A Steampunk Tempest for Christmas

So I just finished my fifth semester a few days back. Before leaving for home, I had one last final, a presentation for my Scene Design class. We each had to present our full color model or two color renderings for our production of The Tempest. I of course did a full color model, enjoying crafting much more drawing. In the presentations we also had to go over our concept for each design. Me, being slightly out there compared to the rest of the class, chose to create a Steampunk version of The Tempest. Please understand thatthe pictures of myproject in this post are of a model. Nothing to fancy here, so please don't judge too harshly.

Now for those who may not know what Steampunk is.... well... its something you can't describe too easily. It's better to glean the aesthetic from pictures and such. Below is an... okay video describing Steampunk.

So... Yeah. I want to reiterate that this is not exactly the best source. Honestly, I would just do a search of Steampunk and see what pictures come up. Or this is another pretty good source, surprisingly: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steampunk

Basically the idea of Steampunk is to take the Victorian age, turn

of the century, and put a

twist on it. Take what appeals to your eye and incorporate it in with today's technology and such. What if steam power brought about th

e information age? How could you make a steam powered motorcycle? Airship? You get the point.

Usually there is a bit of the occult or what have you thrown in for good measure. But the core of Steampunk is the gears and steam and pulleys within the machines, not the shiny exterior.

Anyhoo... I love love love the aesthetic. So while reading The Tempest for research on my set,

I started thinking of abstract ways of doing the island or magic and what not. For those not familiar with The Tempest, this is a passable excuse for a substitute. Please read it. It's truly not that difficult to understand what's going on. And it's short. But if you really don't want to read a piece of good literature...

Anyhoo.... Take two.... I found myself imagining, as I read the play, this great machine floating in the middle of the Mediterranean. This machine was state of the art at one point, but, for some undisclosed reason, it was utterly and suddenly abandoned. It lay in a dormant state for years, until the usurped duke of Milan, Prospero, was marooned there. Prospero's wizardry in my interpretation of the show becomes his ability to control the machine of the island. During the many years of solitude, the island-machine was overtaken by nature. Nature and the machine have become twisted and entwined within each other. Thatwas akey idea I wanted to focus on, this underlying tension, war waging between machine and nature. What is truly natural on the island? Machines were built without the presence of nature, yet nature was always their before the machines were ever build. Who actually has claim to the island? This is epitomized in the structure that Prospero lives in, shown to the left. I wanted to try to portray the pipes and tubes of the machine fighting against nature, growing out of the ground haphazardly. This structure would emit bursts and puffs of steam every so often. Moss is growing on most surfaces on the island, flat areas of the machine are being buried underneath a fine layer of dirt. Both nature and machine are not dormant on the island.

Around the heart of the stage I thought it would be cool to have wires and cables emanating radially like veins into the island. These would glow blue as Prospero casts his entrapping circle. I also wanted to have cutouts in the stage for the audience to see the gears beneath

everything. Plexiglass would lay over the holes as to not cause any accidents. The gears would twist every time magic occurred. I would also love for there to be lights beneath the gears that would shine during the magic as well.

At the very beginning of the show, I envision Prospero coming out to center stage, silent with a single spot light on the heart of the stage. As Prospero nears the heart he looks out into the audience and then back at the heart, inserting his staff into the stage's heart as if a key to wind a clock. And he does such an action. Winding the Stage-gear, the gears underneath are slowly illuminated and creak to life. The veins glows a eerie blue. He takes his key-staff out and while

the lights dim, the audience continues to hear the gears turning and the "clock" ticking. The scene swiftly flows into the shipwreck scene. At the very very end there is an epilogue in which Prospero puts down his staff and renounces his magical ways. I envision Prospero undoing his original magic by unwinding the Stage-gear and putting down his key-staff, retiring his mechanical ways. This coupled with the beginning scene set up the convention that: 1 Prospero while somewhat omnipotent, is limited by the machine (being created by man is inherently flawed and has limits), 2 Prospero purposefully set this entire set of events into

motion by winding the Stage-gear.

Of course the costumes would be out of this world! I haven't thought too much about them, since this was for a scene design class more than a costume design class. None the less, there would be plenty of goggles believe you me.

So that's basically the entirety of the project. Below are more photos that I couldn't find a place for in our conversation. Hope you enjoy them. I'm always open to questions, so drop me a line if you have a query.

