#Liquid storage engineering

[techninja]

Hydrogen Rockets: The Key to Sustainable Space Exploration

Introduction to Hydrogen Rocket Engine

In the realm of space exploration, the quest for efficient propulsion systems has led to the development and utilization of hydrogen rocket engines. These engines harness the power of hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, to propel spacecraft into the cosmos with remarkable efficiency and power.

History of Hydrogen Rocket Engine Development

The concept of using hydrogen as a propellant dates back to the early days of rocketry. However, it wasn't until the mid-20th century that significant advancements were made in the development of hydrogen rocket engines. Pioneering work by scientists and engineers paved the way for the modern hydrogen propulsion systems we see today.

How Hydrogen Rocket Engines Work

Fuel Combustion Process

Hydrogen rocket engines operate on the principle of combustion. Liquid hydrogen is combined with liquid oxygen in a combustion chamber, where it undergoes a controlled explosion. This rapid combustion generates intense heat and pressure, producing a powerful stream of hot gases.

Thrust Generation

The expulsion of these hot gases through a nozzle at the rear of the rocket creates thrust according to Newton's third law of motion. This thrust propels the rocket forward, overcoming the forces of gravity and atmospheric resistance.

Advantages of Hydrogen Rocket Engines

Hydrogen rocket engines offer several key advantages over conventional propulsion systems:

High Efficiency: Hydrogen boasts one of the highest specific impulse values among rocket propellants, making it extremely efficient in terms of thrust per unit of propellant mass.

Clean Combustion: The combustion of hydrogen with oxygen produces water vapor as a byproduct, resulting in cleaner emissions compared to traditional rocket fuels.

Abundant Resource: Hydrogen is abundant in the universe, making it a sustainable and readily available resource for space exploration endeavors.

Challenges and Limitations

Despite its many advantages, hydrogen rocket technology also faces significant challenges and limitations.

Cryogenic Storage

One of the primary challenges associated with hydrogen rocket engines is the need for cryogenic storage. Liquid hydrogen must be kept at extremely low temperatures to remain in a liquid state, requiring specialized storage and handling systems.

Cost and Infrastructure

The infrastructure required to produce, store, and transport liquid hydrogen adds to the overall cost of hydrogen rocket technology. Additionally, the development of hydrogen propulsion systems necessitates substantial investments in research and development.

Applications of Hydrogen Rocket Engines

Hydrogen rocket engines find a wide range of applications in space exploration and satellite deployment missions.

Space Exploration

Hydrogen-powered rockets enable spacecraft to travel vast distances across the solar system, facilitating missions to explore distant planets, moons, and celestial bodies.

Satellite Deployment

The high efficiency and reliability of hydrogen rocket engines make them ideal for launching satellites into orbit around the Earth and beyond.

Comparison with Traditional Rocket Engines

Compared to traditional rocket engines fueled by kerosene or solid propellants, hydrogen rocket engines offer superior performance and environmental benefits. They deliver higher specific impulse and produce cleaner emissions, contributing to a more sustainable approach to space exploration.

Environmental Impact and Sustainability

The environmental impact of hydrogen rocket engines is relatively minimal compared to conventional propulsion systems. The use of hydrogen as a fuel results in cleaner combustion and reduced greenhouse gas emissions, aligning with efforts to mitigate the environmental footprint of space exploration activities.

Future Prospects and Developments

As technology advances and our understanding of hydrogen propulsion deepens, the future holds great promise for hydrogen rocket engines. Ongoing research and development efforts aim to enhance efficiency, reduce costs, and overcome existing limitations, paving the way for new frontiers in space exploration.

Conclusion

Hydrogen rocket engines represent a cornerstone of modern space exploration, offering unparalleled efficiency, reliability, and environmental sustainability. While challenges remain, ongoing advancements in technology and infrastructure continue to expand the horizons of human spaceflight and scientific discovery.

FAQs

Are hydrogen rocket engines more powerful than traditional rocket engines? Hydrogen rocket engines typically offer higher specific impulse values, making them more efficient in terms of thrust per unit of propellant mass.

What are the main challenges associated with hydrogen rocket technology? Cryogenic storage and infrastructure costs are among the primary challenges facing hydrogen rocket technology.

What are the environmental benefits of hydrogen rocket engines? Hydrogen combustion produces cleaner emissions compared to traditional rocket fuels, contributing to reduced environmental impact.

What are the primary applications of hydrogen rocket engines? Hydrogen rocket engines are used in space exploration missions and satellite deployment operations.

What does the future hold for hydrogen rocket technology? Ongoing research and development efforts aim to improve efficiency, reduce costs, and expand the capabilities of hydrogen rocket engines.

[reasonsforhope]

"When a severe water shortage hit the Indian city of Kozhikode in the state of Kerala, a group of engineers turned to science fiction to keep the taps running.

Like everyone else in the city, engineering student Swapnil Shrivastav received a ration of two buckets of water a day collected from India’s arsenal of small water towers.

It was a ‘watershed’ moment for Shrivastav, who according to the BBC had won a student competition four years earlier on the subject of tackling water scarcity, and armed with a hypothetical template from the original Star Wars films, Shrivastav and two partners set to work harvesting water from the humid air.

“One element of inspiration was from Star Wars where there’s an air-to-water device. I thought why don’t we give it a try? It was more of a curiosity project,” he told the BBC.

According to ‘Wookiepedia’ a ‘moisture vaporator’ is a device used on moisture farms to capture water from a dry planet’s atmosphere, like Tatooine, where protagonist Luke Skywalker grew up.

This fictional device functions according to Star Wars lore by coaxing moisture from the air by means of refrigerated condensers, which generate low-energy ionization fields. Captured water is then pumped or gravity-directed into a storage cistern that adjusts its pH levels. Vaporators are capable of collecting 1.5 liters of water per day.

Pictured: Moisture vaporators on the largely abandoned Star Wars film set of Mos Espa, in Tunisia

If science fiction authors could come up with the particulars of such a device, Shrivastav must have felt his had a good chance of succeeding. He and colleagues Govinda Balaji and Venkatesh Raja founded Uravu Labs, a Bangalore-based startup in 2019.

Their initial offering is a machine that converts air to water using a liquid desiccant. Absorbing moisture from the air, sunlight or renewable energy heats the desiccant to around 100°F which releases the captured moisture into a chamber where it’s condensed into drinking water.

The whole process takes 12 hours but can produce a staggering 2,000 liters, or about 500 gallons of drinking-quality water per day. [Note: that IS staggering! That's huge!!] Uravu has since had to adjust course due to the cost of manufacturing and running the machines—it’s just too high for civic use with current materials technology.

