Just because we're on shelter-in-place (#quarantinelife, I suppose) doesn't mean we can't have nice spring things, but the journey can be treacherous even in the world of fractal art.
This is where I started in Apophysis: lovely color scheme that would work well for spring or autumn.
The challenge in doing fractal art is that every decision you make is iterated – repeated, but in a special kind of way.
The difference between pencil drawing and a paintbrush is a mater of iteration: the pencil gives you a single line in each stroke, the paintbrush in that same stroke gives you as many lines as there are quills in the brush – each line very similar to the other, and of course not always distinct because of the medium of paint, but this kind of iteration is what gives a painting the visual and physical texture it has.
In the digital world it is like having a very strong arm and a billion brushes, all iterating every stroke according to the algorithms of the chosen program. I use Apophysis, which gives me a variety of shapes of canvas to iterate around, an even bigger variety of types of strokes and blended strokes, an even bigger palette of colors, and, some starter iterations of random points thrown on a canvas – like a lump of clay to a sculptor.
But therein lies the challenge. A pencil stroke gone wrong: you erase it. Done. A paint stroke gone wrong: not as easy to deal with, but it can be painted over.
In fractal art, a single stroke gone wrong creates literally a billion consequences, because that's how many times that stroke is iterated. You can end up in a strange place quickly – and if you don't keep track of where you are and where you are going, you can't fix it. You have to go back to your lump of clay – or your blank canvas.
Order of operations is also important. Apophysis is very mathematical, but the law that makes multiplying 2 times 3 the same outcome as multiplying 3 times 2 DOES NOT APPLY.
Let's just say I educated myself the hard way this weekend.
So, you saw what I started with, right?
Several million iterations later:
So far, so good … then, a couple of decisions later, the search for spring things went completely off the rails …
You know how people worry about head lice? Every reason why, right here, in a nightmare mode – however, this fractal accident was worth a story of its own … the tale of the horrible “Harebahl” is over in Alien Art Hive if you dare to read it.
Obviously, after I nearly jumped out of my chair at the horrible sight we can now scroll past, I retraced my steps backwards. Quick, fast, and in as much of a hurry as possible. I got back to a good place, reversed a couple of decisions, and …
There we go. Brightly colored birds sipping nectar from brightly colored flowers … that's a spring thing worth the entire journey. OBVIOUSLY, I clicked "save" right there, and breathed a sigh of relief!
How many birds do you see? Some resemble peacocks with their tails down, some resemble roosters, some without a tail... look carefully! Let me know how many you find in the comments, and enjoy!