I wanted to do something with lots of jewel tones. Created entirely in Paint Shop Pro.

A nice snowy design to celebrate winter. The title is from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite. The background fractal is from Apophysis, jewels rendered in Vue, the rest in Paint Shop Pro.

This was part of a three-part color series I created back in 2011. The backgrounds are from fractals, put together in Paint Shop Pro.
Green As the Grass
Blue As the Sea

This was part of a three-part color series I created back in 2011. The backgrounds are from fractals, put together in Paint Shop Pro.
Blue As the Sea
Red As the Flame

This was part of a three-part color series I created back in 2011. The backgrounds are from fractals, put together in Paint Shop Pro.
Green As the Grass
Red As the Flame

“‘Down there,’ said Golg, ‘I could show you real gold, real silver, real diamonds.’

“‘Bosh!’ said Jill rudely. ‘As if we didn't know that we're below the deepest mines even here.’

“‘Yes,’ said Golg. ‘I have heard of those little scratches in the crust that you Topdwellers call mines. But that's where you get dead gold, dead silver, dead gems. Down in Bism we have them alive and growing. There I'll pick you bunches of rubies that you can eat and squeeze you a cup full of diamond-juice. You won't care much about fingering the cold, dead treasures of your shallow mines after you have tasted the live ones of Bism.’”
— C.S.Lewis, “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair”, Chapter 14, “The Bottom of the World”

This was an exercise in color symbolism. Purple often indicates royalty and wealth. Because it's (relatively) rare in nature, and purple dyes used to be difficult to make and therefore expensive, only the wealthiest could afford to dress in purple.

“Her clothing is silk and purple.…”
- Proverbs 31:22

“And Mordecai went out from the presence of the king in royal apparel of blue and white, and with a great crown of gold, and with a garment of fine linen and purple: and the city of Shushan rejoiced and was glad.”
— Esther 8:15

“There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.”
— Luke 16:19

“They put a purple robe on him, then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on him. And they began to call out to him, ‘Hail, king of the Jews!’”
— Mark 15:17-18

This ornate spiral pattern came from the XaoS fractal zooming program, and I added the gold overlay and rubies. How any gems do you think there are?

I wanted to try something metallic besides gold and silver, and I remember my high school Chemistry kit had a copper compound that was bright blue (azurite?), so I decided to try them together. Then these butterflies showed up fluttering across my screen and offered to pose for me, so here they are! Actually it's an Apophysis fractal that I thought looked like a butterfly. You have to have a good imagination working with fractals! This was also another attempt at drawing faceted gems.

Hiddenite , or Lithia Emerald, is a rare green gemstone. It was discovered in western North Carolina in 1879, and named after the geologist William Hidden.

This picture of course is not a photograph of actual hiddenite. It's a combination of my drawing with an Apophysis fractal for the background. I laid out the design to give the effect of heading into a dark cave where such gemstones might be mined. This piece was also an experiment in drawing faceted gems - they're harder than the round orbs.