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↑Chris Hadfield, currently on board of the ↑ISS (in mid-March he will take over command of the space station), having a chat with ↑William Shatner (on 07 February 2013). … Continue reading
Monthly Archives: February 2013
zeph’s pop culture quiz #58 It will be a matter of seconds to identify the movie from which the above screencap stems. But, believe it or not, the building at the left was inspired by a real-life one. Where is the original building located? Simply leave a comment with your educated guess—you can ask for additional hints, too. [Leaving a comment is easy; just click the ‘Leave a comment’ at the end of the post and fill in the form. If it’s the first time you post a comment, it will be held for moderation. But I am … Continue reading
This is the fictional castle or fortress atop the ↑Reichenbach Falls where the showdown between ↑Holmes and ↑Moriarty takes place in ‘↑A Game of Shadows‘ (Ritchie 2011). It was ↑created by the VFX company Framestore. Their first inspiration was the ↑Festung Hohenwerfen in Austria: But as Hohenwerfen looked a bit too military, the designers threw in elements inspired by ↑Schloss Neuschwanstein in Bavaria: And then of course, the basic idea, to my eye, comes from ↑Frank Lloyd Wright‘s ↑Fallingwater: RITCHIE, GUY STEWART. 2011. Sherlock Holmes: A game of shadows [motion picture]. Burbank: Warner Bros. … Continue reading
No, not my humble blog here, rather the fictional element from which my humble blog here derives its name. It always bothered me, that Xirdalium—most likely an invention by Jules Verne’s son Michel—didn’t shine up in Wikipedia’s ↑list of fictional elements, materials, isotopes and atomic particles. Today I thought ‘enough is enough,’ or ‘there’s only so much a man can take,’ and created the following entry in said list: Xirdalium. An element ‘a hundred times more radio-active than radium.’ (Verne 1909 [1908]: 125) Most probably it was invented by ↑Jules Verne‘s son ↑Michel, who introduced it to the novel ‘↑The … Continue reading
Kip W ↑unearthed the above wonderful, stunningly up-to-date ↑Punch cartoon (Williams 1955: 164) by artist ↑Lewis Baumer (1870-1963), which first was published in 1906! It’s great historical evidence for how early in the development of a given technology people not only speculate about the future trajectory of said development, but also think about possible social consequences of it. WILLIAMS, RONALD EARNEST. 1955. A century of Punch cartoons. New York: Simon and Schuster. via ↑entry at ↑boingboing … Continue reading