The article pile recovered a bit, but again is now fairly low, and I would be grateful for some contributions for the next issue, preferably before the last week of October. However I have regretfully had to hold over a few articles this time, so if one was yours, don't despair - it may appear next time!

The PC Program Fractint is now becoming a major phenomena. PC owners should all have one version or another of the program, and recently Computer Shopper distributed a free disk which included Fractint 15.1 in order to support a 20% price increase.

The magazine still remains an excellent bargain when compared with the competition, but I am disappointed that they use "nine pricing". If someone can't tell the difference between �1.19 and �1.20 then they'd be unlikely to make much use of Computer Shopper's contents. Virtually all the advertisers use "nine pricing" and unavoidable extras in order to make their goods appear at a cursory glance less expensive than they really are. In the case of merchandise which is supposed to be used by erudite, intellectual people, I find this insulting.

Because of the popularity of Fractint, many readers would benefit from a regular column of articles on using Fractint, especially the Formula function. I look forward to receiving suitable material for publication in future issues.

I would also be interested in material concerning the use of the Roland LAPC-1 PC sound card to generate fractal music, preferably using a compiled BASIC.

Announcements

Time Problems End Heathercliffe Software

Due to a change to a more demanding job and subsequent lack of time, Liam Proven is no longer able to offer the shareware he advertised in Fractal Report 4, on page 11. In any case, he felt that many of the programs needed a more professional front end in order to compete with Fractint or Dragons. Unfortunately the closure includes the more obscure computers. However as the programs were offered as shareware, if there is anyone out there who has already got copies and wants to continue distribution, then I would suggest contacting Liam Proven to see if he agrees. [Liam Proven, Heathercliffe, Imperial Terrace, Onchan, Isle of Man.] Mr Proven said that he was astonished by the number of letters he received as a result of his article in Fractal Report.

Amygdala 23 Concentrates on M-Set

I received Amygdala 23 on 28 June, just after Fractal Report 16 had gone to the printers. The issue dealt with extreme magnifications of the Mandelbrot set, the largest being 9.05 x 10²⁹⁸, shown on a slide. Mention was made of string based calculation systems, one using the Macintosh's True Basic, and another using ANSI C. Such systems can, of course, calculate to any level of accuracy, but one has to set a limit, as otherwise the machine would loop forever when a number with an infinite number of decimal places was encountered. The first article mentioned that if the Mandelbrot Set was drawn so that it was 100 Kiloparsecs across (a suggested radius of the our galaxy), then a magnification of 3.5 x 10³¹ would represent one hydrogen atom! Interestingly, at these extreme magnifications, one still sees miniature M-sets and the same sort of patterning surrounding them.

Amygdala 24 arrived on 12 August. An idea familiar to Fractal Report readers, iterated function systems with the transformations chosen at random, was the subject this time. An article by Roy W. Sommers gave a Turbo Basic program, line numbered for easy translation. The other main article reviewed three IFS programs for the Macintosh, although these programs also have versions available for other machines. They cost $40-$50 each. Merz, their $30/rectangle advertisement sheet was incorporated into this 10 page issue, but was composed of only two ads, one a half page for Fractal Fx and another double rectangle for fractal prints and a calendar.

Reader's Hall of Fame

No entry again for magazine articles, I am afraid. I wish someone could get an article in New Scientist mentioning Fractal Report! However Dr Clifford Pickover has written another book Computers and the Imagination, and mentioned us in it again.

A Book to Fire the Imagination

Dr Clifford Pickover's latest title Computers and the Imagination doesn't just dwell on fractals and chaos, but obviously these topics form a large part of this diverse work which includes such chapter headings as Growing Your Own Font, Building Your Own Artificial Webs, The Mummy Project, Computer Exoskeletons, Visualisation of the Cleichniszahlen-Reihe Monster, A Fractal Goose, Fractal Faces, Self correcting Anti-Syslexic Font, Computer Generated Poetry. (The contents list is vast - these headings took my interest.) The 448 page book has over 300 colour and monochrome illustrations and is published by St Martin's Press under ISBN 0-312-06131-5, at 5 cents under $30. At the time of writing we were promised a leaflet before the mailing date of this issue from a UK supplier of this book. If we get it in time, you will find it enclosed with this issue.

Spiral Symmetry

This is a more academic sounding work edited by Dr Pickover and I. Hargitti, of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Aimed at scientists, humanists and interested lay people, this collection of articles covers the startling repetition of spiral patterns in science and nature. From the contents list, I should have though it may be heavy reading for some lay people, but there seems to be a lot here for those interested in fractals, particularly Julia Sets. It has 650 pages, and the UK price is quoted at �28, which is an unusually fair interpretation of the US price of $48. World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., 73, Lynton Mead, Totteridge, London, N20 8DH. They seek names for their mailing list, and their other titles appear to be of likely interest to some of our readership and are very reasonably priced for this sort of material. [USA - 687, Hartwell Street, Teaneck, NJ 07666-5309, rest of world: Farrer Road, PO Box 128, Singapore 9128.]

Panasonic Use Barnsley Fractal Transform Technology

We received a letter from Mr Andy Sinden, Cell Director OTIB IQ, Whyteleafe Business Village, Whyteleafe, Surrey CR3 0AT, advising that they are supporting Panasonic Business Systems, who are demonstrating PIPA - Panasonic Image and Picture Archive. OTIB IQ are developing this system for Panasonic, which they claim to be unique. The fractal transform technology will enable colour pictures to be stored with documents. He will deal with anybody in the UK interested in Barnsley image compression technology. Please mention Fractal Report if writing, so that they will consider it worthwhile keeping us informed. His organisation also offers programming services, database upgrading/migration etc., and other facilities.