“We had to shift to commercial consumption applications as they were ready to pay us and it’s a sustainability driver for them,” Shrivastav explained. This pivot has so far been enough to keep the start-up afloat, and they produce water for 40 different hospitality clients.

Looking ahead, Shrivastav, Raja, and Balaji are planning to investigate whether the desiccant can be made more efficient; can it work at a lower temperature to reduce running costs, or is there another material altogether that might prove more cost-effective?

They’re also looking at running their device attached to data centers in a pilot project that would see them utilize the waste heat coming off the centers to heat the desiccant."

-via Good News Network, May 30, 2024

[nasa]

ALT: This video shows blades of grass moving in the wind on a beautiful day at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. In the background, we see the 212-foot-core stage for the powerful SLS (Space Launch System) rocket used for Artemis I. The camera ascends, revealing the core stage next to a shimmering body of water as technicians lead it towards NASA’s Pegasus barge. Credit: NASA

The SLS (Space Launch System) Core Stage by Numbers

Technicians with NASA and SLS core stage lead contractor Boeing, along with RS-25 engines lead contractor Aerojet Rocketdyne, an L3Harris Technologies company, are nearing a major milestone for the Artemis II mission. The SLS (Space Launch System) rocket’s core stage for Artemis II is fully assembled and will soon be shipped via barge from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans to the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Once there, it will be prepped for stacking and launch activities.

Get to know the core stage – by the numbers.

Standing 212 feet tall and measuring 27.6 feet in diameter, the SLS core stage is the largest rocket stage NASA has ever built. Due to its size, the hardware must be shipped aboard NASA’s Pegasus barge.

900 miles

Once loaded, the barge – which was updated to accommodate the giant core stage -- will travel 900 miles to Florida across inland and ocean waterways. Once at Kennedy, teams with our Exploration Ground Systems team will complete checkouts for the core stage prior to stacking preparations.

18 Miles + 500 Sensors

As impressive as the core stage is on the outside, it’s also incredible on the inside. The “brains” of the rocket consist of three flight computers and special avionics systems that tell the rocket what to do. This is linked to 18 miles of cabling and more than 500 sensors and systems to help feed fuel and steer the four RS-25 engines.

8.8 million

Speaking of engines… Our SLS Moon rocket generates approximately 8.8 million pounds of thrust at launch. Two million pounds come from the four powerful RS-25 engines at the base of the core stage, while each of the two solid rocket boosters produces a maximum thrust of 3.6 million pounds. Together, the engines and boosters will help launch a crew of four Artemis astronauts inside NASA’s Orion spacecraft beyond Earth orbit to venture around the Moon.

733,000 Gallons

Achieving the powerful thrust required at launch calls for a large amount of fuel - 733,000 gallons, to be precise. The stage has two huge propellant tanks that hold the super-cooled liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen that make the rocket “go.” A new liquid hydrogen storage sphere has recently been built at Kennedy, which can store 1.25 million gallons of liquid hydrogen.

Four

The number four doesn’t just apply to the RS-25 engines. It’s also the number of astronauts who will fly inside our Orion spacecraft atop our SLS rocket for the first crewed Artemis mission. When NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Christina Koch, and Victor Glover along with CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen launch, they will be the first astronauts returning to the Moon in more than 50 years.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[carsthatnevermadeitetc]

Suzuki Alto Heart Stand, 2004. A small commercial van concept based on the HA24 6th generation Alto, adapted to work as an outdoor plant stall. Presented at the the 38th Tokyo Motor Show, the rear side panel was also equipped with a liquid crystal display for advertisements and information. It was powered by a 660cc DHC 12 valve 3 cylinder engine driving the front wheels. There was only one seat, for the driver, as the offside area was used for storage and to display more plants

[amourquinn]

( drabble ) evening glow

pairing : boyfriend!quinn x fem!reader wc. 900+

genre : fluff no warnings!

summary : you and quinn want to spend some quality time on the boat ( jack and luke are mentioned )

「 author’s note 」 yes i know.. a summer fic in the middle of winter 🙇🏻‍♀️ sue me

the early evening sun bathed the lake house in a soft orange glow, the kind of light that made everything look golden and magical. you stretched your legs out on the porch, letting the gentle breeze from the lake tousle your hair. it was the perfect weekend getaway—quinn had invited you to spend time at his lake house with his brothers, jack and luke.

you had spent the day kayaking, swimming, and laughing at jack’s bad jokes. the hughes brothers were a lively bunch, their energy contagious, but as the sun dipped lower, you were ready for a quieter moment. it seemed quinn felt the same.

“hey,” he said softly, leaning against the porch railing beside you. his hazel eyes, always so calm and steady, held a hint of something playful. “wanna go for a boat ride? just the two of us?”

you glanced over your shoulder at the commotion inside—luke and jack were arguing over the best way to grill burgers, their voices carrying through the open windows. a boat ride sounded like the perfect escape.

“i’d love to,” you said, standing up and brushing off your shorts.

quinn led the way down to the dock. the motorboat bobbed gently against the wooden planks, the water shimmering like liquid glass. he helped you into the boat before untying it and hopping in himself.

the hum of the engine broke the peaceful silence as quinn guided the boat out onto the open water. the air was cool, carrying the faint scent of pine and fresh water. you leaned back against the seat, letting the calm of the lake settle over you.

as the shoreline grew distant, quinn slowed the boat to a gentle drift. the lake stretched out around you, endless and serene. he turned off the engine, and for a moment, the only sounds were the soft lapping of water against the hull and the occasional call of a loon in the distance.

“this is perfect,” you murmured, looking out at the horizon where the sun was just beginning to sink below the tree line.

quinn nodded, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “thought you’d like it.”

he moved to sit beside you, his arm brushing yours. you turned to look at him, heart skipping a beat at how the fading sunlight caught the angles of his face, making his freckles stand out.

“i like spending time with your brothers,” you said, breaking the silence. “but I think I like this even more.”

his gaze softened. “me too. it’s nice to get away from the chaos for a bit.”

there was a quiet vulnerability in his voice, one that made you reach out and take his hand. he laced his fingers through yours, his touch warm and steady. for a while, neither of you spoke, content to simply be in the moment.

then quinn stood, his balance impeccable as the boat swayed gently beneath him. “wait here,” he said, disappearing into the small storage compartment at the front of the boat.

when he returned, he held a blanket and a small cooler. “i figured we’d be out here for a while,” he said with a shy grin.

you helped him spread the blanket out on the deck, and he pulled out a couple of bottles of sparkling water and a container of strawberries.

