Hi everyone!

Been a while since I wrote a journal. I missed Inspiration Stations of many amazing artists, *silwenka and ~OutsideFate in particular come to mind. I also have loads of other features I wanted to do after my recent ventures into various abstract and surreal galleries. Hopefully I'll get to all of them eventually. Until then, you can have a look at my favorites - especially in the Photography, Traditional Art and Other Digital galleries.

I just wanted to say a few words about the name change in case anyone is wondering. I had picked up the name banana-tree in my mid teens, and as much as I still love Queen and the song that inspired the name (I'm Going Slightly Mad), it was time to switch to a more mature name. I wanted to be able to sign my username under my artwork and for it to make sense both online and offline, especially back in Turkey. 'esintu' is made up of my name and the first two letters of my last name. It isn't an actual word but one could say it means 'light breeze' with a northern accent (the actual word without the accent would be 'esinti').

Anyway, you can still refer to me as banana tree or banana or nanners or whatnot if you'd like. I'm still getting used to the new name as well. Hopefully it will be an easy transition

Will be back soon with some features. Cheers!
~ Artist Formerly Known As banana-tree

I'm late again. But I can't skip a feature for ~guagapunyaimel. The apophysis abstracts he exhibits in his gallery are very unique and inspirational and I honestly think he's one of the best in that area, right up there with ~IDeviant and `FarDareisMai. Without further ado, here are some fractals I thought didn't get the attention they deserved. All under 15 s If you like these, you have to head to his gallery to enjoy it fully. Enjoy!

late late feature. but i'd hate to not ever do it, so here goes...

fun dude, great friend, talented computer person that codes pretty images and stuff. i first got to know him from his scraps and not his proper gallery, so that's what i'll feature. please full view the thumbs featured below to appreciate the amazing texture. he actually singlehandedly made me grow fond of grain in digital images. enjoy! and don't let my obsession with his scraps prevent you from visiting his actual gallery. if you like these, you'll love the actual thing

Question 1: Ok, so consider a website that hosts evil evil wallpaper makers. These guys lurk dA all day, find suitable fractals [let's keep it in the family for convenience] and submit them to the website for people's use for free. You get no credit or link backs. You warn the website to remove these users and take the wallpapers off the website, they refuse to do it.  Given that no legal arrangement can be agreed to between two sides, would you, now, if you had the power to do so, shut down the website or block access to all or parts of it?

Question 2: Are you against SOPA?

Bonus Question if you said yes to both: WTF? Explain yourself.

Cheers.

... to whoever bought that print of Hocus Pocus it means a lot to know that someone wants my art on their wall

and i also need to thank *n8iveattitude for the overall exposure, assuming the print purchase and the DD being on the same day was not a complete coincidence

and of course, thanks go out to all those who stopped by the page today, added my works to their favorites and commented on some. i appreciate it, and hope you enjoyed your visit

... and in an effort to keep this link on my frontpage, please follow the link to information about donating to help relieve the effects of the devastating earthquake at Van: [link]

**IMPORTANT: For information on how to help with earthquake relief in Van, Turkey, please follow the link --> [link] **



This week Inspiration Station celebrates its founder, `SuicideBySafetyPin, the current GM and the founder of the only active fractal chatroom right now - #Aposhack.

`SuicideBySafetyPin's gallery is huge. I mean, huge. We're talking 12,000+ deviations here. Being determined to try and keep my features to lesser known fractals of the featurees, I had to pass on about 650 fractals with 40+ favs to reach what one would consider the relatively deeper parts of Light's gallery, and that's still barely scraping the surface. I then moved my search to around the midpoint of her gallery which still didn't cease showing up gems. In my attempt of reducing her gallery down to 5 works, I could not find it in myself to spare a slot to photography, but I do urge you to check her photographs as well, some great macros and landscapes there. Here are your featured works:





* edit: *

Hi everyone,

Thanks to everyone who were concerned about my family back in Turkey after the earthquake. I didn't personally know anyone around the area, my family is mostly in Istanbul and were not effected by the earthquake. I do appreciate your concerns though, it means a lot to me.

