Fire Opera and Steampunk

Have you ever had the experience where you learn a new term and suddenly it pops up all over the place and you think, "why didn't I know this before?" That's been my experience this week with Steampunk. Carolena of FatChanceBellyDance was telling me about a store in the San Francisco Mission called Five and Diamond which sells Steampunk fashion. It seems to be a fantasy genre lifestyle based on the age of steam power invention and centers around Victorian era England.

Here are images from Five and Diamond's online gallery:
On Saturday night Megan and I attended The Crucible's Fire Arts Festival featuring big, noisy, fiery machines. Last year Rachel and David took me to this spectacle and I was literally blown away by, well, the noise. This year I brought earplugs. (As a side note, Saturday I babysat David and Rachel's newborn baby Chloe - another special one-year-back-anniversary experience.)

The intersection of Steampunk and The Fire Arts Festival was the Rootabaga Fire Opera by Emmy-award winning composer Dan Cantrell and featured ShadowLight Productions' puppets and Oakland's KITKA women's vocal musical ensemble. It was all about Steampunk. Here's an image:

Throughout the evening Megan and I pointed out Steampunk fashion and folks. This was clearly their evening.

West Oakland on Fire

This weekend The Crucible, a fire arts organization located in West Oakland, presented their 8th annual Fire Arts Festival. To celebrate my friend Rachel's birthday we headed out with her husband David and took the opportunity to practice night photography. Because of my fancy camera I was considered "media" which was fantastic since I got a photo pass.

The scene was OTT (over the top as they say in the UK). We arrived at dusk and all was pretty mellow, except for the growing crowds. But as the sun set we were jolted into the evening by a HUGE blast of fire. That pretty much set the tone - stand back from the roaring flames. Just writing about it has set my heart racing. Rachel, as always, was fearless.

As for the photography opportunity, we were not disappointed. Our intention was to get photos of the BART trains passing overhead. We were continuously amazed that this festival was happening, in Oakland, just feet from BART.

The image with the stilt walkers is very strange. Notice David in the right corner and a little bit of Rachel.

Images: The Crucible Fire Arts Festival 2008