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Hi All, i just want to inform you, user Jesse has contacted me, he is doing well but he had to inform me that the development of mandelbulb3d has officially sopped by now.

A wonderful program which got a whole lot of attention and produced an enormous amount of pictures and animations, it is still quite useable and with the large
amount of public available formulas it will produce interesting results for quite a long time!

the only alternative to mandelbulb3d is the newly developed "MandelbulberV2.0"

Mixed emotions...

Glad Jesse is OK, but sad MB3D is going to stagnate.

Still, we all have lives, and I suppose this project simply does not fit into his anymore.

It was nice of him to at least let us know.

Best of luck in the future, Jesse!

While I have no idea what Jesse's reasons or condition is it is sad to hear this. On the bright side he has created a program which has elevated fractals and art, and I wish him well and good health. Mandelbulb 3d is an insdispensible tool, and a vehicle which has allowed so many to enjoy the fractal universe. Best Wishes to him

Sad to hear even if I kind of knew this would happen some day...
Thank you for this divine tool Jesse!
Best wishes
Johan

...we have still got an infinite amount of hybrid combinations to try out  O0

Bummer but still, Jesse created the Best(IMHO) program around and I will use it forever just the way it is....I wish Jesse nothing but the Best in whatever his future endeavors are, Cool Runnings Jesse

Set this thread as a "Sticky" for better visibility   O0

INFORMATION:

as jesse said, EVERYONE interested in the sourcecode ( a delphi sourcecode) might obtain a copy of it, he just does not want to share it publicly, so perhaps if someone is dedicated enough, grab the source and continue development! ( let me know i will take care of contact)

Hi there everyone!

I just joined Fractal Forums to say that I find it sad that Jesse - the creator of Mandelbulb 3D - has stopped working on this project.
I myself know how maintaining multiple projects and combining it with personal life and studies/career can be hard.
I guess I just wanted to say that I wish people like Jesse would get appreciated, not only by the fans of their fun little apps and programs and only on these forums, but also by others. I wish I could do something to help the further development of Mandelbulb or any other project of the creator of the software and the team behind it.

The news was probably published here right at the same moment when a new version of the main render was done for an art piece of mine. I´ve been playing with Mandelbulb 3D just for a couple of months but already fell in love with it from the very first calculations. I will be documenting my process of the project and want to give credit to the original author of this amazing piece of software.

For anyone interested in my current project (or other computer techy and arty projects) find me on social networks under the name Disati (in case I forget to share it here). - sorry for spamming :)

All I can really say is sorry  :'( to hear that and a big thank you  :thanks1: :thanks2: to Jesse for providing and maintaining such an excellent piece of Software for so long.
I will be using it in years to come - that's or sure!!

Maybe opening Source Codes wount'be a bad idea? Alredy Jesse agreed, sory, didn't read throught.
Realy Jesse had done ASTONISHING WORK. Maybe even opened new era in design. Realy without such ease and possibilities of M3D there would be very few of the 3D stuff.

Sadly I suspected as much some time ago.

If you read this Jesse you have my eternal admiration for creating something that has brought joy into the lives of countless people and consumed many nights lost in wonder at the beauty of mathematics. Wishing you the best and hope to see you around here again some day.

Thanks for a window into so many astonishing places. :flowers:

This is just a sad moment. Where to now? How a bout a last V2 release!?

Thank you, Jesse for your wonderful contribution to this community and to the world of Fractal Art.

Thanks for the dedication and the hard work Jesse! I will continue to use the last version as long as I can and I hope that someone takes up your robe and continue your work.

UPDATE:

As for now, Jesse did not respond to anyone. That's very sad and we moderators don't know when (nor if) this will change. I am very sad about this, personally.

We can only wait - and hope :flowers: ... Please Jesse don't leave us alone

 :sad1:

I exchanged mails with him recently and he confirmed this is really over for good :(

so that means all the brilliant minds will start contributing to mandelbulber right   :snore:

Not sure what his reason was to stop this, I respect his decision whatever the reason.
But if it was financial, maybe setting up a kickstarter would be an idea ?
I've only recently started using this (like last week) and would already be willing to pay for the program (or support the development of it)

Come on people.
Don't be all so sad.
Not all hope is lost...
But it has to be confirmed ;)

Is this true? What are the reasons ?

I mean we do have Crowd funding these days ?
I'm sure people would pay for a premium version, I would !

The project started free and it would be very rude to make it commercial!
And as I said ... it's still under study - so I am not 100% sure if it will come to life
Don't ask further questions ;)
Just be warned I will not be the programmer :)

Hello all, I wanted to post about this later, but because now the questions arised:

I'm currently evaluating if I will continue the development of MB3D (to a certain point).
This is possible, because my own project (JWildfire) reached a stable state and I would not be unhappy to do something different.
Also, I like the MB3D-software a lot, even if I not had the time to play with it that much (yet).

Unfortunately, even the first addition I wanted to achieve, is very sophisticated to do,
so I'm still evaluating, if it makes sense or not (in terms of effort), but still I'm very positive.

More on this soon...

Andreas

Come on mate, donations is not commercial.

Shame looks like you are not up for a real challenge and truly expand your mind and skills.

