Cyber-Video of the Day
The 2nd Doctor encounters the Cybus Cybermen in The Tomb of the Cybermen – a “What If?” style video from The Mind Robber.
Revenge of the Cybermen from In-Vision
Here is an in-depth look at the Revenge of the Cybermen from the old “In-Vision” series.
NOTE : while the text is probably still readable here (depending on your monitor anyway) it might be easier to read this on the page here as it displays in a slightly larger size without the sidebar.
Cyber-Video of the Day
The Cybermen and the Cybus Cybermen form an alliance…
The Body Electric
I’ve called this piece “The Body Electric”. It is another of my tinkerings with taking a very old anatomical illustration and subjecting it to a process of cybernetic conversion, the idea being to depict early experiments to produce a functional Cyberman and to consider what might lurk beneath their metal exteriors…
The title, “The Body Electric” comes from a book, “The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Foundation of Life” by Robert O. Becker and Gary Selden in which Becker, an orthopaedic surgeon, describes his research into “our bioelectric selves”. Becker set out to examine why normal bones heal, and then explore the reasons why bones fail to heal properly. His experiments were mostly with salamanders and frogs, and his scope was widened to studying regeneration after lesions such as limb amputation. He suspected that electric fields played an important role for controlling the regeneration process, and therefore mapped the electric potentials at various body parts during the regeneration. This mapping showed that the central parts of the body normally was positive, and the limbs negative. When a limb of a salamander or frog was amputated, the voltage at the cut was lessened —a phenomenon called the current of injury. In a frog, the voltage would simply change to the normal negative after some weeks, and no limb regeneration would take place. In a salamander, however, the voltage would eventually normalize —and the limb would be regenerated. The electric field changes turned out to be caused by currents in the nerves, and the limb regeneration occurred from red blood cells. Becker later observed several interesting properties of bones and bone growth, proposing that bones are semiconductors and piezoelectric in nature. These tie into the healing process by electrically stimulating bone marrow cells to differentiate into a form of adult stem cells which regrew the bone from within by regeneration. By applying external electrical stimulation in the proper form, he was able to induce bone healing in patients whose bones had failed to heal together. Later in his research, observing from prior research that silver had been used as an antibacterial material in the past, he used a combination therapy of silver with electrical stimulation to drive silver ions further into tissue to enhance its antibacterial action. With proper stimulation fibroblasts would dedifferentiate and apparently became able to form new cell types, leading to the possibility of wider uses for regenerative healing in humans and other animals.
Quote from “The Body Electric”: “the (‘positive silver’) technique makes it possible to produce large numbers of dedifferentiated cells, overcoming the main problem of mammalian regeneration – the limited number of bone marrow cells that dedifferentiate in response to electrical current alone. Whatever its precise mode of action may be, the electrically generated silver ion can produce enough cells for human blastemas; it has restored my belief that full regeneration of limbs, and perhaps other body parts, can be accomplished in humans.”
My bit of art simply plays with what the early Cybermen might have done with experiments of this kind, attempting to regenerate their failing bodies and adding ever more cybernetic technology to themselves in order to prolong their lives – at any cost. “We Will Survive” – or at least, a few bits might…
“The Doctor Who Redesign Project” Cybermen
The Doctor Who redesign project
– by Niklas Jansson
Cybermen
“Something old, something new, something borrowed, something… silver-ish.”
Design comments
- There was a hose going asymmetrically across the shoulder on an old concept art piece, I wanted have that asymmetry to break up the bilateralism.
- The bandy balls on the joints are from The Moonbase.
- The joint tubes and tight diving suit are from The Wheel in Space. The chest/shoulder (lower pecs) have a hard edge to them, giving the impression that there’s not a soft body under the suit there.
- The bandages are from The Tenth Planet, but I moved them to the wrists to break up the suit into parts, which serves to enhance the cyborg look. It also makes them look a bit like walking dead with a violent medical history.
- The face is from the new 2006 series Cybermen. If the steel mask is removed a bandage face from The Tenth Planet can be seen.
- The horns are an experiment.
- The gun is devenloped from The Tenth Planet belly flash weapon.
- The rust material on the horns are from a spaceship seen in The Revenge of the Cybermen. I also use this material on my Cybermen spaceship designs.
- I like Gun Metal / Brushed Metal. I don’t like shiny silver.
The Cybermen ships are partly inspired by the ships seen in Wheel of time, The Invasion, and Revenge of the Cybermen.
The Invader (longest ship) has a central honeycomb structure containing invasion ships. The main cannon is some kind of large accelerator, and there are also a bunch of ‘smaller’ turrets.
The transport is modular and can stretch on, repeating the cargo segments.
Other Doctor Who redesigns can be seen on the Doctor Who Redesign Project homepage here
We Shall Cast Off The Weakness Of The Flesh
I’ve called this image “We Shall Cast Off The Weakness Of The Flesh”.
This is just something I was playing with. It is based on a 16th Century anatomical study by Juan Valverde de Amusco called “Anatomia del corpo humano” which shows a cadaver apparently having removed its own skin with a knife to reveal the muscle structure beneath. I’ve (obviously) somewhat heavily added to this, giving the figure a “10th Planet” style Cyberman head (the original design from their first ever appearance on TV) and then rather gone to town on adding cybernetic life support systems to the body, and generally mucking about with things, playing on the idea of Mondas (the Cybermen’s home planet) being a dying world set adrift from a regular orbit to wander on its path and the Mondasians choosing to abandon their humanity in search of cybernetic immortality – as the Cybermen say, “We Will Survive”. In the Cybermen’s case, the shedding of their skins is both symbolic and literal, as along with their failing organic body parts they also chose to discard their other “limitations” – emotions – in favour of pure logic, and thus in the process of making themselves free from the “weaknesses of the flesh” – love, desire, hatred, ambition, joy (and so on) they become something less than human; true “monsters” – because they are in essence humanity without any saving graces, with no purpose other than survival for the sake of survival. Life in essence is only worth living because of the very limitations of the flesh; to discard ones humanity is to become a true Cyberman.
