Production Notes

Train Information
'This picture summarises for me some of the social upheavals occurring at the time the game was set. The industrial revolution was getting into full swing, technological change seemed fantastic, and the cities were growing fast. Unheard of wealth was being created, while a few upstarts became fabulously wealthy, many became uprooted. And although people were generally better off than they had ever been before, a general unease, and the desire for social change, was rampant. Here Croation vegetable growers come into Vienna to supply the wants of the inhabitants. Ref 154','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/engHC.htm','engHC','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=540,height=350')">                                                                                                             n                 <td width="19%"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/hitBT" width="40" height="24" border="0"></a> <td width="17%"> <img src="images/wri/hist/th/hitAT" width="32" height="40" border="0"></a> <td width="19%"> <img src="images/wri/hist/th/cofrT" width="40" height="26" border="0"></a> <td width="17%"> <img src="images/wri/hist/th/gdesT" width="40" height="27" border="0"></a> <td align="right" width="18%" nowrap="nowrap"> <img src="images/wri/hist/th/estT" width="40" height="26" border="0"></a> <td width="4%"> <td width="6%" height="42"> <td width="19%" height="42"> <img src="images/wri/hist/th/engDT" width="45" height="19" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%" height="42">                   <img src="images/wri/hist/th/portT" width="34" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="19%" height="42">                   <img src="images/wri/hist/th/engT" width="40" height="27" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%" height="42">                   <img src="images/wri/hist/th/engbelT" width="40" height="27" border="0"></a>                <td align="RIGHT" height="42" width="18%">                   <img src="images/wri/hist/th/frpacT" width="45" height="17" border="0"></a>                <td width="4%" height="42">                 <td width="6%">                 <td width="19%"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/parfT" width="40" height="27" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%">                   <img src="images/wri/hist/th/corHT" width="29" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="19%">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','This picture appears in a number of books on the Orient Express, and it is the only picture from the period that I had to work from that showed the bathroom and the doors to the compartments. I matched the pattern of the leadlight, and the door motif, as closely as possible. The wood panelling and many of the brass fittings were based on photographs of the surviving coach in Athens, which had been stripped of all leadlight work long ago. See a render of the recreated compartment I did from a similar angle to this photograph below. Ref 105.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/baH.htm','baH','resizable=yes,width=480,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/baHT" width="32" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','While Jordan and Tomi and their helpers did a wonderful job researching their story, the material they gathered was nowhere near what was necessary to recreate the Orient Express accurately for the game. They had obtained some poor quality plans from some railway enthusiasts in Paris sufficient for laying out the plot, and had taken photographs of the surviving coaches not the most suitable for building a recreation. Marabeth and I went to Greece and Hungary to re-photograph the surviving cars. Another real breakthrough came when I found a very old German railroad enthusiasts book in a small bookshop in London. It contained quite detailed plans of ALL the Wagon Lits (Orient Express) coaches, including some elevations, along with a handful of pictures from the period. This picture of the salon of an Orient Express car in 1913, a photograph not shown here of a compartment of the same era, and the picture on the far right of this row, were what I used to build the chairs, and many of the fittings, in the train in the game. Ref 161.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/salHB.htm','salhb','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=530,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/mak/th/salhBT" width="30" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td align="RIGHT" width="18%">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','Another view of the same coach shown in the previous picture. The design on the ceiling was regarded as \'Italian\'.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/salit.htm','salit','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=360,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/salitT" width="26" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="4%">                 <td width="6%" height="14">                 <td width="19%" height="14">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','This is another photograph of a salon on the real train. Rather than copy any one coach exactly, something I did not really have enough information to do, I combined elements from the two restaurant and salon coaches that I could still find pictures of. The pattern on the ceiling on the coach in the game was painstakingly copied from this sole remaining picture of it, shown here, and combined with the fittings and furniture as shown in the other coach for which I had found period pictures. The ceiling of the other coach was finished in a mock Italian style (as in the previous photographs), which I didn\'t think reflected the style of the time very well (and which I thought was pretty ugly too. Like the sleeping car, the main layout and panelling I gleaned from the hundreds of photographs I took of the surviving example. Ref 161.