Hee hee, you sound like me. :) Sorry I can't be of much help as far as the math goes, all I know is that its some geometry mixed up with some imaginary numbers. You learn what shapes the different formulas make after a while, but I don't think the "monkey at the keyboard/mouse" approach tremendously impairs your ability to produce something really cool (speaking from personal experience, as it seems to work just fine for me). I CAN at least tell you what my definition of a fractal is~ its an equation that produces an image, such that when you "zoom in" on the image you notice a similar pattern, which is present no matter how close you look and goes on into infinity (except in some cases where your computer just isn't able to handle it anymore and gives you a very nasty insufficient memory error message). Different formulas produce different patterns, and in many cases one fractal will have several different areas that have different patterns. You really won't ever get the exact same image twice, that's what makes it so much fun. Anyways, I'll shut up now and let someone who knows what they're talking about more than I do answer your question. Hope to see you around, and good luck! Elizabeth