------------------------------------------------------------------------- QUICK START HOP - FRACTALS IN MOTION Version 2.0 / 1994-99 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (c) 1994/99 Michael Peters & Randall Scott. All Rights Reserved Even if you never read manuals and documentation (who does?), do read this! It will give you an idea of what HOP is, how it works, and how to play with it without a steep learning curve. For some introductory words and information about program installation, revision history, legal issues, credits, etc., please read the README.TXT file that comes with HOP. Read the HOP AND WINDOWS file (windows.txt) to find out how to set up HOP (which is not a Windows, but a DOS program) for use in Microsoft Windows, as a Windows screensaver, etc. Read the HOP'S USER INTERFACE text (interfac.txt) if you want to learn HOP in depth. It contains a detailed description of all menus, hotkeys, the palette editor, command line parameters, etc. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- INTRODUCTION -------------------------------------------------------------------------- HOP draws beautiful abstract images and real-time animations, based on "strange attractor" formulas, enhanced by mathematical and graphical special effects. A fascinating screensaver ------------------------- HOP's images and animations can be generated automatically without any user interaction. The combination of fractal complexity and dozens of visualization parameters make HOP a perfect screensaver - nothing will ever repeat, and the screensaver will never become boring. A unique interactive fractal generator -------------------------------------- But HOP is more than a screensaver. All fractal values and the wide palette of image parameters can be manipulated, turning HOP into an exciting interactive design tool for fractal artists. HOP is a DOS program -------------------- but it can be used - interactively and as a screensaver - under Microsoft Windows or IBM OS/2. Read the "compatibility" webpage or the HOP AND WINDOWS text (windows.txt) for more information. HOP is distributed as shareware ------------------------------- If you like the program and continue using it, you are invited to become a registered user. Registering unlocks some additional features - HOP can be set to a higher screen resolution (which will make quite a difference); you will be able to edit and save color maps, or tune HOP's improvising behaviour. Please give unregistered versions of HOP to your friends. Visit HOP's website ------------------- If you haven't already done so, be sure to visit HOP's website for the latest updates, more information, online support, and a colorful gallery. If you like HOP, why don't you tell everybody by writing something in HOP's online guestbook! -------------------------------------------------------------------------- FIRST STEPS -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Install the program on your harddisk by running HOP_20.EXE 2. During installation, HOP has tested your video hardware and written the results to a HOP.INI file. In case you had aborted this test, rerun it as described in Readme.txt 3. Configure HOP to run as Windows screensaver, as described in Windows.txt 4. To see what HOP can do, click on the HOP DEMO icon (in DOS: type HOP DEMO and hit the Enter key) and watch the demo. Wait until the demo ends or press the Esc key to end it. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- QUICK START -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Have you watched the demo? Ok ... now, if you want to play with the program, do the following: * Start HOP in "improvising mode" simply by clicking on the HOP-Fractals-in-Motion button (in DOS: type HOP and hit the Enter key). * Remember: You can stop HOP anytime by hitting the Esc key. * After the splash screen, you will see that HOP draws something - probably the last image from the last time you ran HOP, but maybe something new. * Wait for a while. The image or animation will eventually be replaced by something new. If you want, lean back and watch HOP improvise. Some images will be very nice, some probably less interesting. Whatever it is that you see, nobody has seen it before - the possible combinations of parameters are virtually endless. * Press the space bar. You will find that this ends the current fractal and starts a new one. While HOP plays a parameter file such as demo.hop, pressing the space bar will load the next fractal from the parameter file. In improvising mode, HOP throws the dice and improvises something new. Do you like it? If not, press the space bar again ... or wait until HOP itself is bored and starts something new by itself. * If HOP draws something interesting, press the Ins key. By pressing the Ins key, you tell HOP that you like the current image. Now it won't be automatically be replaced by something new. HOP continues with the current image until you press the space bar again. * While HOP draws something interesting, press one of these hotkeys: p, P, alt-p, ctrl-p. These keys load different kinds of new color palettes. (Pressing a hotkey such as "p" is like pressing the Ins key: it will make the current image stay because HOP thinks that you like it, and want to experiment with it. To get a new image, press the space bar again.) Different color palettes will of course change the look of the image completely. To get the most out of colors, be sure to download Fractint compatible handtailored color palettes from HOP's website. There are dozens or hundreds of breathtaking color palettes which will make HOP really take off. * While HOP draws something interesting, press the "*" key. This key assigns new random values to the current formula variables. This influences the shape of the fractal, but other characteristics, such as colors, are unchanged. Hit the "*" key several times to get an idea of what it does. (Pressing a hotkey such as "*" is like pressing the Ins key: it will make the current image stay because HOP thinks that you like it, and want to experiment with it. To get a new image, press the space bar again.) Other important hotkeys ----------------------- * F1 displays the keyboard hotkey layout. Don't press F1 if you have just started with HOP - there are so many functions and keys that you will be discouraged. * Enter switches to the user interface from which you can configure HOP, read and write files, and modify all parameters. If you press HELP from the user interface, there will be context sensitive help for every item as well as general information. For detailed information about all this, read the HOP USER INTERFACE text. To get back to the image, press Enter again. * Pos1 restarts the current image * PgUp goes back to the previous image * r reads a parameter set from a parameter file. This opens the user interface! On the user interface, - press Enter for "Image Parameter" - use the cursor keys to choose a file (e.g. DEMO) - press Enter to load the file - the popup menu shows all parameter sets contained in the parameter file - use the cursor keys to choose "all" or one specific parameter set - press Enter to confirm - press Enter to play it * s saves the parameters that define the current image in a parameter file. This opens the user interface! On the user interface, - press Enter for "Image Parameter" - press Enter for "new" (= new parameter file, called HOP0000.HOP) or choose one of the existing files, if you have already created files - enter a name for the image - press Enter to save the parameter set for the image in the parameter file - press Enter to confirm and return to the image How to interact with HOP ------------------------ Most HOP users have only installed HOP as a screensaver, and never interact with HOP. They're missing a lot! Have you taken a look at HOP's online gallery? Images such as these won't come up very often while HOP is improvising. Yes, most of the gallery images began with something that HOP improvised. Then, this raw material was hand-tailored until it was perfect enough to be presented in the gallery. There are two ways to interact with HOP: 1. The hotkeys that can be pressed while the fractal is growing. 2. The menu-driven user interface (from which you can control all of HOP's many parameters) which runs in DOS text mode. You can't see the fractal from the user interface; you can't use the user interface menues while you see the fractal, so you will have to switch to the interface and back to the graphics. Read the HOP'S USER INTERFACE text (interfac.txt) if you want to learn HOP in depth. It contains a detailed description of all menus, hotkeys, the palette editor, command line parameters, etc. About Strange Attractors ------------------------ - Martin's Mappings (Hopalong) Barry Martin from Aston University (Birmingham/England) discovered a new variety of strange attractors in the mid-80's. He called them Martin's mappings. A. K. Dewdney presented Martin's first images and the algorithm in his Computer Recreations column in Scientific American (Sept.1986). Dewdney called Martin's new attractor Hopalong, referring to the unique way it grows on the computer screen: the pixels hop from one point to another. Hopalongs don't slowly grow line by line as the popular Mandelbrot fractals do but rather emerge from the whole of the screen at once, getting more and more detailed. They usually grow endlessly into all directions, showing surprising details and structures, often reminiscent of organic structures or oriental rugs. HOP features the original Hopalong attractor and introduces about two dozen new variations on the formula, all similar in structure, but different in detail. The result is a wide variety of new fractals. - Gumowski/Mira CERN physicists Gumowski and Mira found an equally interesting attractor, usually referred to as Mira fractal. Gumowski/Mira type attractors show a somewhat Hopalong-like behaviour although they usually don't grow forever. Some of them are mysteriously similar to diatoms, radiolarians, or other unicellular microorganisms. HOP features the original Gumowski/Mira attractor and introduces a dozen of unique new variations. The character of the attractor images is quite different from what most people associate with fractals, and