This is the first fractal artwork I have created using UltraFractal 3. It took about half a day to make. It's a funky sunglasses-wearing extra-terrestrial from the 1970s, with afro puffs. The cute body (head + legs) is a Mandelbrot-form Nova fractal to which the orbit traps outside coloring algorithm has been applied. The afro is a standard Magnet 1 Mandelbrot fractal. I tweaked gradients and inside coloring to make the afro look naturally attached to the head. When designing the background, I hoped to simulate the psychedelic animations of abstract wavy ribbons that you sometimes see in old funk music videos and tv shows. Sometimes they had silhouettes of dancers superimposed on them. I experimented with lots of things, and finally used a Newton fractal with iteration-based orbit traps outside coloring, using wave trap shapes.

I like the jagged bottom surface of the alien's feet, because they could either be interpreted as cleats, or rough bellbottom jean cuffs that hide its shoes from our view. In the latter interpretation, I guess the alien would be leaping. I also like the dim aura that emanates from the afro and lightly affects the background.

In conclusion, I'm very pleased with this amusing first work. Looks like an album cover. If you're an interested band, send me an e-mail. (Remove the NO_SPAM_ prefix.)

Some bands I was listening to while making the art: Rage Against the Machine, Plummet, Run DMC, Jimmy Eat World, Tatu.

- W.Wu, 8/3/2003 7:59PM

After playing with a Mandelbrot fractal for a while, I discovered the rough outline of a stem and flower pattern. With the goal of sculpting a flower, I eventually found a combination of fractal parameters and coloring algorithmics that shapes what you see above. Amusingly, I almost abandoned this piece after I showed Mom this intermediate image, and she said that it looked not like a vased rose, but rather, female genitalia =P

Self-similarity patterns: The blue petal head has grooves which whirlpool infinitely into two vertigo-like drains. The leaves also have interesting patterns. Check out these zoom-ins to see four-leaf groups growing inside four-leaf groups, ad infinitum.

Blue roses do not naturally exist. They can only be bred artifically, by cultivating white rose buds in a blue pigment that eventually permeates the petals. Consequently, I feel that the blue rose makes a good symbol for fractal art, which mixes human creativity with mathematical structures that seem directly taken from nature.

I was listening to various trance anthems while working.

- W.Wu, 7/29/2003 4:55PM