The women of N. K. Jemisin: Representations of women and gender roles in the science-fantasy The Fifth Season

The following paper deals with representations of women and gender roles in science-fiction and fantasy. It briefly discusses the issue in these genres in general, but it is primarily concerned with one specific example, i.e. N. K. Jemisin’s science-fantasy novel The Fifth Season. The paper’s main aim is to highlight the changing nature of representations of women in science fiction and fantasy and pay tribute to a literary work depicting women from a modern perspective. Thus, it presents the analysis of said novel from the perspective of feminist criticism and gender studies, focusing on how the novel explores through its main and side women characters, ideas of representation, biological sex versus “gendering”, and related notions of femininity, gender roles and gender stereotypes and myths.

Invisibility Cloak using Color Detection and Segmentation with open CV

Have you ever thought of making visible things invisible, just like the Harry Potter? Have you ever thought how does one supersede backgrounds and add effects in a movie? The cloak was magical and invisible in Harry Potter, the movie. As we know there is no magic and no invisible cloak which exists in the world. It’s all about the graphicstricks. The concept of an invisibility cloak is a mixture of science, fantasy, and the collective imagination. This paper helps to create one’s own ‘Invisibility Cloak’.It will make use of Python and OpenCV module specifically targeting Image Processing and Image Segmentation to create a false sense of invisibility in the frame. It will explore how an object of a specific color or texture can be manipulated using the OpenCV library of python. To achieve this, initially we’ll be capturing and storing the backdrop frame . Thereafter we’ll be identifying the red coloured fabric by making use of the above mentioned algorithms. Then we’ll segment out the red colored fabric by generating a mask and then finallywe’ll generate the final augmented(magical) output to create Invisibility cloak. These steps are discussed deeper in thepaper.

Invisibility Cloak using Color Detection and Segmentation with Open CV

Have you ever thought of making visible things invisible, just like the Harry Potter? Have you ever thought how does one supersede backgrounds and add effects in a movie? The cloak was magical and invisible in Harry Potter, the movie. As we know there is no magic and no invisible cloak which exists in the world. It’s all about the graphics tricks. The concept of an invisibility cloak is a mixture of science, fantasy, and the collective imagination. This paper helps to create one’s own ‘Invisibility Cloak’.It will make use of Python and OpenCV module specifically targeting Image Processing and Image Segmentation to create a false sense of invisibility in the frame. It will explore how an object of a specific color or texture can be manipulated using the OpenCV library of python. To achieve this, initially we’ll be capturing and storing the backdrop frame . Thereafter we’ll be identifying the red coloured fabric by making use of the above mentioned algorithms. Then we’ll segment out the red colored fabric by generating a mask and then finally , we’ll generate the final augmented(magical) output to create Invisibility cloak. These steps are discussed deeper in the paper

Dread Trident

Dread Trident examines the rise of imaginary worlds in tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs), such as Dungeons and Dragons. With the combination of analog and digital mechanisms, from traditional books to the internet, new ways of engaging the fantastic have become increasingly realized in recent years, and this book seeks an understanding of this phenomenon within the discourses of trans- and posthumanism, as well as within a gameist mode. The book explores a number of case studies of foundational TRPGs. Dungeons and Dragons provides an illustration of pulp-driven fantasy, particularly in the way it harmonizes its many campaign settings into a functional multiverse. It also acts as a supreme example of depth within its archive of official and unofficial published material, stretching back four decades. Warhammer 40k and the Worlds of Darkness present an interesting dialogue between Gothic and science-fantasy elements. The Mythos of HP Lovecraft also features prominently in the book as an example of a realized world that spans the literary and gameist modes. Realized fantasy worlds are becoming ever more popular as a way of experiencing a touch of the magical within modern life. Following Northrop Frye’s definition of irony, Dread Trident theorizes an ironic understanding of this process and in particular of its embodied forms.

Wizje podboju Marsa. Od literackiej dystopii do kluczowych decyzji politycznych

The aim of this article is to outline the vision for colonisation of Mars. In the article I answerthe following questions: what motivates individual persons, communities and states tohead in this direction? Also: why has Mars of all planets become an object of fantasy ofdaydreamers, enthusiasts, experts in astronautics, and – increasingly – politicians? I brieflydescribe the genesis of mass interest in the Red Planet, development of literature and fantasyand science fantasy films. I outline past and present manned Mars mission and colonisationplans as well as political and economic prospects arising out of the planet’s conquest by thegreatest powers in the world.Key words: Mars, dystopia, science fiction, space policy, political decision

Animating virtual worlds: Emergence and ecological animation of Ryzom’s living world of Atys

Ryzom is a long-running (from 2004–present) science fantasy MMORPG (henceforth MMO) set in the science fantasy game world of the planet Atys, an entirely organic “rootball” teeming with alien life forms. The most oft-cited distinctive properties of Ryzom in the MMO world is the way creates not only an immersive sense of “worldness”, but a living, breathing, organic world. The game world is not only a richly animated “world” like all MMOs, but the aggregate of these animations also produce a sense of life, a “living world”. Following Silvio (2010) in particular, I ask how and when the properties of animation — understood in the narrow sense as a medium or media form — can produce a broader sense of “animacy” (Chen, 2012), a lively affect of “animatedness”: how and when animation (movement) is read as life; how an animated world becomes a living world. Specifically, why is it that in the animated world of Ryzom, as in animated cartoons, the animation of animality is central to this transition from animation to life: why the reading of animated “movement-as-life tends to settle on cartoon animals”. The “immersive” feeling of Atys as a ‘living world’ is displayed in the “emergent” animation of animals, particularly the ways that animals interact via “ecological” algorithms of predation and mutual care. animations which players explore as part of the emergent living worldness of Atys.