This piece, which I called Main-gear, took almost three hours to make.

Main-gear turned out quite nice after a bit of antiquing paint.

The beginning of the stage.

Construction of Stage-gear. Lots and lots of floral foam.

Things glued down with a bit of moss for texture.

Proscenium up with Curtain-gears attached.

Everything painted.

One of the best angles I was able to get of it.

The man, as in the earlier picture, does not represent costuming or what-have-you, but merely gives a sense of scale and size. As you can see Main-gear is quite a sizable object.

Scott Pilgrim vs. A Killer Metaphor

So if you've been reading this invisible blog, you may have read my review of Inception. In it I said something to the effect that Inception was one of the best movies, if not the best movie, I have ever seen. Well... Scott Pilgrim vs. The World fits exactly into that same description.

I actually needed to see this movie twice before writing anything about it. There is so much in the film that it honestly feels like genuine comic book (or graphic novel for those who feel that comic book is degrading to the genre); every time you read it (or watch it), aspects of it feel new and undiscovered. It warrants a second viewing.

Scott Pilgrim is a seemingly average kid living in Toronto, Canada with his gay roommate Wallace and plays with his band, The Sex Bob-Omb (a play on words, bob-omb being a reference to items in The Super Mario Brothers games which resembles little black bombs with eyes and feet). The movie begins with Scott, age: 22, rating: awesome, dating a high school girl, Knives Chau. But not too long after the wonderful 8-bit Universal opening (which you can hear, but unfortunately not see, at the bottom of this post), Scott notices another girl, Ramona Flowers. After a quick break up with Knives, Scott attempts to woo Ramona. But Scott's in for a bit of a surprise. He must, in order to date Ramona, defeat her seven deadly exs. Comedy, action, and video game references ensue.

This film feels like the perfect trans-genetic mutation between an 8 or 16 bit video game and

a wicked awesome comic book. From the cartoons added in to animate Ramona's past boyfriends, to the retro (I loath using that word) video game tracks, to the "batman-style" sound text (you know, Bam!, Kapow!, Shazam!), this movie is dripping with pure fan-boy amazement. The visual is really the closest you could get to a comic without separating each shot into individual frames of a comic strip.

The visual, though, is only half of the picture. The dialog is so fresh and witty I was absolutely engaged the entire movie. And it all felt very natural. Nothing was too contrived or forced. If there was an awkward line the movie did a wonderful job at explaining the thought process behind it. Example: After Scott dumps Knives, she dyes her hair similar to Ramona's hair and

starts seeing Scott's friend, Young Neil, in an attempt to make Scott notice her. After they play at the club, Ramona sees knives across the bar and and asks who she is. Scott, panicking, tries to decided whether to say "I have to go pee" or "Who, her?" In Scott's mind we see a roulette wheel spinning landing right on the line between the two options. So what comes out is "I need to pee on her." The best thing is that he doesn't even realize what he said was out of the normal, but the audience can understand what's going on in his head. There are actually quite a few of these moments which make the movie very relatable since we've all had moments where we tried to say something but something else comes out.

The characters are another strong point of the film. Each person is fully committed to their character and they are all so fully developed. While I

have not yet read the books (though I plan on doing so very soon!), I have a clue that we can thank them for such wonderful and developed characters. Two particularly standout characters in the movie were Knives Chau and Ramona Flowers. Both of these were wonderfully portrayed by their respective actresses, Ellen Wong and Mary Elizabeth Winstead. But the character that stole quite a few scenes, I feel was Alison Pill, who portrayed Kim, the drummer of Sex B0b-Omb and an old girlfriend of Scott. I really have no idea how to describe her role. You really just have to see the movie.

Michael Cera is also pretty freaking good in this movie. One of the best roles I think I've ever seen him in. Why do I think that? I think it's because of the role. I feel that he's been stuck in the same role for five years now. This one allows him to be a bit more free with his character.... a bit more animated and emotional. I know a lot of people are getting tired of him, but this movie really is a nice change of pace for him.

The music compliments the visual so perfectly that I was actually compelled to buy some of the songs after seeing it a second time. So catchy are the tracks, I find myself humming them all the time. The final aspect of this film that brings everything together are the battle scenes. Yes, they are over the top. Yes, they are more than slightly unrealistic. But, it brings together everything this movie has.