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/salHA.htm','salhat','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=620,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/salHAT" width="40" height="32" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%" height="14">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','Most of the fabrics and carpets used as textures in the game were painstakingly traced from digitally enhanced enlargements of the handful of historical photographs I could find. This carpet in the sleeping cars was recreated in this way, as was the pattern on the roof, and the pattern on the blinds on the car with the red carpet. The other sleeping car, and the dining car, had this pattern however, from 1905, which was a textile produced in various materials, and was made in Germany. Ref. 24','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/blnd.htm','blnd','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=440,height=300')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/blndT" width="40" height="26" border="0"></a>                <td width="19%" height="14">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','The pattern on the blinds in the compartment coach with red carpet in the corridor looks a little ugly, but was actually the most historically accurate one - I traced the pattern from a digital enhancement of this photograph showing a blind peeping through the doorway in the trade show exhibit shown here that demonstrates the luxurious accommodations on the Orient Express just before the beginning of the first world war. This photograph also provided the style of the glassware in the compartment bathroom, along with the pattern on the blankets, which were all faithfully recreated. Smoking Car had to change the color of the blankets because of the limited palette of colors available to the game designers; you can see renders of the compartment as it should be in the multimedia section of my on-line folio on this website. There is an \'Easter egg\' in the game where you get a view of the bathroom from within a glass if you click somehow on one of the glasses. It was made by one of the people hired to set the camera angles and render the scenes used in the game who was fascinated by the bezier-based models used in much of the game. (For more on this, see the \'Techniques\' section of this website.) Ref 79.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/disco.htm','disco','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=440,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/discoT" width="31" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%" height="14">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','This clock was chosen to be on the train more because of its ugliness than its beauty - it looked like a piece that nobody would steal. All the period photographs I found did not show any timepieces on the train at all, but Jordan and Tomi\'s story demanded the presence of one, and this was the original of the one I modelled. The caption in ref. (6) reads - The gilded clock has been conceived in a marked asymmetrical form, and although it is strongly curved it achieves perfect balance. It is also unsigned, and is probably French. A young girl and a cluster of irises support the clock face, which is modern. I replaced the face with one I copied from another clock of the period in reference. The part of this website on the making of the Last Express goes into some detail about how I reproduced this complex clock in the game. Ref 6','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/wri/hist/html/cloc.htm','cloc','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=280,height=440')"><img src="images/wri/hist/th/clocT" width="24" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td align="RIGHT" height="14" width="18%">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','A computer render I did of the train salon I made for the game that never appeared in the game. Moving the chairs was impossible of course, as it would have affected all the characters\' motion.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/ill/html/salP.htm','sal','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=440,height=440')"><img src="images/ill/th/sal" width="40" height="40" border="0"></a>                <td width="4%" height="14">                 <td width="6%" height="8">                 <td width="19%" height="8"><a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','The finished corridor of the sleeping coach, where much of the action in the game takes place. The fabric on the seats on the remaining car in Athens was very old, and seemed to vaguely match some of those in period photographs, so I used that fabric for the seats in the game. Although terribly faded in the coach in Athens, it was definitely green. All but one of the photographs from the period that I could find were in black and white (the one that wasn\'t is reproduced above showing the trade show display of the beds in an Orient Express compartment), so I chose colors for the rest of the coach that went along with the green fabric of the seats of the remaining car in Athens. Thus the roof became a pale duck-egg blue, the carpet was a green blue, and the doors panelled in green and gold, and that is how it appears here.','TEXTAREA');MM_displayStatusMsg('Refresh introduction/instructions by mousing over title graphic');return document.MM_returnValue" onClick="MM_openBrWindow('images/ill/html/corP.htm','cor','scrollbars=yes,resizable=yes,width=410,height=440')"><img src="images/ill/th/cor" width="30" height="45" border="0"></a>                <td width="17%" height="8">                   <a href="#" onMouseOver="MM_changeProp('document.forms[0].textfield','document.forms[0].textfield','value','The train in the game had two sleeping coaches, and while creating the green one shown previously, I did further research, and found a number of references to the familiar red carpets of the Orient Express, so for the second coach, which we wanted to look different from the first, it became obvious that it should have a red carpet. I had also come across the colored picture showing the three bunks, and the blinds in the corridor were changed to match it. So although I think the coach with the red carpet is less aesthetically pleasing than the one with the green, it is probably the more accurate.',


