This was the result of playing around with gradient overlays and an old Apophysis render that had been calling for me to find a use for it. The jewel is actually the first one I ever designed in 2008 following a tutorial, but for some reason I missed the part about how to add the shine and couldn't figure out why it looked so flat . Three years later I finally revisited it and came up with this.

This fractal created in Apophysis turned out looking like some very brightly-colored coral. I added the gold framing and gem in Paint Shop Pro.