The whole movie is one big metaphor.... well kinda. The whole fighting the seven evil exs are something every guy, and girl (though I enjoy that the movie focuses on the guy point of view) has to metaphorically deal with when dating someone new and special. You always feel the need to be the best person they've dated to date (pun). This movie really does a superb job at jumping into the mind of a twenty something guy entering a new relationship. Bravo. I cannot wait to read the books.

This is the 8-bit Universal opening at the beginning of the film. Unfortunately there is no version just yet that features the visual component to the clip. Sorry folks.

A Summer of Science

This is my last day in the lab. Well, at least for this summer. We've (James and I) have made quite a bit of progress on Dr. Krebs' current project. Honestly, leaving today is a bit bittersweet. Part of me really, really wants to go home and have some actual vacation time, because I know that all disappears when grad school happens, but part of mewantsto just stay put and live in my new apartment. The latter is probably explained by Jennifer's closer abode to myself out here.

So this is our lab. It's actually a pretty small room but it's definitely has a homey feeling to it. The table to the right is our laser set up area, along with a cryostat chamber (hard to see) and monochrometer hooked up to a PMT (photomultiplyer tube; the blue box). James' fume hood in the back is very easy to see, as well as part of his chemistry table in the bottom left-hand corner.The furnace, which isn't visible in the picture to the right

but is visible to the left, is used to heat all of our samples. It can safely go up to about 1,200 degrees Celsius, but we usually keep it below 900 so we don't completely melt our samples.

Basically the point of this summer.... rather, the point of this whole project is to use PLZT, a known ferroelectric, and dope it with nanoparticles to observe a stimulated photocurrent

using a visible spectrum. To anyone who understands that.... Bravo. To the majority of those who don't, myself partially included, don't be afraid. This explanation won't hurt a bit.

A ferroelectric material is something that has an inherent molecular dipole. This means that the crystal structure is not completely symmetric. Because of this dissymmetry, if a large amount of these crystal structures are aligned the same way the material as a whole obtains different attributes. The most important is an electric field that is created in the material. This electric field is a direct consequence of the dipoles aligning in the material. When the majority of the dipoles are aligned in the same orientation, the material is said to be poled. So with the material poled and this internal electric field in it, one is able to stimulate a weak

photocurrent from it. The way this happens is as such. When a particle (yes, I said a particle) of light hits the material,

an electron gains energy. If this energy is enough to bump it into a different energy state (technically it's bridging the band gap between the conduction and valence bands, but this is an easier, albeit flawed, way of looking it), the electron creates a hole in the previous energy state. Due to the electric field in the material, the electron has a good chance of being pulled away from the nucleus it is "attached" to, with the hole it created before going in the opposite direction. When a lot of light hits the material, this effect is brought on to a measurable scale with many electrons going one way, while the absences of electrons are going the opposite way, thus creating a current. This is called a photocurrent.

Nanoparticles... well, to be honest, I don't completely understand. What I do know is that they are groups of molecules that are bunched together and then doped into things. Alone in a solution of hexane or whathaveyou, they are able to make wonderful luminescing liquids. Our goal is to dope, or put a very small percentage into the material, PLZT with various nanoparticles, from Prof. Plass' chemistry lab upstairs, and hopefully find that the conductance in the films have increased.

PLZT, or Lead (Pb) Lanthanum (La) Zirconium (Zr) Titanium (Ti) oxide, is a well known ferroelectric. James made a fresh batch this summer so we know who to blame if we can't get anything to work. In the PLZT, James refluxed in some copper sulfide nanoparticles for the first trails, and then cadmium selenide for the later trials. We hope that the nanoparticles will

increase the electron-hole pairs created by the photoelectric effect (the long explanation about photocurrents is basically called the photoelectric effect.... kinda).

To test if the nanoparticles are in there we set up the laser table for spectroscopy measurements. The final table we built is pictured to the right. We set a laser up to hit the sample after traveling 15 meters due to the mirrors, and we measure the spectrum that the sample gives off after being excited by the laser. James also can look for the particles in the data given by an XRD, or an x-ray diffraction. This will let us see what the sample is made up of. If we see a signature that looks like cadmium selenide or copper sulfide then we know they're in the film.