Fractint 16 "Now Shipping."

Fractint users should look out for The Waite Group's Fractal Creations next time they are in their bookstore. Fractal Creations rolls a fractal primer, Fractint user manual and details of many fractal types into one very readable book. It is written by Tim Wegner and Mark Petersen, who are two of the main authors of Fractint, the book uses the program to help guide the reader through creating their own fractals and then manipulating them with the many features built into Fractint. Fractal Creations comes 'bundled' with a copy of Fractint V15.11, a pair of blue/red glasses for viewing stereo fractals and a fractal poster. Fractal Creations is published in the USA by The Waite Group at $34.95, and will be published in the UK by Pitman Publishing. ISBN 1-878739-05-0.

Version 16.0 of Fractint is now available. New features include on-line context sensitive help, demo feature, parameter save files and ray tracer interfaces. Readers of Fractal Report who would like a copy can send a formatted disk and return stamped addressed envelope to Tim Perkins 118 Leggatts Way Watford Herts WD2 6BH, who will be pleased to send them a copy. PC disk formats 5.25in 1.2mb, 3.5in 720k or 1.44mb only, as the program and data files are over 400k even when compressed. Tim will also include on the disk, part one and two of the Fractint User Guide, although these were written for V15.0 of the program they include a lot of useful tips for Fractint users. They are also a lot more readable than the original Fractint documentation files.

New Fractal Fissures Cassette from Kobus Nieuwmeijer

Those of your who enjoyed the Fractal Fissures music cassette may like to know that Kobus Nieuwmeijer (48, St Leonards Road, Oxford OX3 8AB) has a new cassette Fractal Fissures Opus 1 for sale for �3.50 including postage. Our stock of the original Fractal Fissures is now exhausted, but if anyone would like a copy, then please enquire with Mr Nieuwmeijer.

Bit Bopper Video of Fractal Music

The "Bit Bopper" is a video system employing three Acorn processors to produce images to music. Originally it was proposed to sell the system for public entertainment, but the market would not support the price of �60,000. (Presumably arising from the development costs.) It was therefore decided not to manufacture the system, although two prototypes exist. One of these is being used by a company called Digital Atmosphere Video to make a video to Kobus Nieuwmeijer's "ambient music". Mr Nieuwmeijer will sell these video cassettes for �6.99. (48, St Leonards Road, Oxford OX3 8AB) Also available are two Bit Bopper video cassettes of "Acid Music" at the same price. It appears from the material I was sent that this company may still be looking for investors or participants.

Mandelbrot Corn Circle

An article in New Scientist 24 August included a picture of a Mandelbrot Set corn "circle", drawn in a field in Cambridge. The local paper, Cambridge Weekly News who first noticed the object were not aware of it's significance. Peter Landeshoff, from Cambridge University's mathematics department, denies all knowledge of the student stunt, and the article claims that Dr Mandelbrot himself was asked if he did it. (Really - did anyone actually ask him that?) If any readers of this newsletter were involved with the stunt, next time could they stamp out the words Fractal Report underneath it! Or possibly they could send us an article How to Make Mandelbrot Corn "Circles".

10 REM *********************

20 REM * BIOMORFOS *

30 REM * B.1 *

40 REM *********************

41 REM José E. Murciano

42 REM Apdo. 192

43 REM 44080 TERUEL

44 REM SPAIN

50 SCREEN 9:KEY OFF:CLS

55 DIM B(10000)

60 XI=-1.4:XA=1.4:YI=-1.4:YA=1.4

70 P=.7:Q=.01:LX%=639:LY%=349

80 DX=(XA-XI)/LX%:DY=(YA-YI)/LY%

90 REM

100 FOR NX=1 TO LX%

110 FOR NY=1 TO LY%

120 X=XI+NX*DX:Y=YI+NY*DY

130 FOR K=1 TO 16

140 XN=X*X*X*X+Y*Y*Y*Y-6*X*X*Y*Y+P

150 Y=4*X*X*X*Y-4*X*Y*Y*Y+Q

160 X=XN

170 IF X*X+Y*Y>100 THEN GOTO 240

180 IF INSTAT THEN END

190 NEXT K

200 NEXT NY

210 NEXT NX

220 W$=INPUT$(1)

230 GOTO 5000

240 IF ABS(X)<50 OR ABS(Y)<50 THEN PSET(NX,NY),K:K=16:GOTO 190

250 K=16:GOTO 190

5000 REM

5030 XL=64:YL=35:V=10

5040 GET(X1,Y1)-(X1+XL,Y1+YL),B

5050 LINE(X1,Y1)-(X1+XL,Y1+YL),11,B

5060 A$=INKEY$:IF A$="" THEN 5060

5070 PUT(X1,Y1),B,PSET

5071 REM COMIENZO ZOOM

5075 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(73) THEN XL=XL*1.1:YL=YL*1.1

5076 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(81) THEN XL=XL*.9:YL=YL*.9

5080 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(77) AND X1<640 THEN X1=X1+V

5090 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(72) AND Y1>0 THEN Y1=Y1-V

5100 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(75) AND X1>0 THEN X1=X1-V

5110 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(80) AND Y1<350 THEN Y1=Y1+V

5111 XM=XI+X1*DX:YM=YI+Y1*DY

5115 IF A$=CHR$(0)+CHR$(71) THEN XI=XM:YI=YM:XA=XI+XL*DX:YA=YI+YL*DY:CLS:GOTO 80

5120 GET(X1,Y1)-(X1+XL,Y1+YL),B

5130 LINE(X1,Y1)-(X1+XL,Y1+YL),11,B

5140 GOTO 5060

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