A modified Mandelbulb 3d fractal which reminds me of the Idaho panhandle. There is only 1 fractal in this image. The second and third hills are merely copies of the first; the image was reversed for the second hill. Adjusting the color balance toward the blue and the addition of “fog” gives a sense of depth.
The Green Hills of Earth
A fractal depiction of the Northern Lights reflected off the surface of the Arctic Ocean.
Click on image for full-size view.
The Northern Lights
I entitled this Qaanaaq after a settlement in northern Greenland; one of the northernmost inhabited spots on the planet. I like the sound of the word and it seemed appropriate for the image.
This image is available on numerous items through Zazzle.com; not at my wildlife store, but at Fractal Fire, where I post my fractal art.
Jack Frost making art on your windows. I added a wintery background to a random fractal which resembles ice patterns on a window pane. The glowing blobs of color, elements of the original fractal image, are just a nice plus.
The winter solstice arrives tomorrow.
Click on image for full-size view.
Jack Frost At Work
Those patterns on your windows during winter appear as water vapor crystallizes. The patterns are caused by slight changes in the temperature of the air, but other factors, related to the formation of snow and other forms of frozen precipitation, also contribute to variations in design.
They often begin when a film of condensed moisture is frozen by a puff of cold air, and the glass gets a thin sheet of ice. Perhaps another film of moisture forms and trickles down, cutting ditches and tiny streams through the underlying ice, while another puff of cold air freezes this moisture. New frozen vapor molecules may add microscopic ice crystals. The freezing and melting process repeats again and again. Bit by bit the subtle weather conditions etch the window panes with patterns.
Like snowflakes, frost needs a nucleus around which to form. Ice crystals form on dust, small bumps and imperfections in a windowpane, or the texture of plants. Then frost grows as more ice crystals form on the ones that have gotten started. It can make fanciful feathery or spiky patterns.
In contrast, when water vapor condenses into water droplets on a cold windowpane and these droplets then freeze slowly, the ice has a different look, as seen in the close-up photo of frozen condensation droplets. The large bubble-like shapes in the photo are frozen condensation droplets, and the many small lines on their surface are cracks that formed as the ice froze and expanded.
Update – July 6, 2012.
This image received a “Today’s Best Award” from Zazzle.com.
Zazzle Award
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I have a software application which generates fractal images. Every so often I set everything to “random” just to see what will happen. Lo and behold, I got an image looking much like the Northern Lights. After adding it to a night scene it looks even better.
Click on image for full-size view.
The aurora borealis shimmers in the northern sky
The aurora borealis (or Northern Lights), named after the Roman goddess of dawn, Aurora, and the Greek name for the north wind, Boreas. Many cultural groups have legends about the lights. In medieval times, the occurrences of auroral displays were seen as harbingers of war or famine. The Maori of New Zealand shared a belief with many northern people of Europe and North America that the lights were reflections from torches or campfires.
The Menominee Indians of Wisconsin believed that the lights indicated the location of manabai’wok (giants) who were the spirits of great hunters and fishermen. The Inuit of Alaska believed that the lights were the spirits of the animals they hunted: the seals, salmon, deer and beluga whales. Other aboriginal peoples believed that the lights were the spirits of their people.
The connection between the Northern Lights and sunspot activity was suspected as far back as 1880. Thanks to research conducted since the 1950’s, we now know that electrons and protons from the sun are blown towards the earth on the ‘solar wind’. (Note: 1957-58 was International Geophysical Year and the atmosphere was studied extensively with balloons, radar, rockets and satellites. Rocket research is still conducted by scientists at Poker Flats, a facility under the direction of the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.
The temperature of the sun’s atmosphere is millions of degrees. At this temperature, collisions between gas molecules are frequent and explosive. Free electrons and protons are thrown from the sun’s atmosphere by the rotation of the sun and escape through holes in the magnetic field. carried eartward in the solar wind, the charged particles are largely deflected by the earth’s magnetic field. However, the earth’s magnetic field is weaker at either pole and therefore some particles enter the earth’s atmosphere and collide with gas particles in the higher layers (thermosphere). These collisions emit light that we perceive as the dancing lights of the north (and the south).
Most aurorae occur in a band known as the auroral zone,which is typically 3° to 6° in latitudinal extent and at all local times or longitudes. The auroral zone is typically 10° to 20° from the magnetic pole defined by the axis of the Earth’s magnetic dipole. During a geomagnetic storm, the auroral zone will expand to lower latitudes. The diffuse aurora is a featureless glow in the sky which may not be visible to the naked eye even on a dark night and defines the extent of the auroral zone. The discrete aurora are sharply defined features within the diffuse aurora which vary in brightness from just barely visible to the naked eye to bright enough to read a newspaper at night. Discrete aurorae are usually observed only in the night sky because they are as bright as the sunlit sky. Aurorae occasionally occur poleward of the auroral zone as diffuse patches or arcs (polar cap arcs, which are generally invisible to the naked eye.
