So called dieselpunk

[Atterton]

Yes, how could I forget that? Wonderful art deco.

[Angus A Fitziron]

From what I have read here, it seems to me that the Art Nouveau period characterises the Steam Punk styles and Art Deco period the Diesel Punk. Although there is a suggestion that Steam punk relates to the Victorian era, a lot of the costumes and props veer towards the latter part of the era, say, 1885 to 1905. Steam power had then been regularly employed for about 200 years and a new steam locomotive was completed this year in the UK, so 'steam' is being used as a style definition rather than an era. The Art Deco era, from 1920 to the 1940's also seems to me to encompass those design traits and sources used in Dieselpunk, rather than any direct reference to the age of diesel (Rudolf built his first 'diesel' engine in the mid 1890's and the name is still going strong today!) So, it's a bit obvious really but I think I am going to stop thinking of Steam and Diesel as applying era and more applying to a style.

This also helped me clear my thoughts about airships and I agree the above comment that early balloons and airships (plus all the unlikely literary ships, eg with sails) could be Steampunk, but the Zeppelins and their like would be properly Dieselpunk. I think this therefore means to indulge all my interests there is a need to be both, but to be sympathetic to the two styles when putting together joint or ensemble activities.

Just my three ha'p'orth

[Utini420]

It is also worth pointing out that if these characters were real people, it is entirely possible for one person to live in both Eras over the course of their life time. 

Longer, if you put their brain in a jar.

Turn of the century stuff is awesome, and you better believe in 150 years they kids will be telling some freakin' crazy stories about Y2K.

[Atterton]

It´s not about diesel engines suddenly being invented, so much as them being the main power source of the time and enabling much of the technology. Stones were also around long before the stone age. 

Art Noveau is a bit late for the steampunk era I think. It more falls into that 1900-1920 grey area.

[steamtastic]

Art Noveau is a bit late for the steampunk era I think. It more falls into that 1900-1920 grey area.

Sorry but I disagree. I’ve always thought the whole Art Deco/Art Nouveau was truly dieselpunk and what I liked best about it. This I the great era of the airship!

This is a quote taken from the gatehouse (as you probably aware) a dieselpunk site.

Dieselpunk is a sub-genre of fiction and a growing sub-culture interested in the spirit of the diesel era (post WWI-1950s); fashion, music, art, technology, all of it. To sum dieselpunk up in a few keywords, dieselpunk to me equals: jazz, pulp adventure, film noir, futurism, Lovecraftian horror, streamlined cars, and ass-kicking technology that could actually be built.
While the era was a powder keg of horrors (Prohibition, gang wars, the Crash, the Depression, World War II), it was also a time of discovery and advancement for mankind. It was the era when man rolled up its sleeves, stopped hoping for the best, and started working to build something better.
To me, dieselpunk is a revival of that spirit.

So according to them, your time is just before dieselpunk starts.

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[Rockula]

If Well's 'Time Machine' falls within the 'Steampunk' era does it not follow that people or objects from ANY time period could be transported back to the Victorian age...
 I mean, if you see it as fantasy as such.

[Atterton]

Perhaps, but then it would all get rather pointless.

[steamtastic]

If Well's 'Time Machine' falls within the 'Steampunk' era does it not follow that people or objects from ANY time period could be transported back to the Victorian age...
 I mean, if you see it as fantasy as such.

I don't follow you; dieselpunk is not in the Victorian age. But I see what you mean that in fantasy terms you could have anything you want to make it how you want. Things like this are up for interpretation. however, I do feel there should be set conventions like in steampunk, because, (like Atterton said) things would get rather pointless.

[Angus A Fitziron]

It´s not about diesel engines suddenly being invented, so much as them being the main power source of the time and enabling much of the technology. Stones were also around long before the stone age. 