Nope, but it is important for me to chose the challenge(s) right, there is too many interesting stuff out there... When I stick to this project I can not do much other stuff (in spare time), so I have to evaluate it first, and this I'm doing now. Please just wait a little bit before judging  :beer:

Cheers,
Andreas

Still just sounds like "I don't have the coding chops this!" In all honesty. But then the original coder has thrown the towel in and will not release source.  So it will simply die.

I mean mandelbulber has full source so the hive mind can all contribute.  It's not about putting this one persons shoulders, that would be incredibly stupid. It's many people working together that make the difference. The fact that it's written in Delphi means more programmers can contribute, you don't have to be a c++ expert.

If he won't release the source it will simply die and every one will just use mandelbulber.

What other more interesting projects are there out there out if interest?

Fragmentarium? (http://www.fractalforums.com/fragmentarium/cat-mull-rom-spline-paths-cameraparameter-keyframes/)
;)

That's not honesty, that's anger.

You're not the only one who would like to see the project continued. We don't always get what we want. That's life.

Don't make it even harder for whoever picks up the code. It's probably difficult enough as it is, given how Mandelbulb3D evolved as its programmer was learning to generate 3d fractals, and learning to program at the same time. The source code might not be the pretty poetry that you know from books on the topic.

(No offense to Jesse intended. I know I wrote my share of pet projects that I would be too embarrassed to release.)

This isn't the whole fact. If it would be that easy, the source would have been released and many happy developers would already contribute to it, don't you think?

Good luck Andreas, and glad you are considering this project. In my last conversations with Jesse I understood the code was very complex and difficult to share with anyone, and that it would be extremely difficult to go beyond the current version. But it seems you like to take on the challenge. Happy to beta test like I did since the beginning ;)

I second Bib's sentiments, can't think of anyone more capable to try and add to MB3D than Andreas. I've used every version of MB3D since Jesse first started releasing them and have also used many versions of Andreas's J-Wildfire program including the current one. These gentlemen have done so much for Fractaling I can't understand why anyone would want to badmouth either one of them for anything, I hope you do give MB3D a go Andreas.

That is the fact I'm afraid. Releasing source takes no great effort, that's what an ethical person would do.  Mandelbulber has full source.   Looks like that's what everyone will be using soon.
It really is that simple.

This is great news, I hope you can sort out the "mess" Andreas!  :beer: O0
Do not listen to the winer, and if you need beta testing I am also used to that since way back... ;)

Actually, an ethical person would respect the wishes of other people.  Especially with regards to things said other people created.

As for MB3D's future if no updates ever happen - it will still get lots of use!  The useability of any program has far less to do with the time since it's last update and far more to do with it user interface.

I still use very old programs that have not been updated in many years because I like them and something about the interface "clicked" with me and I can work fluently with them.  I'm sure MB3D will last a very long time even if no more development happens because it's interface works perfectly with my way of thinking.  I have not had as much luck wrapping my head around Mandelbulber's interface so I don't use it  (though I still intend to give it another try someday, that has nothing to do with whether the source code was released).

It really is that simple.
 
If you just want the source code for yourself, just say so rather than pretend you have some sort of moral high ground because you like open source.

And good luck Andreas!  I hope you manage to make progress with this project.

There Honestly is no logical reason what so ever not to release the source, especially if it isn't going to be developed any further by the original author. 

At least then the community as a whole can develop it, that's how good software is made, with many minds.
If that doesn't happen it just means programs like mandelbulber will become the main program.

To me the gui interface could do with some improvements.   If any person says they are going to be using it forever they are lying.  Because other programs with have Decent openCL more real time interfaces and fast rendering using the GPU. 

In all it's a sad situation, real ethical coders leave their work to the world so it can be improved.
It's exactly why things like torrent, http/www, Linux, doom, quake et al are successful because many people are able to improve them and use them.

It's all about giving to the community. If you can't see that it's very sad indeed !

Without arguing, I never said I'd use a program forever, but I did say for years to come.

I still use and love Mutatorkammer - and it never got out of beta and doesn't run properly except on Windows XP.  Yet it is among my most used programs to this day!

And I know I am not alone in being put off by Mandelbulber's interface.  In my case to the point of not even having tried 2.X yet  (but I did download it!).

The point is that there is nothing unethical about not releasing the code.  Especially since all we know is that the reasons are personal.

Now, given that the reasons are personal - that implies there is an emotional component to the reasons.  If so, expecting logic to apply is folly.  Logic and Emotions are incompatible much of the time.

Sorry, but I still see your statements as a veiled way of saying "But I want it!  Gimme!!"

Please try to understand that there are reasons we have been told we will never know.  That HAS to be good enough, if only because it is all you will ever get.

 :beer:
Andreas thanks in the name of the community, every tiny addition -even apparently nonsense ones!- will be super appreciated by the folks! :)
In old computers, opencl and fancy stuff does NOT even work at all flexiverse.
So believe me, MBulber has a very long way to go to become just... half as popular as MB3d!
No discouragement for the developers intended!

Rightly said DarkBeam.

Thank you Andreas for taking the initiative.

people, i locked this topic, i did an error when splitting the good news of thargor, so the last 2 messages belong to
the newly created post:
http://www.fractalforums.com/mandelbulb-3d/re-mandelbulb-3d-development-officially-suspended-(or-not)/msg81902/#msg81902