I've updated my Apophsys 2.04 JF2 with a few changes described at the download page. If you have any problems (that aren't already mentioned below) let me know by sending me a note.

Journal Changelog
October 30th, 2006:

• Apophysis 2.04 JF2b

September 13th, 2006:

• Link to an Image tutorial by =MichaelFaber

September 8th, 2006:

• Initial post
• Minor revisions and additional examples

Changes
This version includes three variations that are not included in the official version of Apophysis 2.04 beta:

• Image: Renders Bitmap and JPEG images in your fractal.
• NGon: Similar to spherical except it can be shaped into polygons among other shapes.
• Pie: Similar to blur except it can be divided into "slices". This was released in a previous custom version.
• Variations Radial Blur and Gaussian have been ported from Apophysis 2.05 beta.

Special Thanks
I'd like to thank *slobo777 aka Neil who figured out the math behind NGon and my brother =MichaelFaber who tested the software and helped with Image.

Disclaimer
There is a small problem when saving flames that have images loaded. You can save your fractals into a new file or into a file that you have open (even if you have saved images into that file), but do not save your flame into a file that has other images saved into it already. For example, let's say you made a nice fractal yesterday using Image and saved it into 'myflame.flame'. Today you opened Apophysis and made another nice fractal using Image. You should not save the image into 'myflame.flame'. If you do you will overwrite the old image. If you want both images in the same file you should first open up 'myflame.flame' then make your second nice fractal and then save it into 'myflame.flame'.

So, in short: don't save images into files that have images in them already unless you have that file opened already. Because this problem exists, automatically saving to the 'renders.flame' parameter file is disabled in this release.

Examples
I've made a few fractals using Pie a while ago:


Ngon is very powerful (especially as a final transform). Brushed Metal, the first fractal shown below, uses a spherical final transform. The following two use NGon final transforms with different variables.

Elevation also has an NGon final transform.

*slobo777's Structure From Energy is a fine example using NGon in a regular transform (not in the final transform).


I haven't made anything artistic with Image yet (I've been busy ), but my brother =MichaelFaber has some excellent examples:


Using Image
In the Editor you'll find a new tab called 'Image'. You can add and remove images by clicking the "Add" and "Remove" buttons respectively. After adding image(s) look for the "image_filename" variable on the "Variables" tab.

A few things to keep in mind when using Image

• Images are always monochromatic (only one colour). If you want full coloured images you need to use three images, one for each colour component. =MichaelFaber made a tutorial that describes how to do this.
• Saved flame files can get quite large if you have large images
• It takes a while to import images. Just wait for the progress to finish before continuing.

Download
You can find an executable and source code here.