The crazed dancing woman needed a prop to go along with the Dr. Who Tardis backdrop that I created back in November.  So out comes the acrylics, a bit of foam core and after a few hours work, voila, one Dalek.  He’s just under five foot high and weighs next to nothing, thanks to the foam core. A triangular piece of foam core hot glued to the back with linen strips helps it to stand upright and then fold flat for transport and storage. He will be showing up at various burlesque and belly dancing shows and I refuse to be responsible for any mass destruction behavior on it’s part.

Dalek dance prop

During a recent inventory in the storage rooms at the Mausonian Museum,  a new specimen has been brought to light after over a century and half of being hidden. This specimen was originally from a dig  in central Turkey circa 1853-1854.

The initial evaluation showed the fossilized skull and neck bones of a primitive batrachian specie. The rest of the specimen was believed to be intact but there was a fair amount of obscuring matrix that needed to be removed.  Cleaning began and eventually the bulk of the specimen began to reveal itself.  A weak solution of acetic acid was applied to help remove the more difficult limestone deposits encasing the smaller bones of the right wrist when a large flake cracked and lifted off. A dark staining of the stone was noted and cleaning proceeded to eventually reveal an elongated fifth metacarpal bordering the dark edge. The dark stain was in fact a wing membrane.  The world’s first specimen of a winged amphibian had been discovered!

As time goes on, more unusual creatures from the earths past are coming to light. This may be the first of a very strange group of prehistoric creatures that established paleontology is likely to have a bit of trouble categorizing.

Somehow the dancing mistress of the house had managed to convince the painting fool living with her to paint backdrops for her. I know the idea came out my mouth but it was placed there via telepathy. No, really. The first backdrop is for a Dr. Who themed dance number and so a painting of the Tardis on an alien planet was in order. Deadline 3 weeks.

I got hold of a roll of single unprimed duck, 100 yards long and 6 foot wide for a reasonable price and that should be enough for roughly 50 back drops.  What will drop first,  the backdrops or myself is a subject for debate. My money is on me going first.

The first hurdle was how to stretch a 7 x 6 foot canvas.  Canvas stretchers of that size are prohibitive, so I opted for 2 decently knot free pieces of pine, dimensions  8′x6″x”1.  I ripped them in half  lengthwise on the saw, sanded them and then after a flurry of measuring and squaring lines on the wall, screwed them directly into the horsehair plaster walls with long drywall screws. The only space in the entire house where this beast could have went was 6 foot 2 inches wide area between two windows in the living room. What a break! When I stepped back to look, I nearly tripped over my jaw. God Almighty, that is huge area. When the dancing mistress came home and saw the frame on the wall, her response was similar with a bit of sailor slang tossed in.

Stretching was much easier than anticipated. I used the basic canvas to stretcher rotational attachment method and everything went along nicely. Priming with gesso took about 1.5 hours with a six inch brush in one hand and a spray bottle of water in the other while balanced on the ladder. I then had to wait till night time to transfer the drawing via projector.

The palette, as you can see below, was several colors of whatever I found in the cellar from old house painting projects. Some of that stuff is near 20 years old but still working. Lots of wet paper towels,  a couple of plastic drop clothes, a few cheapo aluminum pans and we were off!  Some large cheap brushes were used to put the paint on and the painting went fast. I did three sessions for a total of about 17 hours. I am pretty impressed by the amount of pigment in house paint. I used a lot less paint than I thought I would or should have.

So now the piece is done. What is left now is to figure a way to get it off the wall and then trim the sides to be parallel and square respectively. After that,  I have to bind the edges and figure out a way for it to hang on and straight down from the rack we bought just for that purpose.  More on that later.

Illuxcon 2009 has come and gone. I have not been to a con in 3 years by my reckoning so this was a breath of fresh air. A chance to get the fires restoked and meet new folks.  I managed to sneak into the show as some others dropped out. Good for me, bad for them : ) .

Illuxcon was Intimidating. The level of the artwork was phenomenal. There were masters there in their respective fields and some fellas I have not met but all the work was way above the bar. Talk about cream of the crop. No, Pat Wilshire is not paying me to write this.

Illuxcon was Intimate. It is such a small convention you cannot help but eventually meet everyone there. There were 55 artists with a limited amount of guests that can attend. I got to meet a long time influence, Ian Miller.  I was a little leary at first as the last famous British artist I met was total pratt however Ian was sweetheart of guy with some rather introspective questions that I suspect were disguised silly at the time but made me think later on. I also got to meet a slew of other artists and a couple of absolutely incredible sculptors. And of course the best part was saying hello to old friends and just yacking.

