Archive for July, 2006

Steam powered synthesizer!

Sunday, July 30th, 2006

Well, it seems that Mr Parker creates some very strange contraptions - the latest of which is a steam powered, table top sound synthesizer (above)! The small kit engine is connected to a brushless 8 phase AC motor, and generates a sine wave. Visit his site for an mp3 of the low frequency [...]

Klockwerk: Beautiful Clocks

Thursday, July 27th, 2006

Good grief it’s pretty, isn’t it? You should see it’s brothers and sisters over at Roger Wood’s Klockwerk site. Multitudes of clocks made from found and scavenged pieces, collected over time and then magically put together when the moment is right. I’m not sure I’ve seen many other modern creations that say [...]

Broken Gears: Pen and Paper

Wednesday, July 26th, 2006

Broken Gears is a pen and paper RPG created by the roleplaying group at Cambridge Uni - and they’ve written it up (the complete system) and uploaded the Creative Commons liscenced PDF for all to read and use.
Now, theirs is a slightly different flavour of Steampunk - but Steampunk it is. The year is [...]

Steamboy: PS2

Wednesday, July 26th, 2006

So, from one Steampunk game on the PS2 to another - this time a film tie in to the rather beautiful, but unsatisfying anime film, Steamboy. Now again - this is not a game that I have played, but I’ve tried to read up about it, and the press aren’t saying terribly nice things. [...]

Steambot Chronicles: PS2

Wednesday, July 26th, 2006

Recently out in the US, and previously known as Bumpy Trot in Japan (and as yet unnavailable in the UK, bah), Steambot Chronicles is a PS2 role-play game. Now, I’ve not played this yet - but reviews seem to be fairly favourable.
The plot concerns the plight of a young man called Vanilla who washes [...]

Gears: Educational Links

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

So, I’ve been reading up about cogs and gears - partially so I can connect up my little engine to something, and partly because it’s just generally interesting to learn about. I’ve discovered the various kinds of gears, what they’re used for, what a gear ratio is, how a pendulum clock works, and then [...]

Cog Embroidery: The Skirt

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

I apologise for the shoddy photograph, but it was all I had at the time. Anyway - you can see that I put the embroidered cogs (from my earlier pillowcase prototype) onto a skirt. This was my plan, and I’m glad it worked!
Just a couple of notes - the skirt is a linen/polyester [...]

Transformers: Hearts of Steel #1 (review)

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

So I got my comic a day or so ago, and I’ll admit - I’m not a comic reader, generally. In fact, other than a flutter with the Sandman graphic novels a while ago, I’ve never really bought comics at all. So, this was new to me, and maybe what I’ll comment on [...]

The Museum of Retro Technology

Thursday, July 20th, 2006

Oh, what a glorious webpage The Museum of Retro Technology is!
Pages about our old friend the Monowheel (monowheels through the years, up to current time monowheels, and a link to an American gentleman who will build you one custom for several thousand dollars), Steam Powered Bicycles, Ether Engines (no, really!), Diwheels, Analogue Mechanical Computers, Curious [...]

Transformers: Hearts Of Steel #1 (update)

Wednesday, July 19th, 2006

So, it seems that to great lack of fanfare or noise, Transformers: Evolution, Hearts of Steel has actually been released. I’m not sure if they don’t want you to buy it, or something, but the official webpage of the publisher almost denies its existance!
But despite that, after reading that it actually had been released, [...]