About the SynthArt CD-ROM
This CD-ROM is the long-awaited summary of my artistic work in the computer graphics field, since I've began working in it back in 1994. The SynthArt web site, where you can find much of this CD's material, has been accumulating the works during the last six years, but only now I am using a chance to represent these works for a wide publics in the most efficient and rich manner, using all the advanced, recently available achievements in the multi-media technology and advantages of the CD-ROM media.
If you haven't heard of SynthArt and its web site, I quote my own words written on that page: "SynthArt is an ever-ongoing experience in synthesis of the 'cold' and 'perfect' computer images with the real-world pictures and pieces of 'traditional' (but also computer-assisted) art." Most often, I produce and then use as the base of my digital collage works numerous varieties of those beautiful computer-generated images called 'fractals', not mentioning many other kinds of mathematically-synthesised textures. They are combined in a most organic and seamless manner with the more familiar and 'traditional' graphical objects (often spectacularly transformed or altered in some way by the computer too), like photos, old paintings, clip art, fonts, - shortly, with anything what can be used in such creative mix and produce a result which - artistically - might be much stronger than the sum of its parts. Using this concept in the most flexible and consistent manner, I created an extensive number of the still image and animation works, which seem to have found their own ground, respect and admiration in this quickly-changing world of the modern computer graphics.
For a complete experience, you are invited to visit the SynthArt web site, where you can get the taste of this art and philosophy and observe what has been done since year of 1994, in a full scale. This CD-ROM represents the biggest, and hopefully the best, part of the site's SynthArt collection, but in a much more advanced and satisfying manner then any set of web pages can. Because, when present on a CD-ROM disk, many obnoxious limitations of the web media are removed and there is no reason anymore for sacrificing of the computer graphics' quality.
You can finally enjoy the full-screen, true-color images, augmented with the animated transitions and effects and accompanied by a thoroughly selected electronic music track, - a show that is actually a radically new form of the visual art, what I call "Living Pictures" (which represents the first part of this CD product's contents). You won't find anything comparable to this kind of art on the web of today (if you know any, I will be happy to discover I am not alone), nor among any single- or multi-media CD production found at the computer - or any other, for that matter - stores. Each "Living Picture" incorporates one or more animated effects or transitions of the graphical objects it features, sometimes so subtle that you can see it clearly only after a few times of watching the clip, sometimes meant to leave a strong impact on the viewer, but it always remains a piece of still visual art, in its very nature.
Similarly, the "Animations" part of this disk is something that is hard to compare with any other sort of animations found on the web or elsewhere. These works are all looping clips of a 'magical', hypnotic character, featuring either zooming fractal flights ("Into The Grey Matter"), or animated beautiful 3D shapes ("MathFantasy Clips"), or amasing morph transitions ("Cross (The Liquid Beatles)"), each of them displayed against a series of specially-designed full-screen backgrounds which can be considered as works of art on their own. The whole animations show is a play of endlessly repeating, yet ever-changing, states and scenes of objects of a 'virtual reality',
The third part of the CD, the "Fractal Panoramas World",
implements one the most unusual ideas of the contemporary computer graphics,
made using the very fresh Apple's QuickTime Virtual Reality technology. This
QTVR technique is meant to produce an illusion of being put inside a scene with
a full 360-degrees view, where there is no left or right edge in the picture,
and every small detail of the surrounding 'landscape' can be reached, 'zoomed
in' and thoroughly observed. While it's possible to find numerous examples of
such QTVR scenes on the World-Wide Web now, the "Fractal Panoramas
World" is simply incomparable with the rest because of the extraordinary
size and quality of its imagery's and due to the amazing fact that you are actually
put inside of a gorgeous fractal 'landscape'! (Well, there are some 'traditional'
photo-QTVRs too, made of a few nature scenes shot in the beautiful country of
Slovenia). And, while observing all the fine details of a mesmerizing fractal,
you encounter those magical 
hot-spots,
- the miniature oval-shaped pictures inviting you to click on them (you see
the cursor changes its shape) and enter another wonderful fractal world, containing
also a set of clickable 'doors' to other panoramas, ad infinitum. Surely, this
will keep you 'traveling' and 'exploring' and 'discovering' for a long, exciting
time!
Be aware, though, that - because of the cutting-edge and not quite mature character of the technology used - this might require a bit more of the digital power than an average home computer can have, and that some 'hitches' might happen during the playback (see the "The show's 'peculiarities'" chapter of this Readme).