XX Reactor Core - Deep Zoom

I happened to be doing some methodological zooming on the Mandelbrot set. I had been especially intrigued by a video entitled "Metaphase" on HPDZ.net:
[link]

Youtube Version:
[link]

By following his technique, which starts out with a single cross formation and later becomes two and finally four crosses lined up in a row (the now famous "metaphase" image looks like chromosomes), I extended the process to 8, 16, and finally 32 little Xs! Every time I reiterate the process, I have to zoom many levels through the single, double, quad, and so on. After I had 32 Xs lined up in a little row, the two on either edge were so tiny they could barely be seen. I then zoom in through the center rather than go through another painful iteration.

(by this point, even with my Quad-core Phenom II running at 3.6Ghz and 64 bit calcs, the iteration count was climbing and becoming numbingly slow)

I zoom in further to ultimately reveal a big "X" with each of four arms each containging sixteen Xs a piece, an X made up of Xs! I tinker around with the color mapping, save the file, and render big at 2400x2400 pixels and a whopping 782.8 zooms (magnification= 4.4*10^235) - That's smaller that one divided by a googol squared!!

Update: Jan 20th, 2010:
For your viewing pleasure, I have now uploaded to YouTube, a Zoom movie that passes through this exact location, then continues onward until the minibrot at the end...
[link]

See also "Magnum Opus X" which is based off of this concept, but extended to the third degree X^3 (An "X made up of Xs made up of Xs"):
[link]

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Update Dec 15th, 2011: I uploaded a newer file with a tweaked color palette. Redundant palette data has been removed, resulting in a wider color gamut and less posterization.

Dec 19: I re-rendered at 4800x4800 pixels. Scaled to 2400 for a clean antialiased look. [the full resolution 4800x4800 pixels is available for printing]

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Metaphase effect in other Mandelbrot powers:

2nd Order, "XX Reactor Core"

3rd Order, "Lost Y Chromosome" [link]

4th Order, "Knobby Cross" [link]

5th Order, "Starfish" [link]

6th Order, "Hexapod" [link]