Thursday, May 29, 2008

Newspaper Blackout Poetry


AGORAPHOBIA
Originally uploaded by Austin Kleon

Creative Commons image: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Aluminum - The Other Steampunk Metal

Steampunk fashion and art is full of brass, copper, and iron. All fantastic and beautiful metals, but there is an often overlooked material that is attractive, period appropriate and has an interesting history.

Aluminum is a readily occurring element on earth, though it is mostly found in the form of oxides and silicates. It was not named until 1807 and was not isolated as a pure metal until 1825 by Hans Christian Ørsted. The early processes were very inefficient, slowly producing very small amount of impure metal.

This made Aluminum more expensive than gold, sliver or platinum. Napoleon III had given banquets where the most honoured guests were given aluminum utensils, while the other guests had to make do with gold. When the Washington Monument was completed in 1884 it was topped with an 100 ounce aluminum capstone in an elaborate dedication ceremony.

Electrolytic and chemical extraction improvements in the 1880's lead to mass production of the metal, making it the accessible and affordable material it is today.

So depending on your particular steampunk ethic and adherence to "the-past-that-was", consider the inclusion of Aluminum in your props and costumes.

Note: Both "Aluminum" and "Aluminium" are acceptable spellings. How fun is that?

Friday, May 23, 2008

Films in the year 2010

To keep my elbow on the pulse of the film world, I like to browse through IMDB to find projects with distant release dates to see what is in development. Today I chose the year 2010. Digging through the 855 titles, I found some obvious franchise releases, such as Iron Man 2, Harry Potter, and Narnia. However, I also found some titles that surprised me, and I thought I would share them along with a little commentary.

Video Games
Bioshock - Great looking video game with actual plot may make for a good film
City of Heroes - MMORPG as film?
Return To Castle Wolfenstein - Really? Was "Doom" not enough for everyone?

Science Fiction Lit.
20,000 Leagues under the Sea - Jules Vern does not go out of style
Dune - Again, Really? I thought the first film and the miniseries was sufficient.
Fahrenheit 451 - Could use an update given the current political climate.
Illustrated Man
Logan's Run
The Sword of Shannara - Haven't read it. Would this work?
Jennifer Government - Based on a book with a great premise. This could be quite good.

80's
Voltron
Tron
Short Circuit - Could Johnny Five live again?
Thundercats - In the same year as Voltron? The mine of the 1980's is only so deep.
Robotech - Live action? Who can say. This was "Japanimation" not Anime.
Untitled Bill & Ted Project - This could be a a lot of fun, or complete trash.

Comic Books
Thor
Doctor Strange - Guillermo Del Toro is attached to direct and has approached Neil Gaiman to write the script
Green Lantern - Comic book gold.
Sub-Mariner - One of my least favourite characters. Will this work as a film? Could be animated.
Occult Crimes Taskforce - Based on the comic by Rosario Dawson. Yes the "Sin City/MIB2/Clerks 2/Rent/Death Proof" Rosario Dawson. Her fandom godhead is secure.

Other
Dirty Dozen - Will it be an earnest or campy remake?
Have Gun - Will Travel - Will Smith as Paladin? Who can say.
High Noon - Will 2010 be a western year?
I, Claudius and I, Robot - Individually, not really interesting, but I can see the crossover parody SNL sketch already.
Black Hole - Remake of the 1979 film or unrelated offering?

Of course since these films are still in the planning and development stages, there is no guarantee that they will ever be made, or released in the year indicated.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Shane West has mastered Blue Steel


Shane West - Blue Steel
Originally uploaded by Drhaggis.

Looking through IMDB for steampunk movie photos, I came along the collected photos of Shane West. Shane portrayed the grinning Tom Sawyer in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. While on screen he can display the whole range of human emotions. However at movie premieres and public appearances, only one look will do, and that look is Blue Steel.

See more of this look here.

Monday, May 19, 2008

100 Days until Dragoncon

There are 100 Days until Dragoncon begins. Are you ready for the onslaught of awesome? There are about 230 guests and bands confirmed, including Jake Lloyd, some of the cast of Firefly and the usual collection of authors and artists.


Cruxshadows concert 2
Originally uploaded by K. Smithington.
Photo Released under Creative Commons by-nc-sa 2.0

Also, crowd surfing stormtroopers.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Unseen Indiana Jones

Introducing a new feature on Slashboing: Comics. The first offering was inspired by The Temple of Doom.


Slashboing: The Comic Strip
Originally uploaded by Drhaggis.

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Time travel Continuum

I thought I would post this graph for any time travellers who may be reading this blog.

funny graphs
see more Graphs

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Paris: Photography update

I have spent the last several nights uploading photos I took in Paris to my flickr account. I had +860 pictures to review and I uploaded them at full resolution, so it took quite a while.
Notre Dame grotesque
I picked over 300 pictures and a few videos to share, so I won't be posting them all here. The set is in chronological order, with the oldest pictures first, so you can follow my trip along, monument by monument.

I used specific date tags if you want to view each day on its own:
10 APR | 11 APR | 12 APR | 13 APR | 14 APR | 15 APR | 16 APR

Here are some cool monuments and Museum tags to view:
Louvre | Eiffel Tower | Museum of Arts and Metres | Notre Dame Cathedral

I was downloading pictures off my camera every night for backup, so if I ever lost my camera, I would at least have all the previous pictures safe. Reviewing them nightly I was getting annoyed as the inside/no flash shots mandated by most museums were coming out blurry and the resolution of my videos was terrible.Tour d'Eiffel

I still managed to score some great shots from the trip, like this tower "upskirt" so it wasn't so bad in the end, but the shortcomings of my camera became quite clear. These issues were echoed by a CNet review that came out after I had purchased the camera, so don't be surprised if a new camera is in my future.

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Fast Talking, High Trousers

We interrupt our regular silence with an unscheduled post. Do you like old movies? I think some of my regular readers do. Here is a good natured summary of period films from Family Guy.