iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Elissa @elissablack.com · 23/09/2026

Time to re-watch my favourite video essay for the 67,128th time.

The title placard for "Los Angeles Plays Itself", a feature length video essay from 2004 by Thom Andersen.

Elissa @elissablack.com · 22/09/2026

In the lead-up to GTA VI coming out, I am watching a big 'ole pile of South Florida-set movies, some for the first time, some as I haven't seen them in a while. First up: Body Heat. I'd never seen it before. My review? It's good.

A grimy quad poster for Body Heat, black and white and grainy but for the title which is in red. William Hurt, naked but for a terrible moustache, kisses Kathleen Turner who just about looks like she's ready to climax due to sheer proximity to him.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 14/09/2026

It's not -gadgets- that I've lost excitement for, it's hating that what I"m usually being sold is just another hook, going into my skin, keeping me tethered to some corporate service or other.

The same XTEiNK 4 Pro, now running a new OS made by other people. The font is much more legible.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 14/09/2026

Yesterday I got my XTEiNK 4 Pro. Simple enough eReader. Had a play with it, nuked the OS and seamlessly installed CrossInk instead, turning it into a MUCH better device. That? That's the good feeling. The only good feeling a device can give me these days. When it lets me do what I want with it.

The XTEiNK 4 Pro, with the opening of Perfidia by James Ellroy on it. the font is pretty awful. Barely legible. Just not a nice thing to look at.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 14/09/2026

I remember, years ago, watching Apple keynotes and, corpo-fap aside, often being excited for some new device or other. Have felt the complete opposite for basically a decade at this point.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 12/09/2026

THE UFOs FROM OUTER SPACE! The only science fiction film which DARES ask the question... what if Martians were Aussies? Watch it now! youtu.be/XA_1cjceSDk

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 06/09/2026

Which is super interesting to me because I have almost exactly this model of Argus! Still takes wonderful photos, too. Mine is a newer model with a built in physical light meter (yes, really). So cool.

An Argus camera, much like the one in Indiana Jones, but with a little physical light meter slapped on top. You look through the little vents, find the one which just shows light through, move your slider and get your settings from the table on the top of the camera. Like a slide rule type thing.

A photo of some palm trees behind a graffiti'd garage. It's B&W and very hazy at the edges. Very vintage looking, despite being taken only in the last two years.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 01/09/2026

Final Steam Deck testing for Deck & Conn 1.0. (SteamDeck & Conn, lol). It won't be listed at launch as 'great on deck', but it is certainly playable. Even quite pleasant, given it's turn based. The controller needs to be set to virtual mouse on the trackpad and generic gamepad.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 30/08/2026

To write this I busted out my iPad and my typewriter style keyboard and shoved on a vinyl because Sunday. The irony was I couldn’t find a decent iPad minimalist text writing app so I just ssh’d into my Linux server and wrote it in vim.

An iPad sitting in an Ulanzi typewriter style blue tooth keyboard. The cover for the vinyl soundtrack from Chinatown is behind it on the table.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 19/08/2026

STEAMDeck & Conn? Look, it isn't a gamepad game and it's a bit fiddly for touch, but I'm delighted how well it actually plays on Deck.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 18/08/2026

Because I'm THAT kind of sicko, I've created an in-game digital checklist set for your WASP-Class corvette in Deck & Conn. Want a startup checklist for your nuclear-powered space corvette? 'Course ya do.

Deck & Conn, with a 'tablet' open on the side showing a digital checklist. It contains the startup procedures for the space craft in question, partly complete.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 08/08/2026

Camp Miasma was absolutely amazing. One of the best films I've ever seen, and so laser-targeted at my partner & I. Going back next week to take more friends to see it. Wild, powerful, deeply funny, horny and personal all at once.

The post for Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, with the tagline "Blood. Lust."

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 13/07/2026

Oh GODDAMNIT no! This is making me tear up. Going to re-watch Death in Brunswick tonight. I reckon my date will be into it. She has good taste, and we need to pour one out for this legend.

Death in Brunswick. Sam Neill, young and with a big shit-eating grinn on his face, prepares to throw a dart while John Clarke, another Kiwi legend who moved to Aus to continue a great career, lights a cigarette while staring seriously at the off-camera dart board.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 11/07/2026

After two and a half years…. It’s Strahd-killin’ time!

A D&D map on a table with tokens. Also wine. And other things.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 10/07/2026

Y'know what's great? This film. This film is great.

