Second Edition is out!

 The Second Edition is out - as ebook, paperback and hardback.

This book is written specifically for anyone who is curious about what the famous Mandelbrot Set fractal is, and how to recreate it, but has struggled with the traditional textbooks and online guides.

• Explore what a fractal is, artificial and natural.
• Learn about functions, iteration, and chaos.
• Discover the (not so) complex numbers.
• Find out what the Mandelbrot and Julia Sets really are.
• Follow a hands-on tutorial to make your own Mandelbrot and Julia Sets in python.
• Discover different ways to render the fractals - escape time, image filters, and 3d landscapes.
• Bonus chapter on distance estimation to reveal very fine detail.

 

This book is aimed at complete beginners, and only requires a browser and internet connection to follow the tutorials. No software installation is required.

This Second Edition has been updated to python 3, and all the tutorials now run completely in web-based notebooks with no software to install. To keep the price down, this second edition has been redesigned to be attractive in monochrome print.

I'm particularly pleased that the bonus chapter on Distance Estimation Methods (DEM) worked so well. The following is an example of a zoom into the Mandelbrot Set rendered by DEM, and used as the book cover.

All the code for the Second Edition is freely available online:

• https://github.com/makeyourownmandelbrot/Second_Edition
  

Code for the Second Edition is on GitHub

All the code for the Second Edition is now on Github at:

• https://github.com/makeyourownmandelbrot/Second_Edition
  

 

The python notebooks are as follows.

The basics:

• Make_Your_Own_Mandelbrot_black_and_white.ipynb - the very basic Mandelbrot set, no colouring
• Make_Your_Own_Mandelbrot_grey_scale.ipynb - the Mandelbrot set with the outside region coloured according to escape speed
• Make_Your_Own_Julia_grey_scale.ipynb - Julia sets

 

Experimenting with Sobel edge detection filters:

• sobel_mandelbrot.ipynb
• sobel_mandelbrot.ipynb

And finally, creating 3D landscapes from the fractal images:

• 3d_Mandelbrot_landscape.ipynb
• 3d_Julia_landscape.ipynb
  

 

 

Second Edition

I've started work on a second edition of Make Your Own Mandelbrot.

The key differences will be:

• monochrome to minimise the price of the books
• updated for python 3
• using cloud-based notebooks (Google Colab) to avoid the need to install any software
• updated library for generating 3d fractal landscapes
• better quality diagrams and ollustrations
• more concise text - but not too concise because a priority is to maximise understanding