“you really thought this through,” you teased, popping a strawberry into your mouth.

he shrugged, a faint blush coloring his cheeks. “i just wanted to make it special.”

and it was. the two of you sat on the blanket, talking and laughing as the sky turned from orange to pink to deep purple. the stars began to appear, their reflections dancing on the water.

at some point, quinn lay back, pulling you down beside him. you rested your head on his chest, listening to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. his arm wrapped around you, holding you close.

“this is my favorite place,” he said softly, his voice almost a whisper. “the lake, the quiet… it feels like home. and having you here makes it even better.”

your heart swelled at his words. you tilted your head to look up at him, your faces inches apart. “quinn…”

he leaned down, his lips brushing yours in a kiss that was gentle and full of emotion. the world seemed to fade away, leaving only the two of you under the blanket of stars.

when you finally pulled back, you rested your forehead against his, your breaths mingling. “i could stay out here forever,” you said, your voice barely audible.

“me too,” he replied, his fingers tracing lazy patterns on your back.

the evening passed in a haze of quiet conversation and stolen kisses, the kind of night that felt like a dream. when the air grew cooler, quinn reluctantly started the boat to head back to the dock.

as the lake house came into view, the glow of the porch lights guiding you home, you could hear jack and luke’s laughter carrying through the night. quinn helped you out of the boat, his hand lingering in yours as you walked up the dock together.

“think they noticed we were gone?” you asked, glancing toward the house.

quinn smirked. “probably, but they’ll get over it.”

inside, the chaos resumed—jack immediately started teasing quinn about being “whipped,” while luke pretended to gag. but you didn’t mind. you knew the quiet moments were yours and quinn’s alone, a secret you’d carry with you long after the weekend ended.

as you settled in for the night, the memory of the boat ride lingered, a reminder of the magic that could be found in the simplest of things: a lake, a sunset, and the person you loved.

© amourquinn

[macmay]

OMAKHEATERS - PLATİN

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[c0eu4]

OP81 | Hard work ☁︎

Summary: After the biggest exam of her entire life, y/n found Oscar in front of her university, waiting for her.

Warning: fluff, anxious reader?

A/N: Just had some inspiration for that after one exam I had and totally fucked up it lol

MASTERLIST requests are open

Her hand hurts, she can't write anymore. Her copies filled with blue pen in front of her, she read it again one last time until the time limit rings.

A weight immediately lifts from her shoulders. She knows she succeeded. She didn't spend nights and days behind her computer, scribbling things on her notepad and repeating her lessons to Oscar for nothing.

She untied her hair down, puts her pens in her pencil case and puts it in her bag. She puts her coat on her back and grabs her copies. She puts her bag on her back, places her copies in the storage area and heads towards the exit of the building.

She closes her coat as she walks, putting on her mittens and shoving her hands in her pockets.

The cold of winter is felt. She pulls up her coat to hide her chin and leaves the building. Her cheeks and nose quickly turn red from the cold as she walks towards the gate.

Once on the other side of it, she walks towards the street which leads to the metro, to return home.

Her friends suggested that they spend time together in their usual little café but she preferred to refuse, knowing that she would be too tired after her exam.

She continues walking a few meters before seeing her boyfriend, leaning against his car, a coffee in his hand and looking at her, a big smile on his face.

She smiles when she sees him and walks more quickly towards him. She takes refuge directly in his arms, on the verge of crying. After all the stress she has accumulated, all the work she has done, she has every right to take a break. He hugged her tightly, warping his warm arms around her waist.

''I'm so proud of you my love.'' She can't help but blush a little more when she hears his compliment, his australian accent still makes her fall in love even more.

She separates from him, taking the coffee that he offers her.

''Don't burn yourself.'' She nodded quickly and took a sip of the warm liquids.

''Thank you baby.'' He kissed her forehead and opened the passenger door for her.

She sits there and Oscar sits next to her, behind the wheel. He starts the engine and drives them to their shared flat.

Throughout the trip, she talks to him about his exam. Passing by the two hundred and thirty three bananas that a man bought in a problem to triangular figures mixing the theorem of Pythagoras and Thales.

He listens to her, without interrupting her, taking advantage of her voice that he hasn't heard all day.

Once home, she continues talking about her exam. She speaks faster and faster and spreads the subject even more. And Oscar feels that it makes her stressed to talk about it.

So he cuts her off, ''Y/n, don't you want to stop talking about that ? You always speak fast when you're stressed.''

She sighed. Not in a disappointing way, but more because she knows that he's right.

''Yeah sorry if I bother you with that.'' She simply says, taking off her shoes and coat.

''You never bother me love. I just said that for you to relax.'' He takes a hanger to hang his and her coat.

They both walk towards the kitchen, she is already taking the milk out of the fridge and him rummaging on the shelf to get two cups.

It's a little ritual that they both have. Every time, when one or the other is stressed, they prepare hot chocolates. Because it's not a secret that Oscar loves chocolate and it's not a secret that y/n loves the feelings of hot liquids.

He puts the cups full of milk in the microwave and takes out the cocoa. She rummages through a shelf and pulls out some little chocolate marshmallow teddy bears.

Once the milk is hot, Oscar adds the cocoa to the two cups and a few teddy bears to his cup.

''I will never be able to understand how you drink your chocolate with teddy bears.'' She always hated putting teddy bears in her chocolate. Not that she doesn't like marshmallows, but she hates anything that's hard and gets mushy (Without a second thought).

''You don't know what you're missing.'' She puts a few bears in her mouth and eats them.

''Na you, you don't know what you're doing.'' He giggles and steals a few bears from her hands to eat it.

''Hey! I'm going to tell Mark what you're doing !''

He kisses her cheeks, putting one of his hands in her lower back, heading her towards the couch. They sit in, they cups of hot chocolate in hand, a warm blanket on them.

She is looking for a new series to watch on Netflix, Oscar eating his teddy bear with his spoon.

When she finally finds something good to watch, she takes a sip of her chocolate and gets a little closer to Oscar.

They end the day like that, in front of their series, cuddling each other.

[seat-safety-switch]

So-called motorcylists love to shove their beloved bikes away whenever there's a little bit of snow on the road. That's because motorcyclists are famously concerned with their public perception. They don't want to drive around town with wood screws run through their tires, shrieking profanities at stopped traffic before ripping a perfect 12 'o' clocker and driving across the iced-over multi-use-pathway, comfortable in their knowledge that the police will not and can not follow. Or it's because they don't have heated grips, and their handsies get cold.