 * 'Here is a render I made of the model I created for the game, taken at a similar angle to the period photograph (above) on which it was based. The period photographs did not show the ceiling, and that pattern was adapted from decorations created at that time, and reprinted in the Dover historical reprints series.',


 * 'Here is the computer rendered train in all its glory, heading out of the station, while the hero of the story tries to board from a moving motorcycle. This picture only appeared in a single advertisement, in Wired magazine in the US as far as I know, heavily gamma \'corrected\' courtesy of the art director at Saatchi and Saatchi, so it was very dark, and was surrounded by a fairly tacky \'nouvea\' style border (which would have been pretty passe even at the time the game was set in 1914.)',


 * 'Apparently few people travelled light in those days, and luggage was very important. This scene is a typical load at London\'s Victoria Station, awaiting cross-Channel shipment. I actually used some the stickers shown here on some of the luggage in the game. I used period stickers gleaned from many other sources as well. Some bags were modelled on luggage still available today from Louis Vuitton Ref 81, 102',


 * 'Although the action here took place in France, I chose a classic American bike, a 1914 1000 cc Indian V-Twin, an expensive bike then, and a very expensive one now. Ref 59',


 * 'A render of the bike by itself - it took me less than a day to model it, as the shapes were quite simple and well suited to current computer modelling software. The final picture of it with the locomotive is the large image to the upper right - it doesn\'t really do the motorcycle justice.',


 * 'A still frame from the logo animation I did for Smoking Car, the production company for the Last Express, showing the Gare de l\'Est. You can see a selection of reduced still frames from the animation in the animation section of my on-line folio on this website. It basically involved a long camera move from a group of poor people close to the large garbage dump that happened to be nearby Gar de L\'Est. It appears as a stand-alone AVI file on the CD, perhaps Macintosh users can finally access it if they have Quicktime 3 installed, which in theory at least supports AVI playback, but I haven\'t tried this myself. In order to play it back at a the correct frame rate, technical \'experts\' at Smoking Car assured me that they had to compress the hell out of the file, and the one shipped with the game lost a lot of quality, and still does not play back very smoothly. An uncompressed (except for web JPEG) still-frame is shown here.',


 * Here are some of the staff of the Orient Express of the time the game was set. The game\'s producers went to some trouble to match this illustration. Ref. 40.'

Historical Information

 * 'The very wealthy in the United States, and to a lesser extent in Europe, had their own luxurious railway coaches, and it was this fact that allowed Jordan to add a fantasy car to this train of the Orient Express, and still remain at least within the bounds of a possible reality. I was told of this car when I was recruited, and shared Jordan and Tomi\'s vision of showing some of the finest art and design of the time in the decor of the coach, and while working on the other cars, heavily researched the possibilities for the coach. This render of the outside of the coach I did was never used in the game.'


 * 'Here is a render of the interior of Kronos\' coach as it appeared in the game. I provided most of the research, and layed out possible alternatives for art, furniture, and design to Jordan Mechner, who kept a close on eye on it, and had final say on what went in. I had never promised speed for this job, but quality and low cost (which was pretty well limited to speculative royalties). I was unwilling to compromise on quality because I knew just how good the work had to be if I was to have any chance of any money from royalties. Despite my huge investment in the success of the project (three years plus for little pay), I was unfortunately completely left out of the management decision-making process throughout - my input was limited to artistic and historical choices and suggestions. And to make matters worse, it was my \'assistant\' within Smoking Car Productions, Patrick Ladislav, who took it on himself to art direct the subcontractor making Kronos\' coach, Brian Levy in Alias Poweranimator. (Kevin Clarke and David King created most of the textures in Kronos car and retouched all Brian Levy\'s renders in Photoshop to more closely match my renders of the other coaches.) But I took the project on mainly as a learning experience, and that it certainly was. Hopefully through this website, others can benefit from my mistakes, and my research.',