Because the phenomena occurs near the magnetic poles, northern lights have been seen as far south as New Orleans in the western hemisphere, while similar locations in the east never experience the mysterious lights. However the best places to watch the lights (in North America) are in the northwestern parts of Canada, particularly the Yukon, Nunavut, Northwest Territories and Alaska. Auroral displays can also be seen over the southern tip of Greenland and Iceland, the northern coast of Norway and over the coastal waters north of Siberia. Southern auroras are not often seen as they are concentrated in a ring around Antarctica and the southern Indian Ocean.
Auroral displays appear in many colors. Variations in color are due to the type of gas particles that are colliding. The most common auroral color, a pale yellowish-green, is produced by oxygen molecules located about 60 miles above the earth. Rare, all-red auroras are produced by high-altitude oxygen, at heights of up to 200 miles. Nitrogen produces blue or purplish-red aurora. The lights appear in many forms from patches or scattered clouds of light to streamers, arcs, rippling curtains or shooting rays that light up the sky with an eerie glow. Curtain-like structures show field lines in the Earth’s magnetic field .
The auroras that resulted from the “great geomagnetic storm” on both 28 August and 2 September 1859 are thought the most spectacular in recent recorded history. It was reported by the New York Times that in Boston on Friday 2 September 1859 the aurora was “so brilliant that at about one o’clock ordinary print could be read by the light”.
The aurora is thought to have been produced by one of the most intense coronal mass ejections in history, very near the maximum intensity that the Sun is thought to be capable of producing. It is also notable for the fact that it is the first time where the phenomena of auroral activity and electricity were unambiguously linked. This insight was made possible not only due to scientific magnetometer measurements of the era, but also as a result of a significant portion of the 125,000 miles (201,000 km) of telegraph lines then in service being significantly disrupted for many hours throughout the storm. Some telegraph lines, however, seem to have been of the appropriate length and orientation to produce a sufficient geomagnetically induced current from the electromagnetic field to allow for continued communication with the telegraph operator power supplies switched off.
Both Jupiter and Saturn have magnetic fields much stronger than Earth’s (Jupiter’s equatorial field strength is 4.3 gauss, compared to 0.3 gauss for Earth), and both have large radiation belts. Auroras have been observed on both, most clearly with the Hubble Space Telescope. Uranus and Neptune have also been observed to have auroras.
And now for something completely different.
I don’t know if you’ve seen them; those pictures taken by NASA’s Cassini probe of the geysers on Saturn’s sixth largest moon Eneceladus. If not, look them up on the Internet.
Enceladus is one of several moons of the outer planets which have water oceans under their surface ice. The scientific community believes life may exist in Enceladus’ ocean; it contains salts and organic compounds.
Anyway, I’ve got some friends who have been there (They are not exactly from around here); they brought me some photos – here’s one:
Under the Ice of Enceladus
Click on image for full-size view.
Lot’s of living things there though my friends tell me the terms “plant” and “animal” don’t exactly work to describe them.
Though it is heated by gravitational stressing and radioactive decay the water is rather frigid – that’s my excuse for including it on this blog.
Sometimes the simplest fractals work really well.
This is one of those unanticipated happy accidents that occur from time to time. Sometime you just get lucky. A very nice fractal image that happens to look like the head of an antlered animal. I did tweak the colors just a bit. I think the neon-like glow-in-the dark appearance works really well as an abstract image.
As always, click on the image for a full-size view.
Electric Antlers
Here is another fractal image. I was able to tweak the fractal so that it looks like conifer fronds bound together with straw or some other natural cordage. Rendered with Apophysis; colors tweaked a bit with Irfanview. It came out rather well, I think.
Naturalistic fractal image
For a change of pace I have been experimenting with fractal graphics. Fractals can be quite elaborate, but I generally prefer more simple images. The work below was produced with Apophysis, a freeware fractal generator.
Click on image for full-size view.
Fractal Snowbird
Muskox
Native Alaska
Ice Edge
Winter Eagle
Concentration
deHavilland Beaver
Afternoon Moose
Bright Fox
Orca
Wolfpack
Siberian Tiger
Cold Day in Snezhnii
Taiga
Cold Lands Artist 