Heated steering wheels are the single greatest innovation in cars in the last two hundred years. Unfortunately for me, they hadn't been installed into cars of the age I own. In the late 1970s, the newest innovation in steering wheel comfort was "maybe make them a little smaller, for the ladies." Seems like I was cursed to a lifetime of wondering if my thermostat was seized, freezing to death even through many layers of mittens and work gloves while waiting for the tow truck to arrive and clean up the commuters in front of me.

Of course, Plymouth also didn't equip this car with a lot of other modern features. For instance, liquid-cooled active speed laser and radar jamming was not available. Active pursuit drones pre-programmed with a seek-and-destroy order for all speed cameras were not yet on the market, unless you worked for the CIA. And also the good people of China had not figured out how to make $35 45-millimetre ball-bearing turbochargers capable of adding nearly four hundred horsepower to any engine strong enough to keep its guts on the inside when presented with one medium-sized jet engine's worth of boost. I had to add all those things myself.

Easy, right? Run some wires to a heating element on the steering wheel. There's just one complication: steering wheels turn. If I keep spinning the car left and right, eventually the wire will get tangled up and rip itself out, causing an electrical fire. Admittedly, that will also keep my hands warm, but the walk home after is inconvenient.

The original "engineers" who took a whisky-soaked gander at this car before slapping their secretaries on the ass had a solution, though. In every steering wheel, the horn button has the same problem. Unfortunately for me, the horn hasn't worked in this car since 1983, which complicated my attempts to reuse the wiring.

Ultimately, I came up with what a rocket scientist would call "a compromise." A pair of bolt cutters and a map to the local truck-supply warehouse's storage yard soon provided me with a nifty diesel-fired interior heater, a roaring flame that consumes all and produces enough heat to make toast from three feet away. Ratchet-strapped to the place where the passenger seat used to be, it will keep my fingers warm, as well as my feet and every other part of my body. Sure, it's inconvenient having to continually refill it with stolen farm diesel, and I could have run the exhaust pipe out of the cabin a better way than through the rust hole in the floor. Once you get that heated seat feeling, though, you simply can't go back. If you'll excuse me, I need to get going: if I don't get to work in the next five minutes, my boots will melt again.

[spirit-lanterns]

I'm kind of also thinking that Android!Natasha has built-in spray that is usually meant to soothe nerves and help people fall asleep. She also probably has like, medicines, bandages and stuff, because I half-think that she might've been on the battlefield at some point (her codename being Wildfire). She definitely wasn't in the midst of fighting, like Kafka, or Topaz, but has a bit of experience due to being essentially a battlefield-nurse, along with a typical Healthcare bot. Maybe she had an owner transfer? Or maybe her previous owner was a veteran that had to go back to fighting, and brought along Natasha.

Anyway, now that her uses are mostly for Engineer, I kind've feel like Natasha would also secretly have gotten some kind of aphrodisiac spray!

(I almost feel it would be a little funny for Natasha to have "accidentally" used the aphrodisiac spray before bed when she said she was going to use lavender roomspray to help you de-stress ehee!)

BTW! We now have large-chest-lore! She stores all of the dry-medicine (bandages, band-aids, cotton balls and swabs, uhm... other, not-liquid and non-pills) in her chest for emergencies.

Ps: her scent-spray vents are under the collarbone, and on her lower back. There's two in case one expires, go dry, or if she wants to just spritz a room in passing.

"Hey! Wait a second! That doesn't work with the in-game model! If she were to spray, it wouldn't leave the inside of her clothes!"

You might be saying after you read this whole ask.

And to that I say, "uh... hmm... oh! She has a slit in her clothing for this very purpose!"

Her clothing is a little more low-cut for her top, but not by much. It's just past the collarbone, post-scent-vent

And since I think that the little dress-thingie is cute with the adorable little tassel-frills I'm just putting a slit in the back like I said previously

Huh, these ideas are a bit weird...

Anyway!

—🪽

🪽 anon just casually dissecting each Android’s model and purpose and giving them cool functions that I myself could never think of :0

I love all these ideas so much! So many interesting functions and capabilities for Android! Natasha, I like that you gave her a reason for her big chest to be used as storage for medical supplies lol. Also, I think it’d be unique if the palms of Natasha’s hands could be used as defibrillators like Baymax does, so she is useful for resuscitating people during an emergency.

I also really love the idea of Android! Natasha being an old war Android that healed soldiers on the battlefield. It would explain why she’s a healthcare android who is capable of wielding a bazooka gun 😅

[mariacallous]

Let me start with the following principle: “Energy is the only universal currency: One of its many forms must be transformed to get anything done.” Economies are just intricate systems set up to do those transformations, and all economically significant energy conversions have (often highly undesirable) environmental impacts. Consequently, as far as the biosphere is concerned, the best anthropogenic energy conversions are those that never take place: No emissions of gases (be they greenhouse or acidifying), no generation of solid or liquid wastes, no destruction of ecosystems. The best way to do this has been to convert energies with higher efficiencies: Without their widespread adoption (be it in large diesel- and jet-engines, combined-cycle gas turbines, light-emitting diodes, smelting of steel, or synthesis of ammonia) we would need to convert significantly more primary energy with all attendant environmental impacts.

Conversely, what then could be more wasteful, more undesirable, and more irrational than negating a large share of these conversion gains by wasting them? Yet precisely this keeps on happening—and to indefensibly high degrees—with all final energy uses. Buildings consume about a fifth of all global energy, but because of inadequate wall and ceiling insulation, single-pane windows and poor ventilation, they waste at least between a fifth to a third of it, as compared with well-designed indoor spaces. A typical SUV is now twice as massive as a common pre-SUV vehicle, and it needs at least a third more energy to perform the same task.

The most offensive of these wasteful practices is our food production. The modern food system (from energies embedded in breeding new varieties, synthesizing fertilizers and other agrochemicals, and making field machinery to energy used in harvesting, transporting, processing, storing, retailing, and cooking) claims close to 20 percent of the world’s fuels and primary electricity—and we waste as much as 40 percent of all produced food. Some food waste is inevitable. The prevailing food waste, however, is more than indefensible. It is, in many ways, criminal.

Combating it is difficult for many reasons. First, there are many ways to waste food: from field losses to spoilage in storage, from perishable seasonal surpluses to keeping “perfect” displays in stores, from oversize portions when eating outside of the home to the decline of home cooking.

Second, food now travels very far before reaching consumers: The average distance a typical food item travels is 1,500 to 2,500 miles before being bought.