That said, all is not good and dandy. If you have been reading the news about it, you haven't seen one tenth of the severity of the situation back there. I just read the notes of someone who personally experienced the earthquake and the aftermath, and the number of casualties and the need for humanitarian help is much worse than the media portrays it to be. That's why I wanted to provide you with what I think is one of the more reliable websites for donations to the region for earthquake relief. It distributes 100% of your money to what I know are trusted organizations that are involved first hand at the region. I know not everyone might have funds to spare to share with people who need it on the other side of the world, but if you do, here's what I found to be one of the best ways to handle whatever you want and are willing to share:

[link]

Thanks for your attention, take care.

ps. Please don't hesitate to share the link with your friends and whoever you think might be willing and able to help.

I've missed a lot of Inspiration Stations but I wouldn't forgive myself if I missed this one This guy is a great friend and is one of the first people that I chatted with at the #Apophysis chatroom as I was starting out. His Apophysis skills never ceased to amaze me (which, luckily for you, he offers at a discounted price right now - go check his journal), but on the less technical side, I have many of his works among my favorite fractal art of all time (that kinda sounds like the stuff's been around by ages but nevermind). And after close to an hour strolling his gallery and trying to get it down to 5, here are 5 of his works that are relatively unknown (under 40 favs). "Unknown" takes another meaning when you're looking at an ex-gallery director's gallery so spare me the eyerolls. The fourth thumb is from 2007, just for nostalgia, and the last one is one of his stunningly coloured abstract paintings.

All your journals are belong to ~dark-beam!

I remember featuring one of his works in my hipster mandelbulb journal some time ago (the first fractal displayed here). He's a big name for Mandelbulb3D after all, I'm being told I don't have much experience with that particular program, so I wouldn't know, but his gallery offers some pretty nice UF fractals as well, which I will now share with you.



Enjoy!

Hey all!

All my recent fractals have been "Duckies" though that may not always be very obvious. I've been meaning to make a journal like this for some time, but since I'm working with duckies almost constantly now, I thought it would be appropriate. This journal needs to start with a gallery feature for ~misterxz, him being the author of the formulas that would generate Talis type patterns in Ultra Fractal roughly 5 years ago, and also the father of the term 'ducky' as that was the name of the original formulas he'd written. Talis patterns were popular among Fractal Explorer artists, but UF artists were not quite familiar with them yet when ~misterxz started submitting images he made with his private formula.

A few people including myself, `FarDareisMai, ~monochromatic-stains and ~trystianity were introduced to these formulas when Elias started sharing the parameters of some of his works in chat.

It was about a year after some of us had submitted works with these formulas that a group of artists took notice and started asking for the formula to be released. With permission from Elias, the parameters were sent to those who asked for them. After a while, new formulas appeared in the public library, new 'ducky' images started popping up with increasing frequency, followed by a tutorial on how to get these patterns in UF and what formulas to use ([link] which basically created a hype of 'duckies'. As the word and the formula spread around, Elias' name started disappearing from the credits as most artists and the secondary modifications of Ed Algra's variation of the formula never took notice. I don't think Elias cares much, but I felt personally responsible as I was one of the people who released the formula to those who asked for it (along with `FarDareisMai).

So there, I just wanted to give the guy some due credit realizing that the history of this new hype of duckies still remains a little vague to many people. Anyway, here are some more 'duckies' showing the versatility of the formulas (and a shameless plug of my own works as well )...


enjoy!

First off, thanks to ~s31415 who, in a comment on my journal and later on in his journal, provided the links to the websites that allowed me to do what I'm about to show you now. I've always admired his zoomable images and the amount of detail that they allow you to browse in a fractal, and now I'll be doing that as well, on my more textural fractals that don't depend too much on the overall composition (i.e. texture fields). Here's one I made of my latest fractal "Chaos and Cosmos":



[link] - click the button on the top right for a full screen view to fully appreciate the zoom.

