Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => Arts & Talents => Topic started by: Hellstryker on October 04, 2008, 04:24:44 am
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So i've been screwing around with apo lately and came up with this:
http://durandal-thoth.deviantart.com/art/As-lightning-fall-99753420
I actually kind of like it. Anyone here have any experiance with apo/could lend any tips?
As for what apo actually is, for those who don't know: http://www.apophysis.org/
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The center of that would actually serve as a good nebula
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Apo can indeed be used to make nebulae, but I'm still working on that aspect of it.
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Sweet, another Apophysis user! :)
Here's a couple of my examples:
(http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/3807/mutualgravitationea4.jpg) (http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/3320/coldembracerecolorbd5.jpg)
I find it quite an amazing program, especially just from the vast variety of different fractals you can make with it. The possibilities are truely infinite. I can't really describe good techniques for using it aside from simple experimentation. With the exception of just a couple specific fractal types, there is no easy or fast way to make something that looks really cool. Just lots of hours spent "tweaking triangles" in the transform editor.
However, there are quite a few tutorials out there which are of tremendous help. There are a few at http://apophysis.wikispaces.com/Tutorials (http://apophysis.wikispaces.com/Tutorials)
Also some advanced tutorials for making specific fractals can be found on deviantart. For example, http://michaelfaber.deviantart.com/art/Disc-Spiral-Tutorial-38694865 (http://michaelfaber.deviantart.com/art/Disc-Spiral-Tutorial-38694865) is particularly good.
Regarding making nebulae out of it, I think it is very possible if you use a combination of a few linear, sinusoidal, and blur transforms, perhaps a few others mixed in as well. Also another program you can try is Chaoscope (google it). It get's very good results as well, plus I think it's a lot easier to work with. :)
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Sweet, another Apophysis user! :)
Here's a couple of my examples:
(http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/3807/mutualgravitationea4.jpg) (http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/3320/coldembracerecolorbd5.jpg)
I find it quite an amazing program, especially just from the vast variety of different fractals you can make with it. The possibilities are truely infinite. I can't really describe good techniques for using it aside from simple experimentation. With the exception of just a couple specific fractal types, there is no easy or fast way to make something that looks really cool. Just lots of hours spent "tweaking triangles" in the transform editor.
However, there are quite a few tutorials out there which are of tremendous help. There are a few at http://apophysis.wikispaces.com/Tutorials (http://apophysis.wikispaces.com/Tutorials)
Also some advanced tutorials for making specific fractals can be found on deviantart. For example, http://michaelfaber.deviantart.com/art/Disc-Spiral-Tutorial-38694865 (http://michaelfaber.deviantart.com/art/Disc-Spiral-Tutorial-38694865) is particularly good.
Regarding making nebulae out of it, I think it is very possible if you use a combination of a few linear, sinusoidal, and blur transforms, perhaps a few others mixed in as well. Also another program you can try is Chaoscope (google it). It get's very good results as well, plus I think it's a lot easier to work with. :)
Love the one on the left. How do you get them to look so... clean?
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One very good technique for making a fractal less noisy or grainy is to increase the rendering time (increase the quality setting in the render tab; for complex fractals I use at least 2000 quality, sometimes up to 5000). This will make the render sharper and cleaner looking.
Another very big factor involves what types of transforms you are using. Some fractals are inherently more crisp than others, and both examples I show above are of the "disk-spiral" type which is described in the second link. Diskspirals are very nice to work with, in my opinion, because they are relatively simple (generally only 3 or 4 transforms needed) and therefore relatively quick to render, and they usually result in exceptionally clean/crisp images.
Some things I would suggest, aside from trying out those tutorials (trust me, they help out a lot and will show you a lot of cool techniques), is to spend some time playing with only linear, sinusoidal, and spherical transforms. Make random batches of perhaps 25 fractals at a time with only those 3 types set to appear, and with only 2 or 3 transforms at a time, and look through the results until you find one that looks interesting. Then open the transform editor and start playing around with it, moving/expanding/rotating the triangles to get a feel for how it affects the fractal. Also look at the transform properties for each triangle and change the numbers around and get a feel for what each transform type does.
Note that you're not likely to end up with a lot of cool looking images by using only linear/sinusoidal/spherical, but this will help you get much better control over how your fractals look. Then when you make more advanced fractals you will feel much more comfortable and your results will be even better. :)
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Reminds me of my old Trapper Keeper folders from junior high.
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Fractal software has come a long way since FractINT (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractint)!