Venus in Reverse

I have always loved the title of this fractal. I know that may seem an odd place to start, but being the lit crit freak that I am, words often make a good jumping off point when I'm interpreting an image.

The "Venus" part of the title is straightforward enough. Not only does it harken to Boticelli as mentioned in the Artist's comments (the main shapes in the image remind me of her hair, too) but something about the fractal is just so feminine, without being sterotypical pink and flowery. It is hard to put my finger on why, and even if I could, others might not agree. After all, the entire concept of femininity is very complex and nebulous. Maybe it's the dewiness of the details. Maybe the circles are symbolically suggestive. Maybe I'm taking "birth of galaxies" too literally. <img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/g/g…" width="17" height="15" alt="" title="Giggle"/>

IN ANY CASE. Without getting into too much off-topic musings on "what is femininity, anyway," let's just say that I find this fractal strongly feminine, and I think I would get that impression even if "Venus" weren't in the title.

The "in Reverse" part of the title is even more intriguing. How can a person (well, Goddess, but whatever) be in reverse? Yeah, I know that the easy explanation is that Venus (the planet) rotates the opposite direction of the other planets' rotation, blah blah blah, but somehow that explanation is unsatisfying to me. I do not think this image is about clockwise versus counterclockwise planetary rotation. <img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/l/l…" width="19" height="21" alt="" title="Laughing my ass off!"/>

I could list a bunch of ideas for what "Venus in Reverse" means, but (A) I'm tired and (B) it'd probably be boring, so I'll just say one: My mind likes to conflate "The Birth of Venus" and "Venus in Reverse" into "The Birth of Venus, in Reverse." Like this fractal is an impression of the moment Venus coalesces from seafoam... but with the film being played backwards, so to speak. After all, the "fiery rift in the sky" image is at once very evocative and very ambiguous. Is the fire bursting forth and consuming everything in it's path? Or is the darkness swallowing up light? Or perhaps I'm being to negative. Maybe the consuming fire is a creating beacon. Maybe the swallowing darkness is the soothing sea.

Long story short: the title is lyrical and ambiguous; the image is thought-provoking and ambiguous. Thus concludes the wtf-inducing "interpretive" part of my critique, on with the technical details!

I'll just quote my old comment: "My only complaint is that the light-dark grading could be done better, to show off the details better." Now, part of the issue here is my computer monitor (specifically, the gamma). After viewing this on my sister's laptop, I saw a LOT of detail that just looks uniform black on this screen. However, it's still worth mentioning. Even on her laptop, I noticed that, while the contrast between light areas and dark areas is strong, the contrast within those areas could have probably been improved. I actually had this struggle when using the formula as well (it's probably the root of the issue you noticed in Inkkoi, for instance). Getting the right contrast and value scale in fractals is pretty hard no matter the formula. What I'd love to see are fractals that show tiny structures with as much definition as the large ones, as much clarity in the hot spots as in the shadows: basically, what HDR does for photos. Obviously, this isn't necessary for ALL fractals (just as HDR isn't necessary for all photos). But I'm mentioning it here because I think THIS fractal in particular would be stunning (well... it's already stunning. It would be extra super stunning.) if it somehow got HDR'd. The only complication is that I've yet to see a fractal that really succeeds at that. Some are close; I keep aiming for it but I can't honestly say I've hit the mark yet. But still! I'm convinced it's not impossible, just something to think about and work on developing. <img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/b/b…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Big Grin)"/>

Last but not least, I see a scarily exact horse in the upper-right pinkish section: mane, nose, eye, front leg and hoof, outline of thorax. <img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/e/e…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Eek)"/>