Ran two prints today. The second one, the 4th test of the new setup, turned out to be pretty much there with just a few minor issues. The main issue I’m looking at now is getting proper coverage of the paper. For whatever reason, the cyanotyping fluid doesn’t really like the vellum paper and you get occasional blotchiness. This was a constant problem before, and was solved largely by tossing prints that weren’t up to code. Experiments will continue…
Yes, I’m shocked too… I’m linking to a New York times article that is both interesting and informative:
A Times investigation based on interviews, intercepts, documents and secret battle plans shows how a “walk in the park” became a catastrophe for Russia.
For no readily apparent reason, YouTube of late has been tossing videos at me that suddenly started focusing on people reading aloud stories posted on Reddit (handy for when I’ve been working on the cyanotypes). In particular, “HFY” stories… “Humanity F Yeah!” stories, science fiction short tales featuring, generally, aliens deciding to attack dumb ol’ weak humanity and getting their asses handed to them by those hairless monkeys who turn out to be *insanely* capable in the art of war. They are generally fun little tales… usually not *great* by any stretch, often fairly bad by the usual measures of such things, but entertaining. And the idea that Plucky Humans could save the day against galaxy-spanning ravening hordes and evil empires is always fun. But then I read stuff like this NYT article describing the state of the Russian war machine and war effort.
Yes, sometimes humans can be spectacularly expert at the art of war. But often we are phenomenally incompetent. If the Russia that launched this war against Ukraine was the standard of human military capability, even the most mediocre and half-assed alien invasion fleet would mop up Mankind in a lazy afternoon.
The more challenging you try to appear, the more people will challenge you. Armored trains these days seem like the sort of thing that everyone with a surface-to-surface missile, an air-to-surface missile, a drone, a handful of plastic explosive or a cup full of thermite will try their luck at.
There was a time when vigilantes were more legend than fact, because the police and justice system did the job that needed doing. I guess those times are over. We entered a period of lawlessness… and I suspect that we’ll be seeing more stories like this, where vigilantes start doing the job that cops and security guards aren’t allowed to anymore.
Of course, some places want to pretend that crime *isn’t* a problem. That if you cover it up, people will forget about it. Let’s see how well *that* works…
When Twitter banned the New York Post for accurately reporting on the Hunter Biden laptop story, the progressive media said nothing. When twitter suspended some “journalists” for doxxing Elon Musk… suddenly, that’s a threat to democracy. The world will fall into ruin unless journalists are allowed to violate the established Twitter terms of service.
President Trump was banned from Twitter while Jihadi/Islamist terrorists were allowed to remain and continue to spit hate and threats. So, no, some journalists finding that the rules apply to them too is not a “precede
WTF.
A guy who made his billions by selling stuff is… selling stuff. Just… ridiculous stuff. This doesn’t really seem to be the actions of someone who thinks he’s destined to retake the White House.
Todays test involved mounting the UV light bar to a crude frame and just letting it run, not waving it over the print like an idjit. As you can see most of it is pretty uniform; the end of the print that was furthest from the light bar wasn’t adequately exposed. However, come the weekend two more UV lights will arrive and will extend the reach.
The learning curve this time around is going *much* faster than the first time. This should probably not be a surprise, but it’s nice to see that things are trending quickly in the correct direction.
Some interesting shots of a brief static test firing.
STATIC FIRE! Ship 24 fires up as testing resumes for the test flight. Looked like a single engine firing.
➡️https://t.co/f5Sp0aaSMs pic.twitter.com/yaqGyeqa7X
— Chris Bergin – NSF (@NASASpaceflight) December 15, 2022
Ship 24 completes a single-engine static fire test at Starbase in Texas pic.twitter.com/gF9beLcarX
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) December 15, 2022
Tell me if this sounds familiar: convicted felon out on parole commits murder. This time, execution-style multiple murder on the street because he was asked to leave a birthday party.
Even in Illinois, it is illegal for a felon on parole to have a pistol. So yet another Gun Grab Success Story as well.
Sent in. Video of the triple homicide, 4 people shot at Central and School stemming from Vera Lounge this weekend. A cold blooded execution. #Chicago pic.twitter.com/Y9wJ2Anxsl
— 16th & 17th District Chicago Police Scanner (@CPD1617Scanner) December 13, 2022
There is, of course, a solution for this sort of thing. The killer here was charged with first degree murder (in a home invasion) in 2009, but got a lesser sentence because his co-defendant admitted to the killing (which should nevertheless have made him complicit in felony murder). He was paroled in October. Had he been sentenced to life without parole or, better, death, or even better, jettisoning off Earth towards the moon via mass driver, this problem would not have occurred.
This is what “progressive” polices lead to.
GRAPHIC VIDEO
Aftermath of the scene at the triple homicide at Vera Lounge at Central/School.
An off duty nurse is seen trying to render aid.#Chicago pic.twitter.com/MUqC8yc4ZN
— 16th & 17th District Chicago Police Scanner (@CPD1617Scanner) December 13, 2022
The cyanotype setup in Utah relied on direct sunlight to process the image. But the sun is difficult to find here in Illinois in December, so I decided to give technology a try. When I originally set up in 2014, this wasn’t really an option, but Amazon now has 100 watt LED UV light bars for only $30, so I decided to try one. The result is shown below:
Clearly, it looks terrible. But I judged it to be a rampaging success: this was achieved via the crude process of simply waving it over the paper and the transparency by hand for five minutes. My goal was not a pristine cyanotype, but proof that the UV actually worked to process the image. Where it shined adequately brightly for long enough, it really did the job. So I went ahead and ordered two more. I will build a framework to hold them over the print, boxed in with reflectors. Some experimentation to dial everything in, but at this point I’m quite optimistic that a technological solution will make this work reliably repeatably.
On the other hand: the UV light bars are Chinese. So… explosions? Sudden random changes in wavelength? Burst into flames? Microphones directly to the MSS? Who knows.
Bonus wisdom: if you put a rectangular piece of paper on the floor, a cat *will* occupy it.