Third, it remains too cheap in relation to other expenses. Despite recent food-price increases, families now spend only about 11 percent of their disposable income on food (in 1960 it was about 20 percent). Food-away-from-home spending (typically more wasteful than eating at home) is now more than half of that total. And finally, as consumers, we have an excessive food choice available to us: Just consider that the average American supermarket now carries more than 30,000 food products.

Our society is apparently quite content with wasting 40 percent of the nearly 20 percent of all energy it spends on food. In 2025, unfortunately, this shocking level of waste will not receive more attention. In fact, the situation will only get worse. While we keep pouring billions into the quest for energy “solutions”—ranging from new nuclear reactors (even fusion!) to green hydrogen, all of them carrying their own environmental burdens—in 2025, we will continue to fail addressing the huge waste of food that took so much fuel and electricity to produce.

[monsterblogging]

Jaeger Piloting 101: How Rangers Get Into The Thing & Other Basic Stuff

Hello Pacific Rim fans, today I am doing a post on the topic of how rangers get into the conn-pod, and take control of the Jaeger, plus do a quick look at conn-pod interiors in general! I'll be using pictures sourced from movie-screencaps.com to illustrate the process.

Before I proceed, I'd like to remind folks that Lady Danger's canonical name contains a racial slur. It will be depicted here in screenshots, but I encourage fans to use the name "Lady Danger" in casual conversation, fanfiction etc. It doesn't matter if the name was referencing an old engine, it doesn't matter if no harm was intended by it; a slur's a slur.

Before the rangers enter the conn-pod, they must first suit up. This isn't something they can do on their own - they have a dedicated team of assistant techs to help them into their drivesuits. As we can see here, Raleigh and Yancy Becket's team have the name of their jaeger printed on the backs of their jumpsuits:

If you read my earlier post on jaegers, you know that drivesuits come in two layers. Here's Raleigh and Yancy already wearing the first layer, while one of their technicians assists:

Next, the technicians help them into the drivesuit's second, armored layer. On the right side of the first image is the area where the drivesuits are kept when not in use:

And then we have this thing that's pulled out of a special storage box and put over the spinal area, connecting the back of the armor together:

We also see Yancy and Raleigh pull on their helmets, and this strange liquid drains out. (It makes me think of the orange juice Raleigh was drinking earlier.) It's not clear how common this feature is, but we know it's not universal - the refurbished Lady Danger doesn't have this, and Cherno Alpha's helmets don't look it would even be possible.

Next up, the pilots enter the conn-pod. Note those two light gray things on the floor in the first picture; that's part of the Pilot Motion Rig. Also note the dark gray things hanging from the ceiling in the second picture; that's also part of it.

Once the pilots step into the bottom part of Pilot Motion Rig, metal clamps lock their feet into place. On the right, Raleigh is already locked in; on the left, Yancy is not yet locked in:

Meanwhile, more technicians help pilots get into the upper part of the Pilot Motion Rig.

At this point, something magical and wonderful absolutely terrifying else happens: the floor pulls away, leaving the pilots standing like:

If you look down once the floor's pulled back, it's uh. Quite the view.

In the case of Lady Danger, a nuclear-powered Mark-3, this is where technicians drop the head to connect it to the body. (The head is stored separately to reduce radiation exposure that might damage the delicate circuits.)

At this point, the Beckets are looking at this in front of them:

As the head connects, the pilot-to-pilot protocol is engaged, the computer system fires up, and the Beckets see a LOADING screen:

In the Anchorage Shatterdome, Lady Danger was wheeled out through a door on a rolling platform. At this point, the neural handshake was activated with a countdown of fifteen seconds.

The neural link is established, and you got two people in control of a Jaeger!

From here, stuff often depends on the specific jaeger, as control systems can be pretty different. For example, we see Raleigh and Yancy holding these round things in the arms they're controlling at the beginning of the film, but the refurbished Lady Danger doesn't seem to use them, and neither do the other jaegers.

I'd also like to contrast Cherno Alpha's drivesuits with Lady Danger's drivesuits for a moment, just to emphasize how different designs can be. As you can see, each pilot's drivesuit has cables connected to the arm they're controlling:

Also as I was looking at pictures of jaeger interiors, I noticed something curious about Lady Danger vs. Striker Eureka.

The original Lady Danger has a high console like this:

The refurbished Lady Danger has one positioned lower:

Striker Eureka has both a high and low console:

So make of that what you will, lol.

And that's the basics of boarding and controlling a jaeger! If you haven't seen it already I also recommend checking out my other post on jaeger lore, where I compiled everything I could find out about them from various Pacific Rim medias. And you might also read Drifting, as conceptualized by Travis Beacham if you're interested in knowing more about the drifting aspect, and maybe Drift Hangover Lore if the possibility of sentient jaegers appeals to you.

Happy monster punching, or whatever it is you people do out there. *Slinks back into the bog*

[wachinyeya]

Indian Engineers Tackle Water Shortages with Star Wars Tech in Kerala https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/indian-engineers-tackle-water-shortages-with-star-wars-tech-in-kerala/

When a severe water shortage hit the Indian city of Kozhikode in the state of Kerala, a group of engineers turned to science fiction to keep the taps running.

Like everyone else in the city, engineering student Swapnil Shrivastav received a ration of two buckets of water a day collected from India’s arsenal of small water towers.

It was a ‘watershed’ moment for Shrivastav, who according to the BBC had won a student competition four years earlier on the subject of tackling water scarcity, and armed with a hypothetical template from the original Star Wars films, Shrivastav and two partners set to work harvesting water from the humid air.

“One element of inspiration was from Star Wars where there’s an air-to-water device. I thought why don’t we give it a try? It was more of a curiosity project,” he told the BBC.

According to ‘Wookiepedia’ a ‘moisture vaporator’ is a device used on moisture farms to capture water from a dry planet’s atmosphere, like Tatooine, where protagonist Luke Skywalker grew up.

This fictional device functions according to Star Wars lore by coaxing moisture from the air by means of refrigerated condensers, which generate low-energy ionization fields. Captured water is then pumped or gravity-directed into a storage cistern that adjusts its pH levels. Vaporators are capable of collecting 1.5 liters of water per day.

If science fiction authors could come up with the particulars of such a device, Shrivastav must have felt his had a good chance of succeeding. He and colleagues Govinda Balaji and Venkatesh Raja founded Uravu Labs, a Bangalore-based startup in 2019.

Their initial offering is a machine that converts air to water using a liquid desiccant. Absorbing moisture from the air, sunlight or renewable energy heats the desiccant to around 100°F which releases the captured moisture into a chamber where it’s condensed into drinking water.