Another series of tests we do on the samples are electrical tests. We deposit the PLZT onto a special type of substrate, ITO coated glass. The ITO, indium tin oxide, film is a wonderful conductor and allows us to make capacitors out of our films. Well, that's what we wanted. These films are actually somewhat conductive and thus don't make good capacitors. None the less we can run our hysteresis loop tests (not even going to try to explain that in depth here) which basically shows how poled the sample is, and our IV curve tests. The IV curve simply plots voltage vs. current. This means that as you put a voltage across the sample you can plot how the current will rise or fall. Because the film acts like a basic linear resistor, we can use the relationship V= IR. Thus, the IV curve can tell us what the resistance is of the film.

That basically sums up what we've been doing in the lab for the last ten weeks. It's been fun yet frustrating at the same time. It has been a wonderful experience and I hope to continue next summer again. Up ahead are a few more pictures I took of the lab. Thanks for listening.

This is the three stage student-made vacuum pump system for the cryostat.

Evidence that we did a bit of math over the summer!

The ever-present dartboard. I got a bulls-eye!

James eating cheez-its.

Lasers are cool!

The Dream is Real

Inception.

Need I give more of an introduction? If you have not seen this movie yet, you should. I would advise against seeing it, though, if you hate good thrillers, mind puzzles, incredible acting, original plots, brilliant dialog and/or leaving the movie theater feeling completely immersed in the world the director and writer made for you.

Honestly Inception is one of the best, if not the best, movies I've ever had the pleasure of watching. The world they create is so... immense. Each level they go into in the dream is a completely new world full of different imaginative twists and turns. Each level is so wonderfully flushed out and retains incredible depth. Never before has a movie made me so nervous throughout the entire film. Nervous not because I was scared but rather I was so jacked up on adrenaline that I could not physically keep myself calm. As soon as I stepped out of the movie theater I couldn't stop smiling. I also did not feel connected with reality for quite some time after. It probably sank in that I was out of the movie while I was eating dinner with Jennifer in between shows (we also saw The Sorcerer's Apprentice, but that's my last post. If you didn't read it all, conclusion: great fantasy movie offering something for all ages).

The movie revolves around Leo DiCaprio's character, Dom Cobb, and his unconventional profession; dream extraction. In short, he became an reconnaissance agent that goes into people's dreams and steals ideas, secrets or other personal information from his victims. His unorthodox career has stripped him of everything he loves in his life. His home, his wife, his children. But suddenly an employer offers to set everything in his life back to normal for one last job. Inception. It's never been done (supposedly). Instead of extracting an idea from a victim's mind, the employer wants Cobb to plant an idea. He needs to assemble the best team in the business to do the impossible. But there is a complication even more dangerous than the task itself. Something is hiding in Cobb's subconscious that could sabotage the entire mission. Something that has been hidden for a while. Something he must confront to get out of this alive.

Wow... just rereading this makes me think I should get a job writing the synopsis paragraphs on the back of DVD cases. Maybe I just have a huge ego. Whatevs....

The cast is absolutely superb. This movie oozes with terrific acting and amazing subtleties that will make the movie new each time you watch it. The plot is nothing short of elaborate. This means that my dad will probably turn it off half way through because he has no idea what is going on. But that's just him. I honestly think that if you can follow the Star Wars movies, you'll be able to keep along with this one. While elaborate, the plot is perfectly twisted. Nothing is out of place in this movie. Every rule Christopher Nolan (writer, director and one of the producers) creates for his movie is followed to a tee. The cinematography is also fantastic, creating intense shots of action, touching shots of emotion between Cobb and his wife, Mal, and, quite frankly, dreamlike shots of Joseph Gordon-Levitt floating weightlessly in hotel elevator shafts and such.

It's logical, brilliant, and every so tasty. I tried to think of adjectives to describe this movie, after seeing it. My instant thought was that it was juicy. I wanted to say that the movie was like candy, something you could just eat up. The thing is, candy has the connotation that it is simply surface, one-level satisfaction. And Inception is anything but that. Thinking for a while, I realized that this movie was like a thick juicy steak. Everyone can enjoy it but connoisseurs will savor the taste a little more. And just like a steak has many dimensions of flavor, taste, and succulence, so does this movie. Thus the movie is a wonderfully prepared juicy steak for audiences.

This is just a little interview with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ellen Page. No particular purpose other than I love these two in the movie and I think they're pretty great behind the scenes as well.

That's about it for now. I said it once, I'll say it again. This movie is amazing. Literally one of the best movies I have ever seen. Please go see it.