“You Will Be Like Us” – let’s hope not…
Random Cyber-thought…
Ever wondered if Cybus Industries developed Pacman on the parallel Earth? Cypacman……..
Cyberman Redesigns by Librarian-bot
I’ve added a page of Cyberman (re)designs from “Librarian-bot” – it is well worth having a look at the page here
Deconstruction
Deconstruction
by Kevin Hiley and Tim Reid
The Cybermen launch an attack on an asteroid in the middle of deep space.
Chinon, a member of the construction crew is the sole survivor.
Can Chinon stay alive long enough to discover their purpose? Or even worse avoid Cyber-conversion, a fate worse than death…
Deconstruction is a Cyberman fanfilm with very good production standards. It is downloadable for free from Westlake Films (and I have also included direct download links below).
Deconstruction : Trailer
Deconstruction : Part 1
Deconstruction : Part 2
Deconstruction : Part 3
Deconstruction : Part 4
Deconstruction Downloads
- Download MPEG Version – 147mb, 22mins
- Download WMV Version – 48mb, 22mins
- Download WMV Trailer – 3.51mb
Deconstruction Production Notes
from the Westlake Films web page
Deconstruction began on the back of “Help Wanted”. At the premiere we were all tremendously buoyed up by the quality of the film and looked around for ideas as to what we might do next. We all came from a Doctor Who fan background, and it was mooted that we do something with Cybermen. Now, Deconstruction already existed as an unfinished story in the collaborative “Random Fiction” project online, and it’s single main character and strong Doctorless plot suited what we wanted down to the ground. I came up with a glib but satisfying ending that night and we went off and slowly but surely drew our plans…
The driving force behind the film was Kevin Hiley, who had the skills and vision to imagine the practicalities of the shoot: Kev’s genius was to invent ways we could turn just 2 cyberman costumes into an army, shooting composite shots and split screen, and always knowing what he could add in post to turn a deserted rocky beach or a school into an asteroid surface or a futuristic base. Although I am credited as director it was a collaborative effort and while I had plenty of input into directing acting and story moments it was Kev who had the technical overview that has resulted in the film looking as good as it does.
The first shoot took place a short while after September 11th, 2001 in Glasgow and then Ardrishaig in Argyll, Scotland. We were supported and hosted by Kenny Davidson who served as location scout, police liason and corpse. After some location filming in Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Park with John Isles and Tanya Ni Mhuirthile for the flashback scenes, the crew moved to Ardrishaig and work began in earnest, and darkness. Our first night was spent on a precipitous and rocky beach, shooting the initial battle scene. It was tricky work, as our only sources of light were handheld torches and the generator powered redheads that were lighting for camera. We had borrowed a fog machine which kept tripping the safety switch on the genny and plunging us into darkness. Despite being largely unable to see out of their suits our two cybermen (Kevin Murray and Colin Bell) did us proud, stalking menacingly about in many different areas of a split screen shot, before getting out of the silver gear and into natty shades to be soldiers and shoot back at themselves. Once again Kevin showed his instincts were spot on when he had us record an aftermath shot of the cyber feet walking past a corpse. It’s one of my favourites.
We spent the rest of the time in Ardirshaig filming either at the school location, or at some minor locations found along the coast road. The rock face where Chinon discovers his colleague’s body was a wonderful find. Although I can’t remember whose idea it was, lighting it by simply putting the lights in shot as if they were knocked over in the battle was a great touch, and the establishing shot (now nicely embellished with CG) is another one of my favourites in the film, as Chinon’s battered silhouette stumbles up to the cliff face. I also remember spotting from the car the culvert that was to become the entrance to the underground tunnels. Kevin made it look fantastic by drawing a cyber logo onto it in post, but it was a nice location itself, with the overlooking balcony the perfect place to put the corpses and give us a moment for a flashback.
The initial filming at the school was when the smoke machine came into its own – apart from providing that war-torn look and a cloud of steam for the cybes to stride out of for their first proper appearance, it also was helpful in masking the vast quantities of graffiti on the school walls.
The last night was entirely spent on the centrepiece fight scene, and I feel it’s one of the strongest parts of the film. I think the scene hangs together brilliantly, and is genuinely exciting.
We later filmed interiors and some day for night exteriors around the RSAMD in Glasgow, using their now dismantled TV studio as both a studio and a location – its control room becoming a room we couldn’t have afforded to build as a set. Likewise its gloomy fire exit corridors became our underground tunnel, and the industrial look was just right for the piece.
A big thank you has to go to the guys in the suits, Colin & Kevin, who – as well as just enduring the suits – were a constant source of hilarity between takes and off set. Also, it’s down to John Isles, Andrew Crines and Gareth Preston that the film has now been finished. They’ve finished the edit and added the extra layer of sound alongside Peter Wicks’s ever-atmospheric music and this has brought the story to life. Thanks to everyone on the production, it’s fantastic to see it finished, and I hope everyone who downloads it or sees the DVD enjoys it.
When we started making it we had no idea that it would be released into a world where a new series of Doctor Who had grabbed a new audience and delighted the old, that once again the shops would be stuffed with Dalek merchandise and that Doctor Who would again be a must-see program. With the Cybermen to return to the series in 2006, we’re proud to release our film to hopefully remind people of their menace and whet appetites for the new era. Enjoy it, and do let us know what you think!
Tim Reid, February 2006.”
Cybermantra 