The whole process takes 12 hours but can produce a staggering 2,000 liters, or about 500 gallons of drinking-quality water per day. Uravu has since had to adjust course due to the cost of manufacturing and running the machines—it’s just too high for civic use with current materials technology.

“We had to shift to commercial consumption applications as they were ready to pay us and it’s a sustainability driver for them,” Shrivastav explained. This pivot has so far been enough to keep the start-up afloat, and they produce water for 40 different hospitality clients.

Looking ahead, Shrivastav, Raja, and Balaji are planning to investigate whether the desiccant can be made more efficient; can it work at a lower temperature to reduce running costs, or is there another material altogether that might prove more cost-effective?

They’re also looking at running their device attached to data centers in a pilot project that would see them utilize the waste heat coming off the centers to heat the desiccant.

[vykker]

Infrastructure you don’t see in MO that probably exists in Vykkers Labs 13: Part 2!

(part 1)

The ship control room or cockpit. I figure it must be at the tippy top of the structure under the dome, although it wouldn't be easy to see over the sides of the ship- so they must rely heavily on radar and cameras to make sure they aren't about to scrape mountains. I'd be interested to see who's in charge of piloting it. I think it's too vital a function for an intern to captain it, so there's probably some vykker engineer who's really into airships in charge. However, the destinations ultimately fall on Humphrey & Irwin. Vykkers labs has a map it generally follows that is planned months in advance. This is to account for the climate as certain weather can damage the ship. But H&I can redirect the ship on a whim.

Munitions storage/armory. Where the SnUzis and other weaponry are kept. Under strict lock and key to keep random employees or escaped subjects from getting in. Since SnUzis fire poison syringes, the poison is manufactured in-house in the armory.

Company store. So I've spoken before how I imagine Vykkers Labs docks on occasion for maintenance. It's in these situations I imagine employees can disembark and shop in what is essentially a giant airport. However, between landings, if you need essentials, you go to the company store, where everything is extremely overpriced and all moolah goes right back into the lab. They also sell souvenirs for guests! Like ornaments shaped like the ship, or fuzzles with syringes sticking out of them.

Warehouse where supplies are stored. Crates upon crates in rows and rows. Chaotic and poorly managed, there could be some really freaky and outdated shit in some of the crates at the way back. One of the most common places for workplace accidents as employees are crushed under falling crates, run over by forklifts, or stabbed on poorly contained boxes of lil hackers. However, it also has some of the worst surveillance, so you can find interns & scrubs playing cards or napping in a lot of corners. If you're assigned to the warehouse, you'll quickly become popular, as other employees will want to barter with you for goods stolen from the crates.

Livestock pens for freshly captured critters. I think they would be located near the center-bottom of the ship, next to the big hole at the bottom, so that the stalls can be mucked out right off the edge of the ship. Mudokons are employed here more than Interns; they're more compassionate which means a higher survival rate for freshly captured critters, though the job of disseminating them to different labs falls on the Interns.

Nuclear reactor to power the ship. Inspired by the US & France using nuclear reactors to power aircraft carriers. Makes sense that something as huge as Vykkers Labs would not be able to coast by on fuel alone, though liquid fuel is likely kept in massive quantities anyway in case the reactor fails/other emergencies. Probably one of the only places on the ship where safety regulations are strictly followed.

[moon-buggg]

talk about an au you rarely get to draw/write for

Lets talk about the fazbear science center! An au I really haven't really done much with but which sits in the back of my mind at all times!

Fazco builds a children's interactive science museum to branch out a bit. It has a general focus on robotics because that's fazcos whole deal, but also has little areas specific to each glamrock with their own themes.

Freddy is the main mascot for the whole science center. He doesn't have a specific area and wanders the whole center. Parts of his casing are see through so guests can see the machinery inside.

Chica's area is about the human body. It's got a loose theme of being healthy and healthy eating, and is right by the cafeteria which does not serve particularly healthy food.

Roxy's area is a sort of intro to engineering, with stations for kids to make little lego-esque robots and cars (complete with a racetrack for kids to test their cars).

Monty's area is about motion. There's a lot of things for kids to climb on, things they can throw, all with the loose idea of things like gravity, momentum, and friction. It's very physical.

Dj music man is also here. Because I love him. He gets a fun room that teaches kids about sound waves. Why is he so big? Stop asking stupid questions.

There used to be a planetarium, but after an... incident... it was shut down. They're now using the planetarium for storage and repurposed the planetarium bot to do fun chemistry demonstrations for the kids! It's much safer having a robot handle potentially dangerous chemicals, after all. Shame they had to retire the 'sun to moon' transformation gimmick, but it just didn't make sense for the new role.

Yn is hired on to be Sun's assistant. They aren't really on stage much, mostly just making sure everyone gets seated properly and handing out liquid nitrogen ice cream at the end of demonstrations.

One day, Sun gets zapped while doing an ill-advised tesla coil demonstration. The higher ups insist YN has to take over any electricity based demonstrations, not wanting to risk further damaging Sun. It's honestly a rough transition- yn isn't great on a stage and Sun is Very protective of his role

.....not to mention that Sun has been acting.... off... since he got electrocuted. Perhaps yn will find answers in the old planetarium?

[typingatlightspeed]

Metal Gear/TF2 Crossover - cp_shadow_moses_event Chapter 10

Snake is dragged off to be tortured, but thankfully survives and escapes! Making his way back to the communcations tower, he's determined to finish his mission, regrets over Meryl be damned. Meanwhile, Liquid realizes there are holes in the stories one Dr. Naomi Hunter tells about her life, and finds his angle to find out what's going on.

Ao3 Link!

A little more MGS plot on this one, with a touch more Sniper being adorable. Also, a nice little fix for a small plot hole (or at least unaddressed thing) in the actual original game (how does Liquid find out about FoxDie?). And Liquid says "cunt"!

---------

When the elevator to the warhead storage opened again, the BLU team craned to look. Surely Snake wouldn't be back so soon, and it didn't look like the REDs were pushing back, so who could it be?

Sniper Wolf stepped out, her languid steps trailed by a pair of genome soldiers who were carrying an unconscious Snake between them.

Soft murmurs of alarm and disappointment swept through the team, but nobody made a move to stop them. After all, neither Snake nor FOXHOUND were part of their mission, and vice versa. Even so, the look on Wolf's face dared any of them to do something.

None of them dared.

All the same, Scout's gaze followed the voluptuous figure of the assassin as she passed, and he turned to see Sniper looking after her in turn. When they had finally gone, headed for the tank hangar and assumedly the holding cells below, Scout turned to his friend.

"The curves on that one, right?"

