Wada Basins: Ray-Traced Fractals
Ivan Freyman, 11/10/2010

Wada Basins are the fractals that appear when mirrored spheres are placed next to each other. Below are some pictures and animations I created this way in 3D Studio Max 2011. The spheres are deliberately not 100% reflective. They absorb a tiny amount of light so that reflections get dimmer as light bounces from mirror to mirror. Also, each sphere has a different hue, causing interesting color patterns to emerge as light is slightly attenuated at different frequencies with each bounce. For example: Imagine a red sphere that reflects a blue and green sphere, each of which are reflecting magenta, orange and cyan spheres. After dozens of reflections, hundreds of new colors appear.