Please, if you value your speaking parts, do not try to read the title of this post out loud three times fast.  I’ll not be responsible for suffocating fits caused by tied tongues!  But enough of that – Weta are at it again and this time they’ve not only revealed a new raygun*, but they intend to release a directory of arcane inventions, contraptions and weaponry!  It features their own rayguns in pride of place, but their own take on the Steampunk world has far more content than just that – vibrating chairs that may cause unexpected spasms (but that automatically redirect any vaporous emissions you may create while perched upon it), heavy steam walkers for subjigating Mars from, and I’m sure much more.  There’s even an adventure in comic form from Lord Cockswain!  I look forward to that.

The new raygun is the concealable Victorious Mongoose.  They advise that the ladies may conceal it in a garter holster – oh that we live in an age when a lady must conceal a disintegrator beneath her skirts!

That Mr Babbage was a remarkable man, and while the Difference Engine was not completed in his lifetime, he (and his creations) still inspire the most cutting edge of technology today.  The BBC has an article on how a team lead by Professor Blick, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, propose to use diamond or piezoelectric parts to create mechanical computers on the nanometer scale – thus avoiding the ever encroaching limit of silicon based miniturisation.  It will run cooler and will require less power, it will be more robust in areas of high temperature, as well as being able to pack far more of these little components in the same space.  Bodes well, and I wish them fortune!  Thank you, Messers Chuck and Metis!

Mr Mordasky, inspired by Mr Von Slatt, decided that his Apple Pismo laptop could do with a little bit of aesthetic modification, and created a lovely, more subtle effect of layered cogs and brass scales in the Clockwork Pismo.  There’s a walk through of the process, from how to get the watch gears to sit flat, to how to make the layered effect, to how that sheen was gotten at the end.  A lovely modification, and very handsome indeed, Sir!

What a marvellous contraption!  Mr Jonathan Nightingale Lait on the Steampunk forum was kind enough to show us some very well taken photographs of his latest creation – a monoggle that allows seeing into either the future or the past.  As one might imagine, this is very handy in the workshop when wondering where you last put a particular item, or how the next project might pan out.

There’s even talk that he might post some details on the construction of the piece at some point soon – which I very much look forward to.  Mr Hildebrandt believes it may be the long-lost Chronovisor – this is of course impossible, as the chronovisor was designed only to view the past.  chuckles  A lovely item, and surprisingly good photography to match!  Well done, Mr Lait.

There is a group of people who like Zeppelins, and a group of people that like hardcore business simulation games for their computers, and in the small but terribly interesting area where those two groups of people overlap, there is the game Zeppelin – Giants of the Sky on DOS and Amiga. A curious but somehow fascinating creation, Zeppelin – Giants of the Sky (made in 1993) sees you buying and selling stocks, researching new Zeppelin technology, setting up trade routes, passenger trips and fulfilling governmental building orders – oh, and searching the world for your wife, Roseanne.  From reading about it, this is not a game for the faint of heart – there’s no handholding or warnings against getting yourself into a financial pickle here, but it seems that those that do like this game, love it.

I’ve not tried getting it myself (business simulations are a little out of my preferred genre-set) but do let me know if you do and what you think of it.  If nothing else, it’s unusual to see a game quite so sepia!  Thank you to Mr Christopher for knowing how much I like all things lighter than air.

Ms Kaoru asked if I’d seen some lovely lamps and clocks by the artist Benjamin Jones.  I hadn’t, but I find them to be quite lovely – my favourite easily being the above spider lamp of brass and polished wood.  The dragonfly is also charming – hovering as it does above a brass riveted lily pad, but I do prefer the spider.  The glass lampshade goes particularly well, though the positioning reminds me somehow of a scorpion.  Thank you, Ms Kaoru!

The Boston Globe did a video interview with the two gentlemen behind the Personal Blimp project (which recently got the approval nod from the FAA to be allowed to carry passengers in their not-quite-an-airship-not-quite-a-balloon vessel).

It’s lovely to see it in action, and I wish them all the very best in the future for making the ‘Alberta’ blimp better with every iteration, and look forward to the day when I might be able to park my personal Steampunk blimp (it would not be yellow and black) on the top of a tree and take tea in the canopy.  I’d better start saving up my $100,000 to $200,000 quickly!  (Eep)

A while ago I posted about the wonderful, lovely arithmometers – the calculating machines of the 1820′s.  Move forward a little to the 1870s and we have the introduction of the no less handsome pinwheel calculating engines.  Above is one of the oldest, the Baldwin Calculating Engine of 1874, able to add, subtract, multiply and divide by the careful setting up of dials and then turning the handle in the correct direction.  It looks like some wonderfully deranged marriage of music box and cash register, and I feel I’d be quite disappointed if it didn’t play a tune as the handles turned and the numbers crunched. There is more information about these lovely machines, as well as the independently invented cousin of the Baldwin engine, (the Odhner from Russia) on Wikipedia, the Early Office Museum and the Odhner Calculator site.  The Millionaire calculating machine looks stunning too – and came with its own brush!  Thanks to Mr G. Zeus (ahem) for pointing out these lovely machines.

In a secret location in the Ætherport of El Pueblo de Los Angeles, there will be an event, nay – and extravaganza of Steampunk, Neo-Victorian and Fantasy themed music and revelry this coming Saturday (the 21st of July).  It’s seldom that a ball comes with a tale of Steampunk adventure, but this one does:

“The Dauntless was hot on our tails. Our aft cannons held them at bay, but they were still gaining on us. If only we had steam. If only the boiler wasn’t busted again. We could’ve fired up that machine we hoisted from Fort Cydonia… the very thing they were after… a new Tesla invention. The professor said it had some kind of electromagnetic gimmick. A mechanical loom that could weave luminiferous aether. He said it could transport ships rapidly by folding up distance like it was folding up a paper map. If only the boiler wasn’t busted. If only we had steam…”

Far more information is available at the DJWolfie site, and instructions (as cryptic as they are – is this the standard for LA events?) at the HipGenesis site.  What corner to stand on, what curious vehicles to get collected by.  All rather mysterious.  I also find it curious that they allow automatons, but require steam to be below 140F (which is 60C and less than boiling point.)

Do let me know how it goes if anyone attends – it is a little out of my way, I fear.  Thank you Ms Kaun for pointing it out in time!

Over at Instructables, Mr Nemo Gould has posted how he made the beautiful moving Giant Squid mechanical creature that we posted about some time ago. It is so easy to forget just how big this wonderful contraption-like piece of art is, but when you think that the head of the giant squid was formed in part from lamppost heads and that fully assembled the whole thing is approximately as tall as a man, then you can start to grasp what a magnificent beast it is.