High Lord of the Darkness

10 years ago today, Ben Below edited the The Mechanisms steampunk Wikia page so that JDV no longer played the harmonica....

Peacemaker by The Mechanisms, Ashes/Mordred treble and Tim/Gawain bass. It'll be uploaded to Musescore once the app actually works

takes the day off to *checks notes* art fight as hard as possible

edit: forgot to add!!

So the movie Interstellar came out a few months *after* HNOC, but both Fort Galfridian and Cooper Station are variations on the O’Neill cylinder concept (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/O%27Neill_cylinder) so it’s not an original concept to either.

Interstellar is probably the clearest and easiest to find visual example of the main habitable level I can think of. I think this is concept art from the movie:

So as you can see, the people live inside the inner layer of the cylinder (think the inside of a cardboard tube.) The ground is also the ceiling and it’s all a bit giddy. The whole station spins to generate an artificial gravity effect. The big difference between this picture and Galfridian is that this station has the light source at the extreme end of the cylinder (and presumably at the opposite end too), which would not light the whole station evenly, whereas (according to all of us except Jonny, who obviously has a right to his opinion) Galfridian’s light source is a huge strip that runs from end to end of the cylinder, supported by colossal pylons, providing uniform light and oppressive heat (tube sun).

There are, of course, many lower layers under the ground where a combination of automation and operations crew carry out the essential functions, life support, hydroponics, weapons systems etc. How do they get down there from the habitable layer? The same way you’d get into a basement. Service elevators, stairwells, tunnels.