"Huh?" Sniper asked, as if snapping from a daze

"Come on, I saw you lookin' too."

"She had a PSG-1," Sniper replied sullenly, pouting once again.

Scout sighed and threw up his hands. "Man, Demo, will you do somethin' about your man? I think we broke 'is heart takin' that gun away!"

"Aw, lad," Demoman consoled, patting Sniper on the back, trying not to laugh at how pathetic he was being about it all. "Come on, we should push forward, aye?"

"Yes, let's move out, ladies!" Soldier barked, already halfway into the elevator.

*

He'd survived. In spite of it all, he'd survived. He hadn't given in, hadn't cracked, and had to take that bastard Ocelot on his word that Meryl was still alive. It ate at Snake's gut as he shimmied back into his sneaking suit, securing everything back into place and checking to see what was and was not missing.

The optical disk with all of Metal Gear's test data was gone, unsurprisingly. Everything else remained untouched, however. It was almost suspicious. They could have just taken all of his keycards, and if he'd broken out, that was where his infiltration would end, anyway. He'd have no way to escape properly, let alone proceed with the mission.

It seemed sloppy. Too sloppy for someone like Ocelot.

But then, he had accidentally killed Chief Anderson on that table, right? So maybe he wasn't as meticulous as he appeared.

Otacon's trick with the ketchup had been surprisingly clever, and he had to hand it to the guy: it was resourceful as hell in such a bleak situation. He'd been leery at first about how much help the good doctor could be, but after this, he was grateful to have the gangly engineer in his corner. With his freedom, his equipment, and the new keycard Otacon had smuggled him, Snake took a deep breath and prepared to charge back into the fray. He needed to get into that communications tower, and from there: onward.

*

It seemed to take forever, backtracking through the tank hangar, across the snowfield, through the warhead storage which now lacked any trace of RED nor BLU team, down through Baker's old office and the caverns behind. When Snake emerged into the canyon, the blood on the snow reminded him of Meryl, of the venom she spat at herself for becoming a burden to Snake, for slowing him down. She wasn't a burden. And though he'd told her, he needed to tell her again. In person. Once this was all over and she was finally safe.

"Snake, please! Save yourself! Go on living, and don't give up on people! Don't forget me!"

He wasn't about to give up on her. He wouldn't forget her.

Snake's codec rang as he approached the canyon, watching for any sign of eyes on the approach. He opened the channel. It was Campbell.

"Snake, about Meryl..."

"Colonel, I'm sorry."

"Listen to me."

"I wasn't able to protect her."

"Snake, she's a soldier. She knows that prisoners are a part of war. She joined up of her own free will. I'm sure she was prepared for this."

"No, you're wrong. Meryl thought she had to become a soldier... thought it was the only way. She said she thought it would bring her closer to her dead father."

"She... said that?"

"She wasn't ready for real combat. I shouldn't have pushed her so hard." A heavy breath left Snake's nose, rolling out as a cloud in the wintry air. "It's all my fault."

A soft static heralded Miller cutting into the call. "That's not like you, Snake."

"Master?" Campbell asked, startled. "What is it?"

"Sorry for eavesdropping, but I just couldn't listen anymore."

"Master..." Snake fairly whispered, almost fearing the brunt of another of Hell Miller's dressing-downs. He didn't know if he had the stomach for it now.

"Snake, you can have regrets if you want to. It's only natural. But you can't keep attacking yourself for things that happened in the past. That road leads to madness, believe me."

Snake believed him. Considering Miller's previous entanglements with Big Boss, Militaires Sans Frontières, the Diamond Dogs, and FOXHOUND itself, it wasn't a particular leap of logic to assume the master's notorious temper was its own kind of madness.

Mei Ling cut into the channel. "He's right, don't kick yourself. It doesn't suit a legend like you."

Snake was getting tired of being called a legend.

"I'm sure Meryl's just fine," she rejoined.

"Mei Ling..."

Campbell cut back in. "Snake. Forget about Meryl. Stop Liquid. That's what Meryl would want, too."

Snake nodded along. "You're right. Meryl would say the same thing."

"Snake," Naomi cut in, static on the line again.

"What?"

"Meryl... she's pretty special to you, huh?"

"Yes," Snake sighed, ducking into a crenelation to take a breath. "She's special. There aren't many women like her around."

"That's not what I meant."

"She's the colonel's niece. And a combat buddy."

"Is that all? C'mon."

Fuck's sake lady, they met—what?—a few hours ago? "This is like a police interrogation."

"No, I just—"

Campbell cut in, "I guess it's in the genes," he chuckled.

"Genes? What're you talking about, Colonel?"

"No, I just remembered about Naomi's grandfather. I think Naomi said he rose as high as assistant secretary in the FBI during Edgar Hoover's time."

Inquisitiveness in the blood. "Is that right?"

"Yes!" Naomi replied, put on the spot. "Yes, he was Japanese and he became a special undercover investigator to nab the mafia."

"When was that?" Miller asked, dubious.

"Oh, uh, sometime in the fifties, I guess," Naomi said, her voice clipped. She sounded almost nervous.

"Where?" Miller followed up.

"Uh, New York, I think."

"Naomi, I thought that you didn't have any family."

"Well, I—I researched it after I became an adult. My grandfather was already dead by the time I learned about him, I never even had the chance to meet him."

"Oh," Campbell sighed, his attempt at a mood-lightening anecdote dashed thoroughly.

"Snake... good luck," Naomi said, dropping the line.

"Watch your back, Snake," Campbell added before closing the channel.

Snake looked up at the southern communications tower, multiple stories tall and rising high into the blizzard-rimed night. He could hear gunfire and explosions inside. There was probably no other way to do this. He checked his magazines and prepared to go loud.

*

Liquid slammed his fist on the control room console. "That bitch; I knew there was something suspicious about her from the day she started working with FOXHOUND! It was just a matter of finding the right lie to catch her in! A Japanese man as assistant secretary under that racist cunt Hoover! Ridiculous! Dr. Clark might not have given a shit who she hired, but by God I do my fucking due diligence!"

"Shall I do some digging, Boss?" Ocelot asked, a cheshire smile working its way across his lips. Hunter's pet project being deployed was one thing, but Liquid realizing something was amiss, perhaps even discovering what it is? What an interesting thread to weave into this plot! It's not like it would change anything, and the boy's histrionics about it in the meanwhile would be deeply entertaining.

It's not like Ocelot had to worry about being programmed into it, after all.

"Yes. I want you to get as much information as you can about her, what she's been working on, and why she's really on Snake's radio team. Her being here and her dear brother running around the base chopping people up like this is a Benihana cannot be coincidence."