**

As for the notification, it's really for personal peace of mind, and you're free to ignore it. Some of you may be familiar with the blog Orbit Trap. I'm going to skip the introduction on why I used to like reading the blog and how I became increasingly frustrated with their articles,  because the point of this blurb is to provide myself the space for a response to a reply on my comments that the blog doesn't seem to be willing to provide anymore (translate: I'm no longer able to post comments on their blog apparently). I still keep in mind that this might be a technical issue and am willing to apologise if that's the case, though I highly doubt it since this wouldn't be the first time they censor comments on the blog (see [link]. I don't blame them either because it's really my fault I went and commented in the first place after promising myself that I would no longer do that. Not that anyone should care, but just in case, I would also appreciate if no one raised this issue in comments to their blog because I don't want to be accused of triggering a mob as Kerry Mitchell was.

So, since I can't comment there, here's my final response to Tim's reply ([link], in case he finds himself strolling the pages of "Fractalbook" once again and comes across this journal:

"Thanks for the advice but I do read the articles, Tim, and not in one of them do I see a conclusion that shares the positive view of this particular article about graphic design and decorative art being more than 'craft' and being just as valuable as 'real art'. They occasionally hint at that idea and then go on to conclude that decorative art is limited and isn't as valuable as 'fine art'. You can't make such a huge deal about the dichotomy between art and craft and expect people to know when you've dropped the distinction when you use the word "art" and "artwork".

My point specifically, though, is that there is no difference between these images and the ornate UF fractals you so despise - they're all decorative, detailed, complex images with a certain degree of technical achievement. They're all 'craft', and not in a derogatory way. It was you who wrote five articles pointing out that "fractalists" or "fractal enthusiasts" should go beyond ornamentation to be considered "fractal artists". These images that you refer to as "artwork" are not examples of that. Again, I have no problem with these images per se, but perhaps you should make up your mind whether you want to see decorative and ornamental fractal art or not."

Thanks for reading if you did.. Now go back to the zoomable image and have a look

Cheers!

Ok so these flash mob features are fun and all, and everyone we feature has given some valuable art and resources to the fractal community, but I cannot stress how much this current featuree has been a source of awe and inspiration to me. Not only that, but he's the author of the formula and colouring algorithm families i've used in at least a third of my UF fractals, in textures if nothing else. He also has a great website that contains his blog which is, imho, essential for all fractal artists to keep an eye on. So before I go full-on fangirl on you, let me pull out some of my all-time favorites from his gallery for your enjoyment:


Also visit his portfolio on his website for some of his works that are not on DeviantArt such as [link] ,  [link] or [link] . Those links actually contain zoomable images, something Monnier suggests that all fractal artists should try if they value the details in their art - zoom around and lose yourself in the details.

And to finish off, I'll share some of my own art that has extensively used his formulas and colouring algorithms and has been inspired by him in style. I promise I won't do this for all the artists I feature, and believe me when I say that I see this as an opportunity to pay tribute to him, not to advertise my own art. The following fractals were made using ~s31415's colouring algorithms only, the first three being single layered:


Please visit his gallery and see for yourself how beautiful fractal art can be without spirals, flowers and neon colours too.

ps. Fun Fact: It took me an embarrassingly long time to actually pay attention and realize the numbers in his username on dA were 'Pi'

Out, till next week

This week's mob feature is dedicated to ~Zueuk. Many of his fractals are ingrained in the memories of most fractalists who were around when he was much more active on DA. He fathered many a fractal that brought about hundreds more that tried to replicate his works. I remember him as one of the most influential fractalists back in the time when I first downloaded Apophysis and despite the majority of his gallery being from before 2006, it still remains as one of the most technically stunning galleries.

I'll go chronologically here and feature some of his older works from 2005-2006, assuming that his newer work will surely be featured by many others.


all his fractals with no exceptions feature amazing glow and lighting control, presented with great structure, as shown in the very early examples in the sample above.  enjoy the rest of his gallery.