 * But enough of the politics of the Last Express - back to the much more interesting history of design. Kronos coach body was based on a real one on my recommendation. This is the interior of it, a very showy restaurant car, complete with curved window frames, built in 1900. Ref 79.',


 * This was the pattern that Smoking Car chose to put on the end walls of Kronos\' private coach - actually an early nouveau design that in some ways helped start the brief fashion of Art Nouveau. The styling of the interior is by Victor Horta, in 1893, and is the entrance hall of the Hotel Tassel in Brussels. Ref 27.',


 * 'This was my rejected proposal for the end walls in Kronos\' car. I was never clear about why it was rejected, it seemed to have something to do with difficulties communicating with the contractor. This demo took me a day or so to do. Oh, what might have been. At least I can show it off here.',


 * 'A scene of Kronos\' bedroom in his private coach from the game.'


 * This chair, especially when modelled and rendered in Alias software by Brian Levy as it appeared in the game, looks almost TOO contemporary, but this chair was designed by Koloman Moser in 1902, a member of the Viennese Secession, an art and design movement started to formalize a break away from traditional aesthetic values, as of course was the famous artist Klimt.',


 * 'Although the chair in the previous picture looks mighty contemporary, here it is in a photo from the time it was designed, the interior of the hallway of Sanatorium Purkersdorf, 1906. The chairs are made of painted beech with painted cane seats. Although the original Purkersdorf chairs have long since vanished from the building, which I guess is still there, they are still available in modern-day re-editions. Ref 14, 158.',


 * 'This table was designed by Hoffman in 1904, another member of the Viennese Secession. It was custom made and designed for a member of the very wealthy classes, like most of the earlier Art Nouveau, Arts and Crafts and early Modernist styled work of the turn of the last century. This piece was made for the Koller apartment.',


 * 'The bed by the French designer Louis Majorelle. The Paris Exposition Universele in 1900 established Majorelle as what some say was of the preeminent cabinetmaker of the era. A few years into the twentieth century, however, the structure of the French economy began to shift, and with it the character of the furniture market. The wealthy private clients who had supported Majorelle\'s most exorbitant ventures became more cautious, although the new bourgeois market began to demand large editions of relatively inexpensive good quality furniture. Majorelle\'s celebrity had faded by the start of the war. He rebuilt and reopened his Nancy atelier in 1919 after it had been badly bombed during hostilities, but his subsequent attempts to embrace the new modernist style remained undistinguished. Ref 64',


 * 'This wild chair was designed by Italian Carlo Bugatti, and was displayed at the Turin Exposition in 1902, and now rests in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. (Some rich tobacco farmer fell in love with it?) I thought Bugatti was just SO Kronos, caftan and all, and wanted to include some other Bugatti pieces in the coach, but they were incredibly complex to build, and so weren\'t done. Bugatti specialized in over-the-top expensive one-off pieces. At the time, the prominent English designer, William Morris, was very publicly concerned with establishing guilds that specifically protected the craftsman like Bugatti and his way of life according to medieval ideals. But the aspect of Morris\' writings (see Ref 161) that interested Europeans most according to historians was the vital importance of one\'s daily environment, and the belief that its simplicity, restraint, and fitness for purpose in the home, office, or streets could influence people for the good. The means of which the economic expansion of the 1890\'s had been achieved - better communications, faster forms of travel, more powerful industrial machinery greater numbers of workers employed in factories and offices - had made European cities even busier, more crowded, noisy and dirty. The plain interiors offered by the Arts and Crafts movement, full of calm and integrity, present a haven of peace and clear thinking. Sounds familiar. Ref 33.',


 * 'The distinctive high-backed dining chair by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, the Scottish designer of the Art Nouveau. Comfort was not a prime consideration; upholstery was very simple - this chair has a rush seat, and the back of the chair was hardly shaped to match that of a human back. Mackintosh\'s later commissions from around 1912 tended to be less exciting than his earlier work. In 1920, he moved to France to pursue an interest in painting. Ref 113.',


