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Mandelbulber 1.00 - for Linux x86, Linux x64 and Win32 (probably will be also for MacOS)

Open source program (GNU GPL) for rendering photo-realistic 3D fractals

Free download: http://sourceforge.net/projects/mandelbulber/

Website: http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/

User manual: http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/user-manual
Tutorial for creating animations: http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/getting-started

New features in version 1.00:

- Improved Catmull-Rom Splines - automatic switching between linear and logarithmic scale
- Lights are placed more precisely when the FOV value is high
- Improved rendering of visible auxiliary lights
- Added checking of some parameters - more "awesome dude resistant"
- Fixed problems with displaying first keyframe in Timeline window
- Small improvement for 3D Navigator / Backward button
- Corrected "ambient" effect in shading algorithm
- Added displaying of "Distance from last keyframe" also after zooming by mouse pointer
- Added image preview in FileChoosers for loading textures
- Improved DE calculation for Mandelbox formula. Reference: http://www.fractalforums.com/3d-fractal-generation/a-mandelbox-distance-estimate-formula/msg15354/#msg15354
- Mandelbulb formula (without DE) exchanged to optimised version of formula. Reference: http://www.fractalforums.com/mandelbulb-implementation/realtime-renderingoptimisations/
- Improved dynamic DE correction
- Fixed memory leak in ThumbnailRender()
- Fixed missed delete[] in KeepOtherSettings() function
- Fixed uninitialised variable param.qiet in MainThread() function

SVN repository: http://mandelbulber.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/
This repository is available from Google Code: http://code.google.com/p/mandelbulber/

My gallery with images created using Mandelbulber: http://krzysztofmarczak.deviantart.com/gallery/

Before first run please use install script

Nice nice. Good work Buddhi!

Thanks Buddhi!

Also the following maybe of interest to users that have previous installed versions of Mandelbulber.

I did not uninstall version 0.99. I'm simply running version 1.0 over top, I'll explain!
I can extract the archive, Mandelbulber-win32-1.00.zip, to a folder with the same name on any HDD or partition on my system.
Mundelbulber 1.0 will run just fine right from that folder, you will get the following screen on startup see attached pic. ...just click ok!

Why would I do that?

Because all my previous .fract files, and pictures etc. will still be in the original installed location and those .fract files will readily be available for Mundelbulber 1.0 to read.

cheers!

Recomended way for Windows users is following:

- extract the archive to some destination folder on your HDD (location for exe and dll files is not restricted). It could be the same folder as for the previous version.
- run install.bat script which will copy all updated default settings files to %USERPROFILE%\mandelbulber\ folder. You will not loose your own settings files. It will only update files distributed with Mandelbulber program. With each version of Mandelbulber I add some new example .fract files or make changes in some old.

a little hint for windows in addition to the recommended way:
if you put the new version in the same folder as the previous version, all shortcuts (on desktop or start menu for example) will still work and start the new version. (the name "mandelbulber.exe" is allways the same)

Congrats on version 1.00 :beer:  Great improvements.  Thanks for all the hard work.

Congrats Buddhi, very well done!

I think I found a bug, though.
It looks like the 'stereoscopic' rendering mode forces the program to crash when the GUI is disabled. For example, from the command line, just type in:
mandelbulber -nogui stereo.fract

Could you fix it, please?
Thx.

is mundelbulber different than mandelbulber?

Oops! mundelbulber was a typo on my part

I will look what is wrong

Hi mac fanatics!
now there's mac-mandelbulber for you   ;D O0
try it yourself!
where? but here! > http://sourceforge.net/projects/mandelbulber/files/

for leopards and snow leopards but no tigers!  :dink:
are you a macports user? read the README file before


X11 should be installed (find it on your OS x dvd/cds)
just run the installer_setting file using terminal first
run mandelbulber using terminal
(:

If I did not think Mandelbulber was a great program, I would not have bothered to make the following comment:
Hence I hope you would consider the followingin your:  things-still-to-be-done file:

1. Add a Preferences dialog:
4 windows for one program is 2 too many. I would like the ability to turn off 2 windows which I almost never use, dos window, and iterations window via a preferences options.

2. Is it possible to include more sliders in the future, similar to the Fog silder.
I would like to be able to use sliders to adjust lights on the fly,  without a re-render just like Fog.

3. I find the entire light tab information, totally confusing to a new or medium user, and unless I do a re-render I cant see the results quickly enough to see if the changes I have made are valid. As a result I quit the program many times, because I simply get tired of waiting for a re-render. (I have a quad with 4 cores)  :beer:

Thank you for suggestions.
Ad. 1. I will add preferences tab in next release. There will be possible to specify which windows will be opened, standard steps for camera movement, and ... I will see what else
Ad. 2. It is not possible to make sliders for everything, because not all effects are real-time. But I will think what will be possible to do.
Ad. 3. I will try to optimise this. For now I recommend to set-up lights on very low resolution image. But please notice that rendering of one additional light needs almost the same additional amount of calculations as rendering of image without lights (shadows has to be traced for each light source). So adding 10 (visible on image) lights makes rendering almost 10 times longer.

I have found the error in program and fixed this. It wasn't connected with rendering stereoscopic images but with hybrid formulas. "stereo.fract" is a hybrid fractal. Thank you for bug report.

Having figured out how to to share Mandelbulber parm's on this forum, I'm now wondering whats happening when I try to render
such a file using the latest version.

posted by Junkdog: http://www.fractalforums.com/index.php?action=gallery;sa=view;id=7069
the attached pic shows no rendering refresh, while 20 min. of rendering time has gone by.
a refresh finally happened at 22 min.

I finally could NOT stop the rendering process

1. my computer running Win 7 locked up
2. no mouse input
3. the 4 cores were still processing at 100%
4. could not Start the Task Manager to Kill the process.
5. finally with ctrl/alt/del I was able to regain control.

 :beer:

 

There are some reasons why this settings file is rendering terribly slow:
1. DE Step Factor is too low for this hybrid fractal. Optimal value for this image which guaranty good quality and high speed is about 10
2. There is enabled coloured Ambient Occlusion effect based on analyzing of many rays and quality of this effects is high. This effects is very slow for rendering. There is checked Shaders/Ambient Occlusion and ambient occlusion quality = 4 (about 100 rays). Faster is Screen Space Ambient Occlusion algorithm on Post Effects tab, but it looks not as pretty like standard Ambient Occlusion.
3. Hybrid formulas are generally slower than other.
4. Resolution is high (3200x2000)

This brings to mind my limited involvement with my Ruby scripting experiences, where I spent huge amounts of time adding code devoted to trapping potential errors, from user input.  I'm hoping you will make it less painful for new users in the future to avoid similar pitfalls. :beer:

Sometimes it's necessary to exaggerate DE stepping though; especially with FoldingIntPow2 hybrids or strangely folded mandelboxes. Generally speaking, lower DE produces smoother results and reduces noise (yet, other times it also adds noise in the form of miniature shapes - I learnt a couple of days ago).

That said, I did two test renders at a lower resolution with a DE stepping of 1 and 8 respectively. I doubt I could tell them apart. They weren't 1:1 identical, but to the naked eye they were.