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Ancient History
Vision Quest
A portfolio by noted parartist Yngvi Bellingham, Vision Quest is a collection of landscape photographs taken using astral sensitive film. Bellingham travelled the world for this collection.
QUOTE ("Introduction by Yngvi")

To create proper art using astral sensitive film is challenging; the techniques involved require a much longer period of exposure, and so capturing short-lived astral phenomona is almost impossible. Landscapes are the ideal medium, at least for beginning works, because it is very seldom that the land changes significantly over such periods.

The sixteen plates of the hardbound collection are as follows:
1. A manaline running through the forests of the Salish-Shidhe
2. A stone henge at high noon on a summer day
3. A mass grave in the Yucatan
4. The Veil of Tír na nÓg, across the Irish Sea
5. The Great Wall of China, an aerial view
6. The Cermak Blast Crater, from above
7. The background count at a small Catholic shrine in Sicily
8. A patch of Mist in Brittany
9. An erupting volcano in the Phillipines
10. An astral eruption in Auvergne
11. A stark Antarctica landscape, the aurora austrailis barely visible
12. A vein of orichalcum in an Azanian diamond mine
13. A dragon line running along a street in Hong Kong
14. A full Earth rising, seen from orbit
15. An astral starscape, with a waxing moon in the center
16. The Amazonian Rainforest
(17.) Yngvi Bellingham included his own astral portrait as a final "bonus" leaf, it required him to sit completely still for over six hours as the photograph developed.

The Astral Slideshow Project
A bold initiative supported by enthusiasts worldwide, the ASP is a volunteer project dedicated to accumulating the definitive library of astral photographs. Users are rated by the quality and quantity of their additions, while non-users may access the project's archives for 50 nuyen.gif . "Collectors" have taken to printing out photographs in high-quality heavy-stock e-paper trading cards. These cards display holographic representations of the astral photographs, but by touching a corner the image is replaced with a standard entry describing the subject of the photograph. The collections are divided into categories such as spells, spirits and faeries; typical prices for a complete collection are 3,000 nuyen.gif

Dr. Bob™'s Guide to Getting a Magical Healer Certificate: 2064 edition
Doctor Roberta Camerone is the author of this study supplement, designed to assist magicians in preparing for the tests prequisite to obtaining a certificate to practice magical healing in the UCAS. The 2064 edition includes astral photographs of common diseases, poisonings, injuries and other maladies, along with quick reference guide.

Goodensnake's Madness
Thomas Goodensnake was a half-blood Pueblo and an artist adept. He was often given to drug-induced vision quests as a medium for his diviniations, disapearing into the desert for days at a time to purge his system, down a few buds of peyote and beat on his hand-made drum.

On one of these quests, Goodensnake was bit by a rattlesnake. Some say the venom entered his soul, because Goodensnake came back mad with knowledge and sick with ambition. He created a portfolio that made sensitives scream to touch it, and powerful magicians pale and sicken to view its contents. Copies have been circulated among the jaded mundanes who enjoy the emotions it presents, although the work is banned in most countries.
[ Spoiler ]


Six of the twenty-four plates are described below:
(title)
(description)
(emotional aspect)
1. "Wuxing"
Five toxic spirits of the elements, one of each type, fighting one another.
(Transcendant Madness)

2. "Blood"
A masked Aztec priest gutting a young elf girl.
(Sadistic pleasure)

3. "Barrow"
A ghoul ork feasting on her unInfected twin's intestines.
(Hunger for Metahuman Flesh)

4. "Consumption"
A thin human child, on the verge of death by starvation, his aura wasting away. The child is astrally perceiving, and can see he is surrounded by shedim spirits.
(Physical sickness)

5. "Samedi"
A serviteuer possessed by a Petro Spirit; the Baron is posing for the photograph as it wears the sorry flesh like a new suit.
(Complete surrender of Self)

6. "Hive"
A pregnant troll woman being invested with a wasp spirit.
(Alientation from other metahumans)

File #666 - MCT Unit 13 Private Library
The infamous File #666 contains detailed descriptions of astral signatures, with astral photographs, for some of the world's most powerful and notorius magicians; both metahuman and otherwise. The file is said to include, although not be limited to, Wu Lung Wei, the Great Dragon Ghostwalker, an entity known as "Gestalt" observed in Aztlan, Ehran the Scribe and others...

Mitsuhama's Unit 13 maintains the file in a secret vault within their Kyoto library.
ShadowDragon8685
Twisted. Just twisted. smile.gif
bclements
Wu Lung Wei?