 * 'Although these Viennese chairs did not appear in the game, they were in all the major European stations of the time, and in cafe\'s and restaurants all across the continent. Although some don\'t consider Thonet\'s bentwood chairs truly part of the modernist movement, because their design harkens to an earlier time of decoration and curves, they were amongst the first quality chairs to be mass produced. A page from their catalogue of 1904 is reproduced here. Ref 154.',


 * 'We tried to make all the bric a brac as accurate as possible in the game - at least by making sure that they were of the correct period. This matchbox was from the London Match firm Bryant and May. It is a brand that started out as Swan White Pine Vestas in 1897, which was shortened to Swan Vestas in 1906. The Swan changed direction in 1959, just in case you were interested. Ref 122.',


 * 'This striking drawing from Vienna in 1900 shows artists were aware of the rising pro-war feelings in Europe, and that not everybody agreed with them. By Carl Otto Czeschka, an artist who also caught the Art Nouveau wave of the time. This drawing also captured the viewpoint that was proposed in the plot of the game, so I knew Jordan would go for it. I\'m more inclined to think \'the people\' were less innocent than shown here. Ref 153.',


 * 'The poster-child artist of the era, to late twentieth century eyes at least, was Klimt. Despite the wonderful feeling of light and happiness, with its controlled freedom and decadence, of Klimt\'s work, it still has a swirling darkness about it, portending the troubles ahead. This frieze covered a whole wall in a gallery of the time. \'Malevolent Powers\', a detail of the Beethoven Frieze, 1902, from left to right the characters are: the three gorgons Disease, Madness and Death, the giant Typhon, Lust, Unchastity, Excess and Devouring Grief. Great stuff. Ref 14, 86.',


 * 'While Klimt\'s gilded ladies are always associated with the turn of the last century (one of his works adorns a wall of Kronos\' car), Egon Schiele is another artist always featured in books covering art of the era. Schiele\'s dark nudes seem to show another side of the times than the idealized lives of the wealthy few as shown by Klimt. I suggested somehow including some of Shiele\'s work in the game - Jordan thought his work was too disgusting. He was probably right. This disturbing watercolor was done in Vienna, probably around 1911.',


 * 'In 1893, at a Secessionist exhibition in Munich, the German painter Stuck showed the painting that has perhaps had the greatest success and received the greatest attention of all his works, and this is it. \'Sin\' depicts Eve in the sinuous coils of the serpent, framed like a religious icon, representing what was regarded then as a modern representation of moral vacuum. According to art historians, it not only established firm contact with the taste of his day on the surface, in a time when painting was an art-form followed by the public, \'but penetrated the psyche of the Zeitgeist.\' By 1913, Stuck was 50, and still successfully painting Symbolist art and society portraits, and was at the pinnacle of his social career. But after the turmoil of the First World War, and its cultural, economic and political aftermath, the following generation found it impossible to identify with Stuck\'s world. The art movement identified in Germany with the figure of Pan had finally ceased to exist during the war. Stuck\'s qualities as a teacher of composition at the Munich Academy were never questioned though, either at this time, or after his death in 1928. He himself may have totally rejected the new art movements, but it was still possible for a future teacher at the Bauhaus, the German artist Josef Albers, to study with him as late as 1920. Ref 156.',


 * 'This is the music room in the house of the creator of the previous image, Stuck. I put it in this historical backgrounder because it struck me that somehow the guy was trying to do multimedia without a computer here. I particularly like the universe on the ceiling! A few years after his painting \'Sin\' had created a sensation, Stuck installed the picture, which had become a neo-heathen cult image, as the focal point for what he called an \'altar to art\', another multimedia extravaganza, with sculpture, interior design, and lighting all being exercised to make a combined effect. Ref 156.',


 * 'A Tiffany standard lamp, produced by the company from 1902 to 1919. Tiffany glass went WAY out of fashion after a comparatively brief burst of being a must-have around the turn of the century for the fashionable nouveau rich especially. The lamps were expensive when they were new, but now Tiffany is back in vogue again, and in very limited supply - this lamp probably would go for over a hundred thousand dollars today.',


