I first came across the program I attempted to ‘trick’ the program in various ways to show me more than one viewpoint of a flame fractal so that I could see the results in 3D. It didn’t work. Nothing repeated with sufficient predictability or defined direction for it to reveal the real shapes.
A review of the source code told me that it was entirely possible to modify it to include the third dimension, but not having the time, I wasn’t the one to set about the task.
Then a young genius with the handle “Zueuk” came along and did the conversion into 3D. Now you can visualize, design and render scenes of flames from any angle and best of all, it faithfully allows you to craft the precise view locations for stereoscopic output. Not only can you get an idea of what features are located where, but you can explicitly see the shapes in glorious detail and in 3D space!
Please understand, the program does not include direct stereoscopic tools. To obtain stereo views you have to get your render-camera to the right viewpoints AND you have to design a flame that is more than just a flat surface picture! In some cases that can be challenging.
Most of the “variations” and “plugins” for the program are written solely for 2D manipulation. That means that while they make interesting shape-suggestive patterns, they do so by painting flat – like onto a canvas. There are a useful number of additional plugins which have been written for the 3D hack versions and they provide the means to pop a flat texture into a genuine 3D shape.
Once the shape is established, some of the 2D variations end up painting on the 3D shapes and that allows you to continue designing in 3D. Whether you explore using random tools, or deliberately build a flame transform by transform, and painstakingly work your way through the long list of variation options, the 3D flame that results can be very interesting and often surprising.
Discussions on this blog will help the beginner to use Apo 3D hack with basic guidelines. Since the program is quite complex, there’s plenty for an experienced flame designer to learn too. That’s especially true if you want to develop quality stereoscopic image pairs as the output.
As things develop on this site, a number of stereoscopic tools will be developed as scripts, which makes it easy for you to use, whether or not you understand what needs to happen. I’ve started with one really useful and basic script called the Rotate Pitch Script. It easily tips the Pitch axis up and down so you can switch from a top-down view (Pitch=0) to a direct side view (Pitch=90), or a view from 30 degrees. Anyone using Apo 3D needs to do this a lot during the design and exploration process.
When you want stereoscopic images, there are a number of methods of working with the program that you should follow to insure that when you find the perfect flame and viewpoint, it will be simple to arrange the camera in the right way to get perfect results. Maybe some future version of the 3D hack can have additional improvements to overcome some of the idiosyncrasies and bugs that currently exist in the program.
Stereo results are fun and wildly rewarding. Obtaining them need not be terribly difficult when you learn some of the tricks. Stay tuned to this blog and website for more information, and most of all, try things for yourself in Apophysis 3D!
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