The gentleman’s choice for a Venusian hunt

If lashings of brass, copper and wood are your thing, chances are you would appreciate the steampunk genre.

There are two art periods that, despite thir utter contrast, fascinate me the most: Art Deco and Art Nouveau. Steampunk is simply Art Nouveau with sci-fi tacked on the end.

The Gargleblaster is a typical exemplar, with antiqueing to lend it some authenticity. Originally created for a WETA competition (didn’t quite make it due to the time zones yada) I really wanted to achieve a complex pipes-and-wires-everywhere thing.

It really is a work half completed, so given some spare time I will attempt to give this model its due.

The full glory of this fabulous weapon. Brass, copper and wood with cogs and complicated bits.

Observe the hair-pin trigger, the complicated-looking knob the most certainly makes this piece of kit do something impressive, the beautifully printed “Gargleblaster” logo and so much more.

The gunsight was especially developed for the Gargleblaster and has unique features. I think.

“Pull the cavitation lever, adjust the Trebinthium injection manifold pressure, and enjoy some Earl Grey until the green lamp has been illuminated,” advises the manual.

For those of a more curious nature, observe the Trebinthium injection manifold that is perched above the main quantization chamber.

Finally, the Trebinthium pressure chamber itself. Oh, what fabulous glory!

Split screen in KDE

I cried, wept, screamed, railed against a cruel fate and then decided to wander the interwebs for an easy way to pull this off.

You see, I had to create a split-screen animation, and there was no apparent simple solution. Using of the crop and pan and zoom effects caused more problems than they solved.

In the end, I used rotoscope, which I should have thought of originally. Except I had no idea that it existed, and even if I did, how was I supposed to know what it did?