 * 'While I would have liked everything in Kronos\' car to have existed in real life, this was not to be, as I was neither the boss, the art director, or the modeler for the car. But I did provide practically all of the research for the items featured, and gave those creating the car recommended references to select from when building it. The wall lights became an amalgamation, based largely on this table lamp from the Vereinigte Werkstatten in 1900 in Germany, combined with another German light in the next picture. Ref 24.',


 * 'This was the light the ceiling groups were based on, an Art Nouveau example by Messing, from Prague around 1900. Ref 128.',


 * 'This German wall light was designed in 1908 by K. Koenig. There is a variant of this lamp in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. It was this lamp that was the inspiration for twisting the quite well known table lamp in the previous picture to become a wall mounted light fitting in Kronos\' coach. Ref 132.',


 * 'Here we have what was really a trade show in Munich 1912. The lights here formed the other element of inspiration for those hanging in Kronos coach. The European tradition of trade shows is alive and well all over the world, seeing this one of eighty-five years ago really filled out my impressions of the era. Ref 132.',


 * This lamp inspired a very similar one in Kronos\' coach. It is by Frenchman Emile Galle, considered the greatest master-craftsman in glass even within his own lifetime. He established his workshop in Nancy in 1874, and he died in 1904, but his firm continued to produced signed works by him. The different colors were made by layering different colored glass. Ref 113.',


 * 'The box that contained the magical egg has a beauty all its own.. My brief was to come up with something not too showy, but that was still stylish. I based it on an interesting, much larger chest, that was made in 1897, shown in the next picture.',


 * 'Here is the egg casket\'s progenitor. I moved the lock to the top, and used it as a hinge, while shortening the case to maintain the proportion. The chest, first exhibited together with furniture by Berlepsch-Valendas, Karl Bertsch, Pankok, and Riemerschmid at the Munich Glaspalast exhibition of 1897, was amongst the earliest examples of Jugendstil furniture in Munich. After the exhibition, it stood in the study of the artist\'s villa, maybe he couldn\'t part with it. In type, it recalls Gothic chests with iron fittings, but its structure and ornament are entirely original according to my reference, relating in terms of motif and linear design to Obrist\'s work in the textile medium. The chest originally rested on two beams, and now is in a Munich museum. Ref 24.',


 * 'A small section of the wall in Kronos\' compartment is decorated with a section of Moorish design, which was based on a pattern found in the magnificent Moorish palace, the Alhambra, in southern Spain, much of which was built in the 14th century. The Lion Court is shown here. In true European cliche tradition, the guy in the game with the Moorish artifact is a villain (and he\'s black to boot.) Ref 118.',


 * This carpet was used on Kronos\' floor, and is currently in a museum in Munich. It was made in 1903, by a German firm Smyrna-Teppichfabrik in Cottbus (Lausitz). While inspired by classical carpets, it certainly has a very contemporary feel to it - although it was made almost a hundred years ago. Ref 24.',


 * 'This is another piece designed by Koloman Moser. This interesting looking large box is in fact a desk and chair set. The one in Kronos\' car looks like it\'s a bit of a cross between two similar works, this is one shown here, and was made in 1903. This one was designed for the Charlottenlund Palace in Stockholm. Ref 158.',


 * 'Another picture of the Moser desk, a version made in 1904, showing how the clever, and attractive, contraption looks opened up. Ref 24.',


 * This picture was painted in 1913 by German Franz Marc, a member of the futurist movement of the time. This is not the actual painting that was used in Kronos\' coach, but a very similar one from the same period. According to historians, the Futurists embraced modern life \'as an agent for destruction which they welcomed with chilling enthusiasm.\' Futurists had great enthusiasm for scientific progress, and for war. Italian Futurists were especially passionate about their love of war. In one manifesto, they declared \'We will glorify war - the only true hygiene of the world - militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of the anarchist, the beautiful ideas which kill, and the scorn of woman. We will destroy museums, libraries, and fight against moralism, feminism, and all utilitarian cowardice.\' Needless to say, despite the extreme rhetoric to modern ears, these guys got their wish in two world wars soon to follow. Perhaps we have learned from their mistakes, although sometime I\'m not so sure. Some things have definitely changed though - imagine getting that passionate about museums? Ref 63',


