A Little Steam With My Comics This Weekend
I am traveling this month to such exotic locales as Michigan and Washington DC, and while I was reading the Washington Post this weekend I ran into two comics that I wanted to post. This first one gave me a nice little chuckle and is from the strip WuMo.
Before Electric Eels
The second had a little Steampunk thrown in. Check out the decked out doggie in the third panel of this Prickly City strip by Scott Stantis.
Prickly City
Van Helsing (2004) Mixes Monsters for Movie Magic
Stephen Sommers, who brought us the special effects-laden reboot of The Mummy in 1999, also lent his imagination (as well as his pen) to create Van Helsing in 2004. Even though both films are almost a decade or more old they are some of my absolute favorites for their combination of action, visual effects and fun.
Gabriel Van Helsing (played by Hugh Jackman) is a monster hunter with a mysterious past. He is employed by the Catholic church to seek out and destroy evil, but remembers nothing before he was charged with his holy quest. As far as I can tell, the only thing this Van Helsing has in common with the Dutch doctor and do-gooder Abraham Van Helsing of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula is the name.
The film starts with an homage to classic black and white movies as an angry mob attacks castle Frankenstein in 1887. Sommers’ twist is that the good doctor’s financial backer is none other than Count Dracula. Van Helsing enters the movie with an epic confrontation between him and a truly monstrous Mr. Hyde (of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde) on the rooftop of Notre Dame. Later, Van Helsing is charged with slaying Dracula in time to protect the souls of the Valerius family, who vowed they would never rest until the vampire met his demise. With the help of his techno-whiz sidekick, a friar named Carl, Van Helsing travels to Transylvania and to aid the last members of the tragic tribe before nine generations are shut out of heaven.
Sommers’ creates a plot that incorporates Dracula and Frankenstein’s monster, as well as the Wolfman. He also gives a much larger role to Dracula’s three ‘brides’ (which by the way, are not identified as such in the novel) and they provide some wonderful action sequences as they terrorize the nearby village as flying monsters in order to hunt down Anna Valerius (played by Kate Beckinsale). Though the roots of this movie clearly come from a love of classic horror films, the time, literary characters and gadgets (like a gas-powered repeating crossbow) land it squarely in the Steampunk canon.
There is an animated prequel called Van Helsing: The London Assignment which you can read more about and watch here.
I also recently found out that there is another Van Helsing movie planned, but it is going to be a “reboot” starring Tom Cruise. Check out that story here.
Click on the thumbnails for larger images.
Steampunk Scrapbook Paper by Graphic 45
I found these Steapunk Spells papers by Graphic 45 listed under Halloween while I was surfing the web. I like that the pallete has the warm gold and orange colors because I find many of the steamy papers and embellishments to be very dark or sepia toned and its always nice to add a spot of color.
Alphabet stickers to match Steampunk Spells
Cardstock to match Steampunk Spells
Are you looking for some projects you could try with scrap paper? Check out my Steampunk cage ornament tutorial and Steampunk-inspired Assemblage clocks I have done.
Beyond Bustles: Daisy Viktoria Designs
Daisy Viktoria thought she was going to be a scientist, but her passion for fashion pulled her away from chemical engineering and into the world of fantasy. Her whimsical designs flirt with fairy tales, Victorian England and the wild west, and she was kind enough to send me photos from her most recent Steampunk-inspired shoot. (Click on the thumbnails for larger images)
I love the gold and black motif in this set of designs, especially the black on black striped shorts. But if bustles and corsets are a little too steamy for your everyday wear, Daisy has many subtly Steampunk designs as well. If Santa leaves some money in my stocking I am definitely going to ‘stock up’ on some of her ready to wear items. (Click on the thumbnails for larger images). You can check out more of her designs and her online store here.
Emperor Norton: America’s one and only monarch…
I had planned to do a piece on Norton I, the Emperor of the United States, myself, but I found this one while doing my research and I really liked it. I used to live in the San Francisco Bay Area so I had heard of Norton before and I think of him as basically a steampunk in his own time. He certainly “punked” the status quo in the 1860s-1870s.
These are hard times. Many bad things are happening The jackboot of oppression is being stamped upon Ukraine’s citizens. Innocents are being murdered. Prices are rising. Belts are tightening. A dark cloud awaits in the distance – an economic reckoning that will be unleashed, most likely in the depths of our next winter. The miasma of Covid still lurks, picking people off; maybe not killing them, but making them ill. And on top of that, there’s the small matter of our dying planet and the Doomsday clock of climate change ticking towards the final minute to midnight. Things are grim, so we hunker down; our hearts heavy, our spirits full of the gloom of bad tidings.
We forget the positives – the bravery, the sacrifice… the love… that still exists in the shade of all that sadness and worry. There are glimmers of light, though, in the enfolding dark…
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Cog Couture: The Jewelry Designs of Angela Venable
The first place I ran across Angela Venable’s work was on YouTube. She has posted a video tutorial about how she creates her Steampunk statement necklaces. I recognized many of the findings and paper from my own sojourns to Michael’s and I think we share a similar aesthetic. I’ll start posting some of my own art soon (the pesky camera is acting up on me) but until then I hope you enjoy this sampling of Angela’s jewelry and paper arts.
You can see more of Angela’s jewelry designs as well as the tutorial I mentioned here.
For Whom the Gear Turns 