And yes, very twisted. Good job.
Supercilious
Those are getting some game time...
hobgoblin
hmm, these may well belong just as much in deadlands: weird west as in shadowrun biggrin.gif

just shows that with the right view on things you can get SR to support any game style nyahnyah.gif
Ryu
"Goodensnake's Madness: Barrow" will soon be changing location and owner.

Thank you!
Lady Door
I'm a little worried that my first thought after reading these is that my Petro Voudoun is going to have sooo much fun! *squeal*
nick012000
Umm... how did these get made? Technology can't detect magic.
ShadowDragon8685
And yet there's such a thing as FAB-III bacteria.

"Technology" is simply the art of taking what is available to you and manipulating it in the most advantageous way possible. This means that yes, technology can interact with magic, by employing such things as FAB-3.
Conskill
QUOTE (nick012000)
Umm... how did these get made?

Probably with the use of some Awakened biological medium that has been engineered to change color based on the presence and intensity of various astral energies.

I'd personally take the concept in a bit different direction than a direct photograph, but it's a neat idea and there's enough preliminary stuff in the setting already to make it a feasible leap.
Ancient History
Let Uncle Ancient give a lesson.

In State of the Art: 2064, in amid the spy gear, is given astral-sensitive film. It's based on the older silver dageurrotype film, and takes a great deal longer to set up and take the damn picture than your favorite disposable camera.

Now, add in that Adepts with the Virtuoso metamagic can create masterpieces, which are objects d'art with a background count, aspected toward a given emotion.

Photography as art form. Astral photography as magical masterpieces. Keen, eh?
blakkie
QUOTE (Conskill @ Sep 8 2005, 04:19 AM)
QUOTE (nick012000 @ Sep 8 2005, 01:16 AM)
Umm... how did these get made?

Probably with the use of some Awakened biological medium that has been engineered to change color based on the presence and intensity of various astral energies.

Somebody read some dubious material about photographing ghosts or auras and figured "hey, wouldn't it be cool to say they've been taking pictures of the astral all along and didn't know it"?
blakkie
QUOTE (Ancient History @ Sep 5 2005, 11:34 AM)
14. A full Earth rising, seen from orbit

Very low orbit? Is this feasible? Wouldn't the mana warp completely obliverate any discernable view of the giasphere? So this would be like taking a picture in a brightly lit room, through a steamed up window, of a man 300m away outside in the dark?
Ancient History
If you took it from, say, the Moon, it would be like pointing out the bright spot that miht be the sun in LA smog. But from low-earth orbit, geosynched? You can probably get a decent picture. Pick out the Great Wall of China, maybe.
Crusher Bob
From what I remember then mana starts running out at around 100 miles up, you can see plenty at ~500,000 feet.
blakkie
QUOTE (Ancient History)
If you took it from, say, the Moon, it would be like pointing out the bright spot that miht be the sun in LA smog. But from low-earth orbit, geosynched? You can probably get a decent picture. Pick out the Great Wall of China, maybe.

The 100 mile high pictures, ya no problem there. Even a bit farther out in lesser warp territory i can see making out fuzzy images through the distortion.

But i still don't get why anything that is interacting or influenced by the astral in a serious mana warp isn't just getting the total work over. This isn't just a little irritant in space, it is brain frying time for anyone/anything stupid enough to try mess with it.
Foreigner
QUOTE (Ancient History)
You can probably get a decent picture. Pick out the Great Wall of China, maybe.

A.H. :

First, let me say that I don't mean to dispute you--after all, you're one of the most knowledgeable people here--but I seem to recall reading that the Great Wall of China is not visible from orbit.

The belief that it is is a common misconception, and one which might not apply 50-odd years from now--although I grant you that this might not be true with astrally-sensitive film.

--Foreigner
Crusher Bob
You can try taking a look for yourself, personally, I couldn't find it, though I only spent a few minutes looking...
Ancient History
Oops. Damn you, public school! <shakes_fist>

Okay. So you probably can't see that big-ass man-made manaline from space. <shrug> Maybe you could pick out Tibet, though.
Sunday_Gamer
Cute. I personaly wouldn't use it. Astral space is already messed up enough, they keep contradicting themselves. According to the basic guidelines however, astral perception is a psychic phenomenon. I would never allow a camera to capture astral space, it goes against all the tenets of astral spaces nature, I don't care what SOTA says, guy who wrote it was talking out his ass for the sake of making "neat gear". No thanks.