"On it, Boss," Ocelot hummed, spurs jangling as he moseyed away.

[shelandsorcery]

Astronomics Game Art : Designing Mining Equipment!

Gonna talk this week about designing mining equipment for the sci-fi game Astronomics - demo on steam right now! - And I thought I'd start with a little conversation about research and process (...that doesn't really have on a much art in it but just stay with me) and maybe get to tap in a little bit into how someone like me who doesn't do a lot of technical design learned a lot about how to get excited about that whole field through the research stage of this game.

So when I say research I really do mean fairly old-school research — and this is probably gonna be a theme with a lot of the posts about this game in particular, because I don't think you can build sci-fi without some understanding of engineering systems and current scientific realities to then play with, you know?

As you may gather from the trailer, Astronomics is a game about asteroid mining, among other things. Which meant that we had a lot of need for legit industrial feeling props and tools for the player to use, things that felt functional and believable without feeling complicated or delicate. I really enjoy the challenge of adding appeal to something that maybe people don't always think about being appealing or fun or cute (this is never an absolute statement — there's always somebody already able to see more appeal in any given subject and I could ever imagine) so part of the research stage is going and looking for that appeal. So above you can see a sheet of loose rough sketches I did in clip studio paint from reference that I gathered with the rest of the team and by myself that seemed relevant to some of the designs we were pursuing.

If you've had the chance to play the demo, you'll know that it's not just surface mining but we are going to be letting you mind gases and liquids and underground mineral veins as well — these are all things that people do in the real world of course, so process one was taking a quick look at those actual industries and then figuring out how I could condense that activity down into a pretty simple and easy to understand machine.

So turned out what we needed was something that drilled and dug, something that pumped liquids, something that sucked air, and all of these things needed to then produce some sort of container to hold what they had collected.

In a videogame you really need to communicate to the player why each act they do is significant and different from the others, and as the art director it was my job to figure how to do that through visual design of the tools they're going to be using. So that meant that even though you could certainly store liquid and gas and solid resources in the same kind of box, I wanted to try and find ways to keep each thing feeling different. Best case scenario is that you're able to look at a prop we've designed and know in a split second which of these three states of matter it will be containing; in the research stage one of the things I'm looking for is any existing visual language that we have (in this Western English-speaking North American videogame audience culture) that already solves this problem.

The great thing about industrial design is that they indeed have very intentionally tackled this problem. Part of it is purely physics optimization that the field of engineering has been working towards for human history. For example, when you're storing liquid and you want to remove all of it from a container you probably don't want something with corners — that's how you end up with cylindrical liquid storage. When you're storing a gas you're likely keeping it under pressure, which means you need a shape that will withstand pressure evenly, which means you're looking for something with literally no corners or edges ideally — and that's how you end up with bubble-shaped gas storage like a propane canister. And then when you're storing something solid and you want to use the space most efficiently and be able to stack whatever it is that you have packed it into, you have a box.

Real good news is, a box and a cylinder and a sphere are all wonderfully visually distinct shapes in a fantastically strong place to start when it comes to solving the question of storage. So then we get into the challenge of the machines themselves — what distinguishes a drill from a pump from a vacuum?

So that's the beginning of some of the questions that you have to answer when you're designing props for a game — in the research stage is only one of bunch of different ways you start figuring out these answers. But I want to talk for just a second a little bit about how I personally wrangle my research, because I am definitely not telling you this is the only way to do it. It seems like it may be worth explaining what I get out of this process and see if anything here make sense for you!

One of the reasons that I have this huge page of sketches, big and detailed or tiny and loose, all laid out in one place for me to look at, is because I personally learn and remember things more strongly by taking notes. With my hand holding a pencil ideally. And when they're abstract concepts or verbal or numerical then I'll use writing and I won't have a problem with it, but my job at this stage was not to figure out abstract concepts or to find themes — my job was to solve visual problems. So my first order of business was visual research specifically. Now for me, that involves lots of things — I have a Pinterest board for any sort of subcategory of stuff I'm researching to just do enormous broad research with; then I probably bring most of those images into a huge working .PSD file and move them around to create groupings. And then I start drawing.

I really think that drawing is integral for me at this stage. I don't think I could do this without drawing as part of my research. There's so much that I just don't bother noticing if I'm not going to be drawing the thing that I'm looking at; even the worst, fastest, sketchy as drawing makes me pay infinitely more attention to something then I do when I am simply collecting information mentally. I'm phrasing this in a somewhat exaggerated, self-deprecating way, but I really can't exaggerate how much more I get out of things when I sit down and draw them. They talk about drawing is a way of seeing, and for me that's a practice I've intentionally pushed and explored in my life.

The other thing, though, is that visual problem that I need to solve. Sometimes solutions to the problem aren't obvious until they are visualized — it can be very easy to get distracted by things like surface details and miss the silhouette language, or vice versa, but when you are doing the drawing you have to wrestle with the silhouette and the details and make decisions about them. Visual trends appear way more clear when you are drawing something for the 10th time as opposed to simply seeing it for the 10th time. And all of the layers of cultural meaning and context that clutter up a photograph can be simply ignored as you transfer only what you need to a drawing, where you might discover something that everything else hid until then. Beyond that, one of the things you may notice about the sketches is that they are somewhat cartoony — I'm certainly trying to capture important details and be representational to a degree, but much like gesture drawing the human figure, researching this way lets me start finding out what the gestures are of these different sorts of subject matter. This is something that I knew about creature design, and about flora design, and one of the real joys of this game in particular was proving to myself that this gesture approach applied to industrial machines and technology as well.

I mean, I knew that there were cute trucks out there, but gosh.

I think if you are in need of something to reinvigorate a particular piece of subject matter for you — if you're designing something that you are just not that excited about, or if you don't feel challenged by the work in front of you — I really think sitting and sketching from reference can open up the complexities and help push you and your work farther. It certainly works for me and I know that the learning I did on this game is something I carry with me to future projects as well.

That seems like a pretty strong place to leave this post in particular, but I'll be back later this week with more breakdowns and screen caps of the actual design process of all of our adorable mining equipment!

I would really love to hear from folks if you also engage in similar research processes before going into full design mode — or if you have a completely different way to get your mind revved up and ready to go, I would really enjoy reading about it!

In the meantime, if you're curious about mining asteroids but it's cute please feel free to check out the Astronomics demo on steam, I made an awful lot of visdev art for this and handed it off to some incredible game creators who have done some really impressive stuff taking their ideas and my ideas and running to honestly some pretty new and exciting places with them.