A Daily History of Holes, Dots, Lines, Science, History, Math, Physics, Art, the Unintentional Absurd, Architecture, Maps, Data Visualization, Blank and Missing Things, and so on. |1.6 million words, 7500 images, 4.9 million hits| Press & appearances in The Times, Le Figaro, Mensa, The Economist, The Guardian, Discovery News, Slate, Le Monde, Sci American Blogs, Le Pont, and many other places… 5000+ total posts since 2008.

Technical Drawing–Superb Shadowing, Shipboard Cannons, 1887

JF Ptak Science Books   Quick Post

  Shadow ship 515

Horace may have said “Pulvis et umbra sumus” (“We are but dust and shadow”)- and meant it, but the artist working here on this ship would definitely have replaced “dust” with “metal and wood”.  The details above and below are two very small bits (each about a half-inch long or so)  from a 15-inch long engraving of a Spanish torpedo boat, and published in The Engineer on 21 October 1887.  The workmanship is superb and the sense of design to me is absolutely glorious–the entire image of the plan of the ship is below. [The original is available from our blog bookstore.]

And another detail:

Shadow ship 516

 

 

 

 

 
Shadow ship 513

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