A poster (well, I think it's an older DVD cover I remember seeing) of Duel, Steven Spielberg's first flick.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 03/07/2026

Show me a cool physical game.

Ultima VII original black box edition with 5.25” disks out along with the cloth map.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 24/06/2026

Just learned that the game we all played in school when I was younger was NOT commonly played outside Australia. Despite having the same name as about 80 other sports/games. And my god the diagram on the wikipedia page sure is... unique. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handbal...

Some oatmeal-ass diagrams showing the basic rules of Handball, the game played in Australian, New Zealand and Kiwi schools.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 24/06/2026

Wandered into my local pub the other night with some friends to play pool. Some local guys had the table before us. They expected a group of girls to be bad at pool. When I start cleaning up, they're staring at me. "How long have you been playing pool?" one asks. I reply, "Since Duke Nukem 3D."

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 21/06/2026

I haven't seen it and don't plan to, but since I read the premise some time back, it sat weirdly. Then I read this and realised why.

A post by @rose_alibi on post.lurk.org over on Mastodon:

It seems like real weird timing to choose to tear apart the mythos of Robin Hood.

"The dude who famously stole from the rich and gave to the poor was actually really bad" is not the message we need currently.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 20/06/2026

It's been a few months. So I guess it's time to re-watch Deadwood.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 17/06/2026

Trans Backrooms, but oops-all-elevators. (Video doing the rounds on Chinese social media. Allegedly in Beijing.)

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 12/06/2026

Matthew Rhys does "guy who doesn't believe in the supernatural but is slowly beginning to suspect he may have been wrong about that" face real great.

Matthew Rhys as the Sheriff in Widow's Bay, hugging a leather paper folio and sitting behind a desk, a look on his face somewhere between concern and disbelief.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 04/06/2026

Okay, but does it make coffee as good as my THREE thousand dollar machine... that I didn't pay for? I'll save my $79 thank-you-very-much.

It's glorious, isn't it? The gold sheen. The beautiful reflections. The steampunk energy. The weirdly fascist eagle on the top. As my Spanish friend said, "Wait, they make fascist coffee machines now?" I guess the Italians just love eagles and fascism. It's not real gold though, it's copper and brass. It IS a real coffee machine though.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 04/06/2026

I felt enormous validation when I realised Q has the same taste in coffee machines as me. How did I miss this while playing! (Mine is an Elektra, and if Q's isn't, it's a very very similar model of the same design. They were immediately post-WW2 designs.)

A bronze & copper Elektra Micro Casa, a beautiful extremely mechanical coffee machine. Think a steampunk version of an aeropress, in a sense.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 03/06/2026

On the final 'lost' ep of Miami Vice before all that's left is the finale. The show got worse as it went on, more or less. From the most epic needle drops, cinematography and editing on TV to muddy crap. But this ep... it's got the goddamn juice. (Though epic cinematography aside, it's DAAARK.)

A beautiful, colourful hazy beach shot of a car parked on Miami Beach next to a small stand and some people. The colours are just gorgeous, a perfect sky, a perfect ocean, and a perfect rich sand colour.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 03/06/2026

On the last few eps of my Miami Vice watch and discovered Pam Grier looking ABSOLUTELY STYLISH AS FUCK.

Pam Grier. Pam fucking Grier. Pam HOLY FUCKING SHIT THAT'S A LOOK Grier. Pam. Grier.

Honestly, I can't even do this outfit justice. I just can't. She looks gay as fuck.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 26/05/2026

Stevenson playing BLACKBEARD in later seasons is a highlight in a show full of highlights.

Ray Stevenson as BLACKBEARD, standing on the prow of a ship's jollyboat or cutter, a brace of three pistols on his chest.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 24/05/2026

My editing process for this film is a little different than usual. I've been trying something that's primarily about mental headspace when editing. First, I extract literally every usable shot of every line or action in the scene. I place them in not even an assembly but a full assembly.

Da Vinci Resolve, the best editing suite currently available, with a meta assembly cut of one scene open, numerous shots in place, with some basic colour work so that I'm looking at close to the final look rather than some ghastly flat log footage, which helps me see the scene as it might be.

A close up of my terrible handwriting in a small notebook, scribbling lines/actions and which takes I think I want to use.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 16/05/2026

It was my birthday yesterday and I share it with an actor friend who was like "what should we do for our birthday?" and my answer was "well we love making movies, let's do that - people can't say no because it's our birthday!" Now we're 80% of the way thru shooting a B&W 1950s flying saucer comedy.