That's the point I was trying to make. If we define the style by a lable attached to a technology then there is a risk of over-extending the period of the style due to the longevity of technologies. I have to confess to not knowing much about dieselpunk above what I have read here and related links, but was diesel really the main power source or is it an all encompassing phrase covering all types of internal combustion engines?

Art Noveau is a bit late for the steampunk era I think. It more falls into that 1900-1920 grey area.

Art Nouveau began in the 1880's and peaked 1890 ~1905, within the generally accepted SP timeline. I agree that this suggests the latter part of the period that SPs use for reference, but I observe that many of the costumes and other items shown on this forum are based on that period. However, this is not to say that the influences don't go back to 1830ish, particularly so with the Wild West style. But again, I'm thinking about style first and timeline as a secondary indicator. 

[Kylen Phylar]

Personally Diesel punk is much more of just after the prohibition, whereas Steampunk is Victorian up to the end of the Prohibition. Granted I like to give thins a nice long edge so I can write plenty of stories.

[neon_suntan]

The Mister X comics by Dean Motter have a very Art Deco / Expressionist style that seems to stretch from 1920's to 1950's with added robots and flying cars

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Can anyone recommend any other Dieselpunk books?

[Nitr0gene]

So...would I be incorrect in thinking that Mad Max was slightly Diesel Punk in its post-apocalyptic nature with lots of leather and rugged machinery? Or is that something entirely different? I'll be doing a Steampunk VS Dieselpunk photo shoot where one Wayward Victorian lady gadgeteer will be against a mohawk-sporting leather clad Diesel punk villain.

[Utini420]

While I personally think there is a lot of cross-over between the Mad Max and the Dieselpunk, they aren't really the same thing, if you want to get nit picky.  And since you asked, what the hell...

Technically, Mad Max is post-apocalyptic, and if you take the movies pretty literally, that would be a post-1970s or 1980s apocalypse (no one is cruising in beater Priuses, right?) Its got cars, and gas, and leather, and diesel, but (and I think this is key) no infrastructure, so everything is all slap-dash and jerry-rigged.  Armored school busses and football pad armor.

Dieselpunk is (and this is just my description of it) what happens when WAR (in the Extra, Extra!  Read all about it! WAR! sense) comes to steampunk.  If steampunk is the calm between the storms of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods and the later World War eras, Dieselpunk is slap in the middle of full-tilt mechanized 20th century war, even if the major combatants are taking a break this week.  But, key to fighting and winning any war is maintaining your infrastructure while trashing that of your enemy.  Basically, you still have cities, and manufacturing, and governments.  Actually, you probably have massive Orwellian governments and people shuffling off to factory jobs in the city to crank out the giant flying robots that will crush the mechanical hoards of our East-Asian enemies, with whom we've always been at war.

Does that make sense?  It was kinda rambly.  I guess to say it really short, Dieselpunk and Post-Apocalyptic both depend on lots of cars and guns, but Dieselpunk is before they drop the bombs, and Mad Max is after the radioactive dust settles.

[Ottens]

So...would I be incorrect in thinking that Mad Max was slightly Diesel Punk in its post-apocalyptic nature with lots of leather and rugged machinery?

I don't think that's incorrect at all. According to The Flying Fortress there are two kinds of dieselpunk and Mad Max definitely falls within the darker/dystopian/post-apocalyptic category.

On the same subject, I wrote an article entitled "The two flavors of dieselpunk" that might be of interest.

Also in issue #4 of the Gatehouse Gazette Piecraft explores the issue in Part II ("Diesel Classics") of his "History of Dieselpunk".

[Atterton]

I also can´t see why Mad Max is any different from lots of other post-apocalypse stories. That their vehicles run on diesel/gasoline seems rather incidental.

[Utini420]

I'm A-OK with my two descriptions of post-apocalypitc and dieselpunk being re-identified as the two flavors of Dieselpunk.