in fact, Hopalongs and Miras aren't fractals in the strict mathematical sense. They are plots of orbits of two-dimensional dynamic systems and could maybe referred to as orbit fractals. Hopalong and Mira fractals show no self-similarity, and they lack the infinite complexity of the famous Mandelbrot Set. On the other hand, the way they are created is far more interesting to watch in real-time than the (usually boring) line-by-line growth of static Mandelbrot images. HOP's special effect sections feature other loosely fractal- or complexity-related formulas such as Plasma clouds, Connett Circles and Ant Automaton cellular automata. About Even Stranger Attractors ------------------------------ Strange Attractors (see above) from the world of mathematics are HOP's source material, but wait - there's more: HOP introduces many mathematical and graphical special effects many of which are unique and were designed especially for HOP, e.g. realtime animation - Fractals in Motion. While "naked" Strange Attractors such as the ones used as HOP's source material already show an infinite variety, this infinity is literally multiplied a thousandfold by HOP's special effect section. If you are bored by screensavers which repeat themselves, here's the remedy: HOP will never repeat itself, promised. How does HOP work? ------------------ HOP runs like an slideshow. While some of the images in the show are more or less static, others contain wild or gentle movements and animations, depending on dozens of interacting parameters all of which you can control if you want. Each of the slides runs endlessly or for a predetermined number of pixels. The slides are either 'composed', stored in a file, and can be exactly reproduced, or they are designed on-the-fly (improvised) by HOP's random algorithms or by you, or both. When you run the demo, HOP plays back a parameter file containing a series of 'composed' images and animations. (If you like HOP and learn how to use it, you will very soon also come up with interesting 'compositions' which you can exchange with other HOP users or run with the screensaver.) If HOP doesn't playback a file, it runs in an 'improvising' mode. Each of the images will run for a certain number of pixels, then a new image will come up, and so on. You have full control over all parameters, but unless you want to explore a specific image, you don't have to enter any numbers - everything will happen by itself! (Actually I started writing HOP because I'm so lazy.) While some of the images might blow your mind, others might be boring. The program juggles many variables, producing images that are based on controlled randomness - unfortunately, the program can't watch the images and decide if they are beautiful or not. The algorithms are blind. It is as if you took a snapshot of a random area of the Mandelbrot set - the chance to get a boring image is quite high even if the M-set contains loads of incredible sights. You have control over the decisions the program makes to some extent though - this happens on the 'Tune' page of the user interface. Take the randomly generated images as suggestions. Throw them away, or modify a nice image until you really like it. Then store it in your 'favorites' collection, and please exchange it with others. When you play with HOP's suggestions and learn to master all the different parameters, you will find that there are a number of effects that are almost never used in HOP's improvisations. They have to be used like the special effects in a movie or in rock music: Overusing them won't do any good, but using them thoughtfully can add spice and interesting variations. Also, some of the effects slow down performance or could easily make a boring picture if applied by a blind random algorithm. Another thing you should be aware of is that when running in random mode, HOP will try to automatically center and size the fractals. The reason this is done is that without this automatic optimization (just taking the naked random numbers and formulas and generating the images as they come), many fractal images would be too small, or you would be shown less interesting details, or the screen would be mostly blank because the fractal would develop right outside of it. The positive effect of this optimizing is that most images will be more or less interesting. You can sit and watch HOP design a neverending series of fractals, like the shells you find whilst walking along an ocean beach. But this is only one way of looking at them! Anyone interested in shells would stop from time to time and pick one up to look at its microstructure which - as we have learned from fractal theory - is just as complex as the view from above. HOP cannot do this for you automatically. It doesn't know where interesting details are located. The incredible microstructure of HOP fractals has to be studied manually. Try zooming in to interesting details and playing with the many program features and parameters to manipulate your view. HOP will reward you with an infinite world of complexity and beauty. --------------------------------------------------------------------------eof