Now if they were paintings, that would be different.

Overall though, neat idea.

Sunday
Conskill
QUOTE (Sunday_Gamer @ Sep 8 2005, 10:42 AM)
According to the basic guidelines however, astral perception is a psychic phenomenon.

Heh. This is the meat of what I meant with "I'd take it a different way."

I have no problem with the idea of material sensitive to astral energy, but in my interpretation of Astral Space (and my own RL bias on the concept), I'd rule that an astral photograph doesn't show remotely the same thing that an Awakened "sees."

It might still be quite useful, even pretty, but at best it'd lack some essential psychic stimuli, most likely it wouldn't even use the same range of colors and visual stimuli.

The basic idea could still work, with two things in mind.

1) Mundanes have no clue what Astral Space really looks like. You could show them practically anything and say "Here's Astral Space!"

2) The photographs would still probably be internally consistant. While a photograph would be useless for a mage to read, two photographs of the same phenomonon would be recognizable. This could easily become a strong, objective tool in foresenic magic.
Ancient History

Astral perception covers a sensorium beyond those we know - you could realistically apply it as a distinct sense which magicians can do no more than offer rough metaphors because no equivalent sensations exist to mundanes. As simsense demonstrates, this sensory range cannot be properly captured or recorded. Any mundane description or rendition of the astral will thus be inherently flawed. So ka.

But, on the other hand, astral sense is highly tuned to sight in most cultures, specifically the when you reference the colors of the aura. This isn't a comprehensive trait, but it is predominant. Furthermore, there are occaisions which offer a perception of the astral available to mundanes - specifically, the spirit power Astral Gateway, the spell Astral Window, the conditions known as Astral Shallow and Astral Rifts and the magical compound Altyrre.

In most cases - astral gateways, astral rifts and altyrre - the mundane may be said to be using latent or inherent structures in their brain (or soul, or consciousness) to correctly perceive the astral as magicians do - because they physically occupy the astral plane.

With the astral window and astral shallow, however, it may be construed that the astral is rendered in terms of mundane senses. Essentially, the fourth-dimensional (astral) aspect of an object becomes represented in three-dimensional space, and that representation is what is viewable by astral photography. The exact mechanism of this is funky, natch, be it the collection of astral light onto mana-sensitive silver implements in the development of the photographs, the use of astral-sensitive pigments (such as those shown to exist in certain paracritters) or some more arcane process.

So, anyone viewing an astral photograph isn't seeing the same thing as an astrally perceiving magician, just a highly limited single-sense representation of the astral scene. Enough for a skilled aura reader or theoretical thaumaturge or forensic magician or accupuncture healer or psychic detective to work with, say, although far from the depth and accuracy available to most magicians.

QUOTE (Sunday_Gamer)
Now if they were paintings, that would be different.


Nah.
Nyxll
If I recall in 2nd ed a photograph taken with a SLR camera and film will capture the astral, so a mage could perceive the photograph and see astral signatures within.

Is this correct?

If that is correct, I assume that the astral film will take a snapshot of the astral and show it to the mundane. Is this assumption correct?

Ancient History
QUOTE (Nyxll)
If I recall in 2nd ed a photograph taken with a SLR camera and film will capture the astral, so a mage could perceive the photograph and see astral signatures within.

Is this correct?

No.

QUOTE
If that is correct, I assume that the astral film will take a snapshot of the astral and show it to the mundane.  Is this assumption correct?


Also no, but you're closer. Astral-sensitive film will develop a photograph - you still see the physical, but astral impressions within the area are also captured, and rendered visible to mundanes. There is nothing magical about the photograph itself: it's just a graphic. This isn't a snap-shot, either - the techniques requires long exposure times, ideally suited to sterile crime scenes and landscapes. Portraitures and exhibitions require the subject to maintain their poses for long periods of time, else the picture will be flawed or appear to have some optical illusion.
hahnsoo
Why am I thinking of "Red Dragon" (and the parody done in "South Park")...

"Do you see? Do you see?"
hobgoblin
so this is how the star records and archive astral spell fingerprints?
Ancient History
One possible way, although the current cost is probably prohibitive. No, the Star undoubtably relies on written descriptions of spell signatures, with general notes on similarities of theme that might occur among various traditions, schools, colleges, groups and teachers.
Supercilious
PS: AH, I like your comment on decks in System Failure.
Ancient History
Heh.
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