 * 'This photograph of a street scene in 1913 in London shows plenty of streetlife, and is well worth the download if you want to get a feel for what it looked like at the time. It is of the Strand. Ref 103',


 * 'This picture, part of one taken in 1900 by Atget, shows how commercialism was alive and well in vibrant Paris of the day - posters and advertisement festooned any available wall. Note the tram tracks in the street, which is in the Quartier du Bel-Air. Ref 35.',


 * 'A Faberge egg - which became a symbol of the excesses of the czars. Like all artistic \'excesses\', it started small and tasteful, was hailed a great success, and just grew from there. If something is good, more of it just has to better, right? The Chanticleer Egg, on the left, possibly made in 1903, now belongs to another master of excess, Forbes. The first Imperial egg, made in 1885, is shown on the right. Ref 110.',


 * When Smoking Car came to me for ideas for Kronos\' coach, I chose this picture to embody the look that I envisaged, and they liked the idea. This room, and the furniture in it, was designed by an architect and designer whose name has become an adjective meaning \'over the top\'; Spaniard Antoni Gaudi, in 1906. Ref 27.',


 * 'While the look of the game was inspired by early Disney films, Alfons Mucha\'s work definitely provided a big inspiration to those creating the animated foreground art in the game; the characters, although by 1914 when the game is set, Mucha\'s work was very much out of fashion. The piece on the left is one of the more interesting of Mucha\'s earlier works, done as he approached the height of his career, in 1896/97. By 1902, the organic and sumptuous Art Noveau has already passed its zenith, although Mucha clung to the style he had made his own, and continued to work with it. Facing dwindling fame in Paris, in 1904 he left for America, where he stayed for six years, without gaining the success he had hoped for. In 1910, he returned to his native Czechoslovakia for good, and by 1912, had created the symbolist work shown at the right \'The Slave Epic, no. 3, Introduction of the Slavonic Liturgy to Great Moravia\'. Ref 5.',


 * 'I put this odd image in of some puppets from the turn of the last century here because I think it somehow makes a more personal statement about the aesthetic of the time. It also has some significance because modern computer graphicsa are quickly becoming powerful enough to tackle sophgisticated puppetry, and I\'m very interested in the development. Ref 155.'


 * Although the destinations of the Orient Express were major European cities, it\'s route was also through some of the bleakest, most forbidding scenery in Europe- through the Balkans, shown here. When researching the game, Marabeth and I took a Hungarian jet over these mountains while a new Balkans war raged, and they looked all the more bleak somehow. It seems to me that mountain dwellers (and small island dwellers like the British and Japanese) seem to have a long tradition of being particularly warlike. I think a big factor in this seems to be the geographic isolation of those places - Afghanistan, Azzabyjan, and the people of New Guinea spring immediately to mind. It strikes me that war seems to be the human race\'s unsophisticated cure for isolationism - look at the United States in World War 2, which was dragged kicking and screaming into the conflict, and look at the US now - strong peaceful political and economic ties throughout the world, especially with its erstwhile enemies Japan and Germany. I see modern communications technology - TV, movies, the internet, as the most peace-bringing technology yet devised by the human race because it so directly combats isolationism. Ref 157.'


 * This part of the historical information section focuses on the research I did for creating fantasy coach in the game, Kronos\' car. I was still finishing off the luggage, after completing the corridor, compartments, restaurant and lounge car, and the coach ends when Smoking Car hired another contractor, Brian Levy, to model and light this coach. But because I bought most of the books on which the car was based (see the bibliography link, left), and offered the range of suggested alternatives for objects and design, I can provide Last Express fans, and those interested in art and design of the period, with this historical backgrounder. Like much of the rest of this site, get more information in this text box about the various items by moving the pointer over the thumbnails. Moving the pointer over the heading graphic returns this text. And clicking on the thumbnails of course opens a window to a larger image, clicking on that image closes the window.'