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Tier — Description
Mandelbulb 3D v1.9.0 ALPHA1

DEcombinate in Min mode using: SphereHeightMapIFS (x3)/_PolyFold-sym/ABoxPlatinum/Sierpinski3/_boxtiling/_reciprocalY3
The extra formula slots in the latest update to MB3D came in very useful here!

Inspired by Hal Tenny's wonderful formula combo, as used in his 'Imagination Destination' www.deviantart.com/art/Imagina…
My thanks to Bernard Bittler - 'loboto' for kindly sharing his excellent heightmap which I used on the 'ships'.

This is an imagining of the vast habitat 'Tier' from the SF novel 'Excession' by Iain M. Banks . Below is an excerpt from the novel describing Tier:

"Tier was a stepped habitat; it's nine levels all revolved at the same speed, but that meant that the outer tiers possessed greater apparent gravity than those near the center.
The levels themselves were sectioned into compartments up to hundreds of kilometers long and filled with atmospheres of different types and held at different temperatures, while stunningly complicated and dazzlingly beautiful arrays of mirrors and mirrorfields situated within the staggered cone of the world's axis provided amounts of sunlight precisely timed, attenuated and where necessary altered in wavelength to mimic the conditions on a hundred different worlds for a hundred different species.
The environmental diversity and civilizational co-dependence it implied, and intermingling it encouraged had been Tier's raisond'etre, the very foundation of it's purpose and fame for the seven thousand years it had existed. Its original builders were, perhaps, unknown; they were believed to have Sublimed shortly after building it, leaving behind a species or model - depending on how you defined these things - of biomechanical sintricate which ran and maintained the place...."

A larger version of this piece can be viewed, and prints ordered at: markjaybeefractal.com/tier/

*Update 24/3/17: You can now view an interactive 360° panoramic version of 'Tier' on my sites at: markjaybeefractal.com/tier-pan… and: mjb-graphics.co.uk/tier-panora… Enjoy!!