3.8 Biomorphs
Related to Decomposition (p. 93) are the "biomorphs" invented by
Clifford Pickover, and discussed by A. K. Dewdney in the July 1989
"Scientific American", page 110. These are so-named because this
coloring scheme makes many fractals look like one-celled animals. The
idea is simple. The escape-time algorithm terminates an iterating
formula when the size of the orbit value exceeds a predetermined bailout
value. Normally the pixel corresponding to that orbit is colored
according to the iteration when bailout happened. To create biomorphs,
this is modified so that if EITHER the real OR the imaginary component
is LESS than the bailout, then the pixel is set to the "biomorph" color.
The effect is a bit better with higher bailout values: the bailout is
automatically set to 100 when this option is in effect. You can try
other values with the "bailout=" option.
The biomorph option is turned on via the "biomorph=nnn" command-line
option (where "nnn" is the color to use on the affected pixels). When
toggling to Julia sets, the default corners are three times bigger than
normal to allow seeing the biomorph appendages. Does not work with all
types - in particular it fails with any of the mandelsine family.
However, if you are stuck with monochrome graphics, try it - works great
in two-color modes. Try it with the marksmandel and marksjulia types.