Monday 28 March 2011

The Impaler

Seven different articulating movements bring this gigantic 13' tall creature to life. The creature stands up & sits, head rotates, head tilts, mouth opens/closes, right shoulder rotates, right shoulder raises/lowers, right forearm raises/lowers. Left arm will support optional special Shredded Kicker that kicks its legs suspended from the creature. This is a special order item and requires additional shipping charges and production time.


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Wednesday 16 March 2011

Halloween Animated Props

Animatronics was developed by Walt Disney in the early sixties. Essentially, an animatronic puppet is a figure that is animated by means of electromechanical devices[2]. Early examples were found at the 1964 World Fair in the New York Hall of Presidents and Disney Land. In the Hall of Presidents, Lincoln, with all the gestures of a statesman, gave the Gettysburg’s address. Body language and facial motions were matched to perfection with the recorded speech[3]. The abbreviated term originally coined by the Walt Disney as Audio Animatronics which is used to describe the mechanized characters, can be actually seen in the various forms as far back as Leonardo Da Vinci’s Automata Lion, which is theoretically built to the present lilies to King of the France during one of his Visits,and has now be developed as the career which may be require combined talent in the Mechanical Engineering , Casting/Sculpting, Control Technologies, Electrical/Electronic, Radio Control, Airbrushing. Long before digital effects was appeared, animatronics were making the cinematic history



Monday 28 February 2011

Vlad III the Impaler


Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia (1431–1476), more commonly known as Vlad the Impaler or simply as Dracula, was a three-time Voivode of Wallachia, ruling mainly from 1456 to 1462.
Historically, Vlad III is best known for his resistance against the Ottoman Empire and its expansion[3] and for the impaling of enemies.[4]
Vlad III is believed to have inspired the association of his name to that of the vampire Count Dracula in Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula.

Russian stories about Vlad the Impaler

The Russian or the Slavic version of the stories about Vlad the Impaler called "Skazanie o Drakule voevode" ("The Tale of Warlord Dracula") is thought to have been written sometime between 1481 and 1486. Copies were made from the 15th century to the 18th century, of which some twenty-two extant manuscripts survive in Russian archives. The oldest one, from 1490, ends as follows: "First written in the year 6994 of the Byzantine calendar (1486), on 13 February; then transcribed by me, the sinner Efrosin, in the year 6998 (1490), on 28 January". The Tales of Prince Dracula is neither chronological nor consistent, but mostly a collection of anecdotes of literary and historical value concerning Vlad Țepeș.
There are 19 anecdotes in The Tales of Prince Dracula which are longer and more constructed than the German stories. It can be divided into two sections: The first 13 episodes are non-chronological events most likely closer to the original folkloric oral tradition about Vlad. The last six episodes are thought to have been written by a scholar who collected them, because they are chronological and seem to be more structured. The stories begin with a short introduction and the anecdote about the nailing of hats to ambassadors heads. They end with Vlad's death and information about his family.
Of the 19 anecdotes there are ten that have similarities to the German stories.[26] Although there are similarities between the Russian and the German stories about Vlad, there is a clear distinction with the attitude towards him. The Russian stories tend to portray him in a more positive light: he is depicted as a great ruler, a brave soldier and a just sovereign. Stories of atrocities tend to seem to be justified as the actions of a strong ruler. Of the 19 anecdotes, only four seem to have exaggerated violence.  Some elements of the anecdotes were later added to Russian stories about Ivan the Terrible of Russia.[28]
The nationality and identity of the original writer of the anecdotes Dracula is disputed. The two most plausible explanations are that the writer was either a Romanian priest or a monk from Transylvania, or a Romanian or Moldavian from the court of Stephen the Great in Moldavia. One theory claims the writer was a Russian diplomat named Fyodor Kuritsyn.

Romanian attitudes

Romanian folklore and literature, on the other hand, paints Vlad Țepeș as a hero. His reputation in his native country as a man who stood up to both foreign and domestic enemies gives him the virtual opposite symbolism of Stoker's vampire. In Romania he is considered one of the greatest leaders in the country's history, and was voted one of "100 Greatest Romanians" in the "Mari Români" television series aired in 2006.
A contemporary portrait of Vlad III, rediscovered by Romanian historians in the late 19th century, had been featured in the gallery of horrors at Innsbruck's Ambras Castle. This original has been lost to history, but a larger copy, painted anonymously in the latter half of the 16th century, now hangs in the same gallery. This copy, unlike the cryptoportraits contemporary with Vlad III, seems to have given him a Habsburg lip, although he was not a member of the Habsburg lineage.
His image in modern Romanian culture clashes with foreign perceptions. It is the last part of a rather popular 19th century poem by Mihai Eminescu,"Scrisoarea a III-a", that helped turn Vlad's image into modern legend, by having him stand as a figure to contrast with presumed social decay under the Phanariotes and the political scene of the 19th century (even suggesting that Vlad's violent methods be applied as a cure). Notably though, the first author to depict Vlad as a Romanian heroic character was a Transylvanian who probably never travelled to Wallachia, Ioan Budai-Deleanu. Around 1800 he wrote a Romanian epic heroicomic poem, "Țiganiada", in which prince Vlad Țepeș stars as a fierce warrior fighting the Ottomans. Well in advance of Romanian literature at that time, this work, unlike Eminescu's, remained unpublished and ignored for a century, and did not exert any influence.
All accounts of his life describe him as ruthless, but only the ones originating from his Saxon detractors paint him as sadistic or insane. These pamphlets continued to be published long after his death, though usually for lurid entertainment rather than propaganda purposes. It has largely been forgotten until recently that his tenacious efforts against the Ottoman Empire won him many staunch supporters in his lifetime, not just in modern day Romania but in the kingdoms of Hungary, Poland, the Republic of Venice, the Holy See, and the Balkans. A Hungarian court chronicler reported that King Matthias "had acted in opposition to general opinion" in Hungary when he had Dracula imprisoned, and this played a considerable part in Matthias reversing his unpopular decision. During his time as a "distinguished prisoner" before being fully pardoned and allowed to reconquer Wallachia, Vlad was hailed as a Christian hero by visitors from all over Europe.