An old rotary phone in B&W with "The Blower" printed on the back of it using a vintage style labelmaker.

A monitor atop a small cinema camera showing two women dressed in cheap 'space person' costumes on a set made of like $80 of crap from reverse garbage and the reject shop.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 13/05/2026

Props are now completed for Saturday's short film shoot. #ShortFilm #Filmmaking #IndieFilmmaking

A fake computer made of MDF, plastic and wire. Shot in black & white, it has a big switch for 'on' which has both 'yeah' and 'nah' settings, and above it reads a label "G'Day-GPT".

A side-on shot of the same prop, showing its shape, not unlike an Apple Lisa. To one side you can see part of another prop, which has "Fuses" visible in a label on it.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 11/05/2026

Pretty sure this was the conclusion ages ago, and hasn't changed.

A meme of a cat standing like a hagged mechanic over a car, photoshopped wrench in hand and cigarette in mouth. Text above it reads "it's fucked - totally fucked"

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 10/05/2026

Re-reading the Good Book.

The Deadwood Bible: A Lie Agreed Upon, by MZS press

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 06/05/2026

My The Wire re-watch just wrapped season 2. When I first watched it 20+ years ago I felt it was the weakest of the seasons (though still good). I was wrong. It's just as great as the others. The subject-matter it covers resonates more and more as the decades roll on.

An election flyer for Frank Sobotka as the Secretary-Treasurer of the I.B.S Local 1514, citing years of proven experience.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 22/04/2026

Not since I nuked my instagram account a million years ago. Though this is the main one I spent too many hours on during the lockdowns... Electric lights that flicker like gas too.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 21/04/2026

🎶 Jedi on one side, Sith on the other, and I'm stuck in the middle with Orb. 🎵

The chancellor of naboo or whoever the fuck he is with a random plasma orb at the end of Phantom Menace.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 21/04/2026

Omg you just reminded me - I made this for one of my best friends as they're as much of a Trap Door nerd as me. Please enjoy. It now sits below their TV.

BERRRRRKKKK!!! FEED ME! Comes the voice, and Berk is ready to open the trap door once again. I hear there's Something Down There.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 19/04/2026

ALT: GAMES Day 2: electric boogaloo

Dungeons of Freeport in a tv and two laptops, controllers at the ready.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 16/04/2026

The world is awful and only getting worse, but you can console yourself with the fact that Death by Scrolling is out now on console!

It's DEATH BY SCROLLING: THE POSTER. A new poster! It features our intrepid hero, Skylar, one of several characters you can play as (but she's our favourite). She's grasping for a floating gem, leaping over a pit, and being chased by a skeleton, an evil snowman, and an evil reaper. Also there's pine trees. It's really exciting stuff.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 16/04/2026

[Ghostbusters voice] When a friend offers to loan you his #Leica M6 you say YES! This one absolutely banging camera.

Elissa, a very pale white woman with cherry red hair and a black dress & sunglasses, stands in front of some graffiti on an industrial garage door. She is holding up a chrome Leica M6, late-model before the TTL, with a small Voigtlander 40mm lens on it.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 15/04/2026

DUNGEONS OF FREEPORT IS OUT! An Extraction Roguelike Dungeon-Crawler for Linux, macOS and Windows - you and every other player get the same procedurally generated dungeons to delve into each day! Have you gone delving yet today? www.dungeonsoffreeport.com #Roguelike #GameDev #IndieDev

Dungeons of Freeport - a classic roguelike with ANSI style codepage 437 graphics and pixel-art frame around it.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 15/04/2026

SO excited for the new Aragorn.

Jamie Dornan as Edgar in Barb & Star Go To Vesta Del Mar. He is lying naked in bed sandwiched with Kristen Wiig below him and Annie Mumolo above him. Everyone has that look showing they're at various stages of confusion and acceptance as to what happened the previous night.

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 15/04/2026

Sorry, chat, I am Of A Certain Age, so I had to.

Other person:
"Ramps up nice, plenty of critters to bonk, a few secrets that will get
spotted fairly easily, with some more hidden ones."
"Plenty of mushrooms, too"

Me:
"MUSHROOM MUSHROOM"
"snaaaake it's a snake"

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Elissa @elissablack.com · 14/04/2026

The problem with getting 250 flyers printed as a solo dev is… you gotta fold 250 flyers. Good thing I got a lot of tv to watch.

A folded Dungeons of Freeport flyer sitting in a huge box of unfolded ones.

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