Oct 2016 Challenge - Thingamajigs II !

Hello again everyone! We had another great response to September's Ducky Plus challenge with a very high level of parameter sharing as well! Thank you all so much and I hope you all enjoyed exploring that new-ish formula.

For the month of October we thought it would be fun to re-visit a well known colouring that I still think is much loved by most if not all UF artists; Thingamajigs II in tma.ucl. Beware: do not mix this up with any other Thingamajig colourings you may find! Your images should use Thingamajigs II on most or all layers and its influence should be reasonably obvious.

Now, this colouring might be a familiar friend to many but remember that we do have some newer users on this group who just may not have come across this colouring before so we think it's well worth making it the focus of this month's challenge.

New users: You are in for a treat, my friends, as Thingamajigs II is a whole lot of fun and easy to get some terrific results with! As well its native trap shaping potential this colouring has some other very useful features such as extensive built-in texturing options and even some rudimentary masking. Be sure to take your time and to open up and have a play with all the sections of this colouring, there's tons of good stuff to tweak in there!
If you need a little help getting started on this challenge I have uploaded a sample layer which you may freely tweak and mash up to your heart's content. It's a simple Julia plus Thingamajigs II to get the ball rolling for you. It can be found here:


Tips for new users using this formula:
1. You are, of course, free to use any formula you like but a simple Julia provides an excellent base for exploring this colouring. Keeping a simple base shape will help with your exploration of this colouring.
2. Once you have found a nice shape or design the texturing parameters towards the bottom of the Outside tab should add some interesting detail straight away. I've always found them to be better/easier than the smaller section found higher up the panel. Just be sure to enter something in the "Tx Amount" slots for your texture to be visible.
3. Keep an eye on the formula bailout. Tweaking this value up or down can be sometimes be useful for emphasizing texture. Also, if your design has thin spindly lines around your shapes that you would like to get rid of then lowering the bailout will usually remove them (this tip works in other situations, with other colourings, too).
As a general rule do bear in mind that a bailout that reads "1e20" or similar is actually a very large figure (if memory serves I believe that is a "1" followed by 20 zeroes)... knocking off that last zero to make "1e2" can have a dramatic effect on the image (ok that's probably the same things as "100" but I use that trick as a very quick and dirty way of effecting a rapid change, so shoot me! ). Dropping really low to 40 or 4 is also worth trying at times. All this is just something to bear in mind as you work in UF.
4. Do check out the "Morph Parameters" section. These parameters and functions can dramatically change your base shapes, enabling you to find something a little more unusual. Try them out on a copy of one of your layers so you don't lose the original starting point if things don't turn out as you hoped.

Old hands: This is your chance to let rip and show us what you can bring out of this colouring! If you can share your parameters too then that will help the less experienced folk. So my special challenge to you guys is... dig deep into this one, find some more advanced things and show us what you come up with!!



As is usual now you may enter up to FOUR images to this challenge and you MUST include a link to this journal or to the group in your comments.
We have a few general but simple rules you must also follow - please review these before submitting. The rules are listed below.

At the end of the challenge we will ask the members to vote on their three favourite images with the top three or four images featured in a follow-up journal approximately one week later (or maybe more images will be featured if we continue to have such an amazing response to these challenges). This is just a fun part of the exercise, if your image is not highlighted it does not mean it is without merit, most images get at least one vote! There are no prizes, we are just doing this for the practice, for inspiration, for fun and for helping others learn from shared parameters. A community venture, freely done for everyone to benefit from so have fun and be generous and share wherever you can!



Challenge Rules - Please read these carefully.

Submissions need to use Thingamajigs II formula in tma.ucl on most if not all layers together with any formula/s of your own choosing.
Do NOT mix this colouring up with any other "Thingamajigs" you might find!
The influence of the colouring should be fairly prominent in your image.
You may use mappings and other texturing.
Images must be new and uploaded to DA on or after: October 1st 2016. The challenge ends on Monday October 31st 2016.
You may enter up to FOUR images to this challenge. If you have any problems please note the group, not the admins.
You MUST mention this challenge and add a link to this journal -OR- our group icon in your comments:
Submit your entry to the Challenge Folder: LINK You need to be a group member to do this.

NO huge/ugly watermarks (that includes the DA watermark) and frames should be simple and unobtrusive.
NO Fractal Manipulations are allowed.
Minimal post-work only allowed (such as enhancing colours, sharpening and adding a signature or very simple border).

We encourage you to share your parameters publicly if you can, as part of the ethos of this group.
A tutorial on how to store your parameters in your DA Sta.sh area can be found: Here
As always, only formulas from the Public database are acceptable if you intend to share your parameters.

Questions or don't understand something? Please ask first as we do not wish to offend or upset anyone (and ourselves) by refusing an entry.

We look forward to seeing your entries. Happy fractaling!