how
it started 
People say that I saw first light of day in 1938. May be, I can’t remember exactly. The first thing I remember seem to date 1939. At those times there was a national exposition and one of the attractions was a channel with aluminum boats swimming there. I remember that with my last ounce of strength I reached the board to look, what there was behind: a wall and water. Long time afterwards I found a catalogue of that exhibition, and there I found pictures that proved my reminiscences true. In what concerns other events from my earlier childhood, I cant remember much - well, there were not too many standing outs.
schools
In the age of six I started going to school - and this should become quite a long journey. It ended with a high school diploma on natural sciences. But if you ask me, how I arrived to become a programmer - I can’t answer. It is just another example that shows, that the shortest line between two points in life might be a wavy one.
first profession
With that diploma in pocket
I might have become a teacher to train future high school students - but since
I had (and have) a lousy memory for names I had to try other ways to earn a
living for my family.
So I first worked at a company mainly treating noise problems inside of automobiles.
At those times came the first computers. Machines, that were less efficient
than any recent office computer, but they filled quite a truck. And this at
prices beyond any happiness.
A few years later that company entered a state of financial crisis, so I preferred
to quit that company before they dismissed me.
second profession
So I changed company and
also profession. I became technical writer (how to use and how to repair our
machineries) and also teacher for adult education.
To computers I still kept respectful distance - but as in the seventies/eighties
those toy computers became available I could not resist any more. So my first
machine was a Commodore C64. And this one I brought to performances that astonished
even specialists.
Now - these activities where to help me much some times later. I here have to
mention, that already as a youngster I showed clinical pictures no one was able
to explain. Most boring were poor eyesights - pictures as one would see after
cleaning his glasses with vaseline. And these disturbances mostly disappeared
after a few weeks, i.e. there always remained something.
third profession
My eyesight became poorer
and poorer - finally I was no longer able to find typing errors on the proofs
coming out from our typesetters. So I had to end up with my technical writing
and I changed to be a programmer. This lasted for the rest of my active life
at the company.
A few years ago I got the explanations for my different disturbances: I suffered
from multiple sclerosis.
The doctor then gave me a book about the disease and corresponding symthomes.
After having read it, everything became clear to me.
and nowadays?
My slowly progressing disease caused in the end that I prematurely had to retire - but the computers, I did not leave them behind. Nowadays I have a "toy" comprising two computers with Pentium 4 at 1.7 GHz together with keyboard, monitor, mice and a small printer.
So there I am sitting now and keep me busy by surfing, mailing and so on (on the right one, operating system is Windows) or then I am writing programs (left one, operating system Linux) or I let it calculate pictures out of the Mandelbrot set.
Everything comes back
At the beginning, I was in a four-wheel carriage, and now I am on a four-wheel chair:
And it continues
The principle of selfsimilarity in a fractale also is valid within the different potencies of the Mandelbrot formula. Except of course for the form of the Mandelbrot-set and -subsets.
There are things that changed on the program since 2002.
Most obvious is that the size of the pictures has changed - responsible for that is, that my old monitor has given up, and the replacement, a flat screen, shows a higher resolution. Therefore the size of the pictures was changed from 801x801 to 1001x1001 pixels. There are still pictures of the old size on these new pages, because I have learned something in the mean time: It is a hopeless intention to redraw a picture if you do not know the exact location and range of a picture, and exact means values defined by 15 or 19 digits. And besides you should know the palette used - all are things, that I did not take down. And blowing the pictures up to the new size is out of the question, since any pixel on the picture is the result of a calculation, and the values in between them are unknown.
Some two years ago I pretended, that above the tenth potency there is not much to be expected. I admit, that I was wrong. I simply was not patient enough. So now I pretend the opposite and therefore I present pictures from the second up to the twentyfirst potency.
Its easy to understand, that calculating higher potencies is more time consuming. Regarding highest potencies there are billions of multiplications to be executed and therefore my patience gets strained, even when using a Pentium 4.
Then I found, that my C-compiler knows the type long double, not in the version of 128 bits, but only 96 bits. Bur anyway, it turned out to be a reasonable compromise for my purposes: So calculation of a picture takes only (!); twice the time as before. But nevertheless the calculation on 19 meaningful digits shows quite interesting details.
I had to work hard on my palettes. Two years ago my program contained but 20 of them, a number which is by far not enough. So I changed their number to 100. Not all of these palettes are good ones, but there is a routine, that looks for the palette number used while saving a picture and writes it to a file. After a longer period of time I may print it out, so that I see, which ones are to be kept and which ones are flops and to be deleted.
Pastime for a
retired programmer with multiple sclerosis
I did not create but the pictures for this collection. Since I started numbering my pics some two years ago I created more than a million of them. Quite a lot of them became printed on my *) color-laser-printer and then used for the most differing purposes: some of them became greeting cards, all kinds of decorations, even hiding spots on the wallpaper.
*) While time went by a wighty printer machine (about 60 kg) landed on my table: a true HP ColorLaserJet 4550. And this for next to nothing.
How did I reach such a vast number? (> 1 million) Quite easy: Since I am retired and since my sclerosis gets on I spend most of my time in front of my computers. And while the left one puzzles over fractal drawing, on the right one I edit this text or a mail or then I surf the internet. You see, I keep me busy.
Well, if there would be strict rules, life would be easier. In other words: I have to run around and from time to time I drop on something pleasant.
Earlier I looked out for line drawings or ornaments, but such things are rare. Interesting stuff occurs the surroundings of secondary Mandelbrot sets, that is to say spots, where calculation is stopped while reaching the maximum of iterations permitted.
There is a good method to look out for spirals. You go to its center and enlarge it, over and over until the computer gives up - due to the precision of calculation.
What fascinates are the different secondary Mandelbrot-sets and the branches originating therefrom: While the set shows (potency - 1) tips, the number of branches equals potency or multiples of that.
Now: The more you proceed to the center of the spiral, the more the branches are wrapped around the secondary set, while the set becomes smaller and smaller.
And
like this I muddle through room and time
