Um...subject says it all :-)

Attached Link: http://fractals.iuta.u-bordeaux.fr/f-art-faq/

Every link you need is located here, The Fractal Art FAQ http://fractals.iuta.u-bordeaux.fr/f-art-faq/, and it includes the various links to other individual sites or comprehensive sites that have been listed in posts that you can find in the archives of this group. Try all the software you can to find which one suits you and what you are looking for.

Cool, thanks

As far as commercial software goes: For 2D Mandelbrot/Julia/Newton types: Ultrafractal www.ultrafractal.com For 3D Mandelbrot/Julia types: Quasz (etc.) www.hypercomplex.org (I think) For (3D) IFS: Xenodream www.xenodream.com I don't know if there's any "stand-out" commercial software for other fractal types eg. L-systems, flame fractals, strange attractors etc. but there's a commercial plug in for Photoshop -- ie. Kai's Power Tools 5 though I haven't got it. As for the freeware - you don't pay your money and take your choice ! but if you want a program that does a selection of different types you could start with Fractint (DOS but Windows version pending ?) If you want DOS freeware but with high/true colour then MMFrac though it's not tremendously compatible with systems - it's very sensitive to slight idiosynchrasies in video hardware/software.

Just to say I posted the above as I thought - "Try all the software you can to find which one suits you and what you are looking for" may be a little daunting as there's a very large number of freeware programs out there for generating z^2+c and nothing else. Hopefully someone with experience/liking for some particular freeware (or alternative commercial software) will also reply to your query.

Sorry, I wasn't aware I had violated the rules of daunting someone. I think the statement fairly well stands on it's own in that it is a good idea to be open to trying as many different programs as one would like, or would be available, because the fractal community is far more divided along political lines involving the use of one program over another and suggestions are undoubtedly subjective at best. Perhaps after trying various software the person my find that it is in their best interest to pursue the use of a program that they are comfortable with, and may in fact like to explore the endless possibilities within the framework of the "z^2+c and nothing else" equation. Just as there are those folks who like to explore Lyaopunov's Quaternerion's, IFS, Attractors and whatever els they may choose to pursue, to the exclusion of others. Also a person could try to explore the many types of fractal generators to find ones that best suit them in the event they are merely looking for a style that they are interested in using as seed images within other software or post process in a myriad of ways. Yes, fractals, graphics and the choices thereof are truly daunting. That's one reason I listed the Fractal Art FAQ so that a description of the most popular programs are given, with links to everything else. BTW, Fractint has been available for Windows for some time. It is known as Winfract, version 18.21, but it has not been updated since 1994/95 and does not have the deep zooming capability, or a host of other capabilities, that the full DOS version has.

fractal forge is a good windows explorer as well, especially since the windows version of fractint just really falls far short of the dos version.

Doug: Sorry, I didn't mean to sound as critical as you obviously thought I was - I don't subscribe to politics in either programming or fractals or arts or.... All I meant was there are so many fractal programs out there that it would be nice to hear others subjective opinions about fractal software - I have neither the time nor the patience to try all the fractal software that is available. I neglected to mention the old version of Fractint for Windows as it is/was so limited compared with the DOS version - a subjective decision :-) To me the ideal fractal software would be something like UF combined with Xenodream combined with Quasz combined with Bryce combined with Photoshop including L-systems, flame fractals, strange attractors, digital automata..... OK - a pipe dream then. More specifically (and realistically) something like UF but with the switch previews using the currently selected colouring/s rather than just some defaults.

Dave, Okay, fair enough, and I agree in that I don't have time to try them all either. I have tried many of them though, and in doing so find ones that suit me regardless of popularity, suggestions or hype. Even if I could get a "be all, end all" piece of software as you suggest, I probably wouldn't use half of it because I wouldn't be interested in half of it. Plus, some individual pieces of software do individual functions, or renderings, better than some present "catch all" offerings. That's why it is important to find what you like. For me it is the same as other art work in that I am interested in a wide variety of things, with a wide variety of styles available and I would like to work in a wide variety of media, but have found it best to work in the various media that suits me best with the tools I am most comfortable with. Coming to that realization included trying a lot of different things along the way. Doing so makes the difference between success and failure and liking what you do or create. That's just what works for me. My recommendations to any beginners would have to start with: Mind-Boggling Fractals www.mbfractals.com or it's freeware limited version Mind-boggling Fractals Lite found at these two locations: www.simtel.net/pub/pd/54429.shtml www.completelyfreesoftware.com/graphics_programs3_w95.html Then, next, would be any of Stephen Ferguson's programs: http://fractals.iuta.u-bordeaux.fr/fergusonsc/ Followed by Fractal Explorer: http://www.eclectasy.com/Fractal-Explorer/ which incorporates many of the better features of Ferguson's programs more completely, 3D, Landscapes, IFS and Quats along with simple versions of popular features of Ultra Fractal in it's layering capabilities and palette control. These are listed solely for ease of use and ease in getting used to working in fractals and some of the different rendering methods. From there the field is wide open. For switch previews, Terry W. Gintz developed the best method I've seen when he adapted Zplot for Windows, and has undoubtedly continued that to present. However, once someone gets experience working around M-set locations of an equation and learning what will happen in switching to the J-set, you get pretty used to what you can expect from generalized switch window images in most current software. I agree it could be better, though.

Well im only a newbie at this fractal stuff but this is what I did. I searched thru hours and hours of surfing peoples galleries and I made note of the images I liked and tried to find what program they made the image in ***. Then I found the various sites for the programs and checked them out in detail. Then I downloaded the ones I liked. The 2 free ones I started with were Sterling and QS Flame. And that was all she wrote until I happened across an image in a fellow Terrageneer's gallery made with a program called Xenodream. After visiting that website I thought really hard about it for an hour then logged on and bought the damn thing, sight unseen and no demo, and Ive never regretted it! I have also tried Ultra Fractal which allows free use for 30 days but I found it REALLY REALLy hard to understand. ***(where possible - its really important to note on your websites what programs you use for a particular image for peoples like me - and im sure im not the only one:) Anyway hope that helps Stacey