One might look at it as a series of switches: 
Is it in the past, but with things that shouldn't be there?  That's anacronistic.
Is it anacronistic with a Victorian flair, probably in a time of peace?  That's Steampunk.
Is it Steampunk, after the war (hot or cold) comes?  That's Dieselpunk
Is it Dieselpunk, after the bombs drop?  That's post-apocalyptic.



(It is worth pointing out that my own definitions of X_punk have nothing at all to do with the prevailing power source, despite it being in the name)

[Ottens]

I think dieselpunk's a little more than "steampunk in a different time period" actually.

[Lucius Voltaic]

I think that the difference between steampunk and diesel punk can be summed up thus:

Steampunk is brown and gold.
Dieselpunk is silver and black.

Those are, firstly, the colors most associated with the two styles. (Yes, they are independent--steampunk is more popular, but that doesn't mean that dieselpunk is a subset thereof.) They are not merely associated in a manner in which any color could be, however--there is more to the colors than color. They somehow embody the essential spirit of the two aesthetics in a way which I will try to describe below.

As for steampunk--
The brown is for wood, leather, and oil; for machinery and builders; for the constructive, gadgeteering attitude.
The gold is for wealth and opulence; for elegance and the stylish; for socializing in your best tailcoat with your pocketwatch on a gold chain.

As for dieselpunk--
The silver is for steel and aluminum; for streamliners, skyscrapers, and the Graf Zeppelin; for the future that shone bright and would be taken forward on the wings of technology and made beautiful with the clean, sleek lines of Art Deco.
The black is for shadow and smoke and noir; for the hard-boiled P.I. stalking his prey through the back alleys, far from Raymond Loewy's sleek steamers and the glittering future; for the downtrodden worker and the rising evil in Hitler's Reich.

[Jonny B. Goode]

I also can´t see why Mad Max is any different from lots of other post-apocalypse stories. That their vehicles run on diesel/gasoline seems rather incidental.

I disagree. That their vehicles run on diesel/gasoline was hardly incidental. The central focus, at least of the second movie, is the power of the automobile, and the struggle for control over sources of petroleum and the technology surrounding it. (And to a smaller extent, half the third movie, although they had switched to bio-diesel by that time as society broke down further.)

[darkshines]

I like those descriptions, Lucius

[Nitr0gene]

Well, I think that you've all cleared managed to seperate the two "styles" of Steampunk and, as you would no doubt agree, there are some sub genres within Steam and Diesel i.e. Neo Victorian, Post Apocalyptic etc if you want to get really descriptive.

Just realised that all my time trying to describe the styling in Bioshock, I guess that could be described as a subgenre of Diesel Punk, with all the Big Daddys running around, the Art Deco, and the Dystopian style story.

Thanks everyone for clearing that up and breaking it down for me. I think we could probably continue the "what is Diesel Punk compared to Steampunk" discussion for eternity!

[dnbsdizzy]

I've been wondering, what is the difference between dieselpunk and steampunk? Is it merely time period (victorian-1920's vs. 1930's-1940's) or is it more with the technology. My aesthetic seems to be more after the victorian era but in my mind, it still utilizes the whole steam idea instead of combustion fuel.

So this raises the question: Is steampunk set in victorian times or is it more an anachronistic time period where steam is utilized?

I have always thought of steampunk stopping in the victorian era, deiselpunk claims everything from ww1 to somewhere in the late 1940's, it seems to me that the fashion and style of deiselpunk is more deco, and less victorian, but there is ton of overlap between these cultural kissing cousins, like goggles, who claims what movies, things like that

[Wells45]

Well said, dnbsdizzy.

[Lucius Voltaic]

I think we can all agree that Sky Captain & WoT is the ultimate dieselpunk movie. On that note, does anyone know where the clips of Sir Laurence Olivier that they neatly fitted in came from?

[Atterton]

Yes, that movie is bolts to the walls dieselpunk.  Rocketeer was nice too though.

If anyone is interested, DC published a comic last week wherein Batman meets Doc Savage. It was called First Wave and, as I understand it, was the first in a future series of Doc Savage comics.