Fractals, who doesn’t know them? Well, if you are a little bit interested in math, you couldn’t have missed those things. The beautiful resulting graphical representation of simple formulas in itself remains impressive. And you can make them yourself in no time on your Apple iPad or iPhone.
Fractal formulas themselves are simple, but they quickly produce extremely complex results, which lead to very beautiful graphics. Especially if you also take into account color shades and more. Nowadays you no longer have to be a mathematician or a computer programmer to enjoy fractals. The CPUs and GPUs in the average iPad and iPhone from Apple are so fast that some of these types of images can even be generated in real time.
The Frax does exactly that. Frax has a variety of built-in formulas, each of which produces a different base image. You can move it or zoom in on it. What you will soon discover is that the possibilities of generating images in this way are endless. While there is an element of repetition in a fractal, there are so many conceivable zooms and cuts that you can go in all directions.
Real-time and hi-res rendering
Frax is basically simple to use. Choose a fraction type, or get started with the default one. Zoom in and slide. You will probably come across something beautiful. If desired, you can have such a crop rendered in high resolution by the app. For extremely high resolutions you can even switch to an external server at Frax. For this you need to purchase a package of credits, but the price is competitive: a few euros for 80 render assignments.
Moreover, the question is whether you will really need that external rendering. You can also choose to upgrade Frax to Pro via an in-app purchase of – at the time of writing – € 5.49. And then you can also render pretty high resolutions locally on your iPad or iPhone. The Apple’s have little trouble with that, because they are arranged quickly. Pro also offers more extra options in terms of ‘fine-tuning’.
Generate videos too
Basically it works as follows. Tap the screen and then tap the grid button at the top left of the screen. Pick a base fractal and swipe your fingers across the screen looking for a nice point. You can zoom in and out using the well-known pinch and spread movements. To render an on-screen location in high resolution, tap the screen followed by a tap on the share button at the top right. Tap on Save Image; press and hold this virtual button for a menu of available resolutions. Without using the external render server, the maximum is 5864 x 4096, more than enough for even large prints on paper.
Back in live view mode you can also tilt your device, while – after a screen tap – all kinds of extra options become available. Good for endless variations and fun. You can also record videos of zooming, coloring and shifting fractals. All in real time.
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