Check these sculptors out!

Jordu Schell at http://schellstudio.com/

Thomas Kuebler at http://www.tskuebler.com/

And lastly Illuxcon is Ingenious. Quite a concept to have a convention for artists for the artists. Kudos to Pat Wilshire and his amazing staff for making for an incredible four days for me. There were so many venues, receptions, talks and demonstrations by people who know their craft that it was hard for me to stay at my table. I was falling down tired at the end of each day but eager to get back again in the morning. I hope to return next year but we shall see what the new year brings.

Other Illuxcon stuff:  John Picacio’s , a fabulous artist from Texas (bonus points for that alone ) photostream of the event. http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnpicacio/sets/72157622693706277/

Well in New Zealand anyway! Below are images of Woolungosaurus glendowerensis in action doing something useful for the Nelson Provincial Museum.

The central image is by Edmund Sullivan who illustrated a translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam by Edward Fitzgerald in 1913.

The Rubaiyat itself is a collection of quatrains written during the course of Omar Khayyam’s life – May 31, 1048 to December 4, 1131. Khayyam was a Persian poet, mathematician and scientist. The original illustration depicts Fitzgeralds translation of Khayyam’s quatrain number 26.

Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the wine
To talk; one thing is certain, that life flies;
One thing is certain, and the rest is lies;
The flower that once has blown forever dies.

Overall design created for Necon’s Thirtieth Anniversary.

Late last year , I was contacted by the director of the Mausonian museum if I would be interested in a position in their bone washing department but I had to defer as I was still attempting to exhaust these creative urges that wash over me. He also mentioned that they had discovered a small draconian arboreal flyer which they have named the Leaf Tailed Dragon.

It is approximately 30 inches in length, discovered  in a recently evolved volcanic rift east of the Atlas Mountains in Morocco. This entire area at on time was a heavily forested swamp with giant trees along with the attending giant bugs and swamp creatures. Primarily an insectivore, it likely also fed on snails and small reptiles. The wide rudder like appendage on the tail served as a dynamic in-flight foil for rapid maneuvering and if draped over the creature while resting may have provided camouflage of a sort. It certainly would have been one of the smaller denizens in this environment.

For security reasons, the exact location is being kept a secret however in their usual method of operation when dealing with a find of any significance, they have once again uprooted their operations and simply moved the base museum and its staff to the site. Apparently, they have also undiscovered evidence of a possible aquatic species and are hoping to make a real discovery in that area. Anyway, he wondered if I would be interested in doing this replica at a third scale and the result is below.

As an authorized reseller of Mausonian museum replica specimens, it can be found in the Battleduck.com store or by clicking on the picture below.

     A couple of weeks ago, I was an artist guest at Star City Games Standard Open held at Holiday Inn in Boxborough, Massachusetts. This was my first experience with a Magic crowd and signing their cards and such. Turned out to be a great bunch of people who were there for only one thing : to game! When the card contest started, the hush that fell over the room was so noticeable it was as if everyone had suddenly disappeared from the hall.

Time to skin the puppet! Sounds nasty but we are not taking it off, we are putting it on! I am using a piece of anti-pill fleece with a rather bright green color with some mottling. Not being sure how to approach this, I went ahead and placed a very small tack of hot glue on the center lower jaw and stuck the fleece to it. Then, I started wrapping the fleece around the edges of the jaw looking for lines and folds that I would like for the features. When I found something I liked,  a tiny spot of hot glue was used to tack the material down and then reinforced with some hand-sewing. I kept working this way till the lower jaw and body were done. The skull portion was a repeat of the process by starting with a glue tack, centrally, and then wrapping and stretching the fleece to get the desired effect.  A dart or two near the crown was employed to relieve the extra material buildup but other than that it was pretty much straight forward. I used very little glue and tried to hand sew as much as possible, tucking and pulling as I went along. I found out quickly that too much glue makes sewing impossible. You cannot push a needle through the set up glue very easily. So, the less the better, at this point. We want to be able to manipulate the features as much as we want and this may mean backing up a few steps. Clipping stitches beats cutting material loose from glue.

Two days later: I have found a very cool material remnant. It is a variegated purple shade with a very coarse weave and a bit of shagginess  going for it. I picked it up thinking it would make a good skin for the back.  I cut a piece out of the remnant about 12 x 20 inches and draped it loosely over the back of the puppet.  Bulldog clips were used to hold the materials in place while the hand-sewing was done.

Two days later: I am not very satisfied with look of the back piece.  Because of its stark contrasting color and texture, it looks more like an overcoat than a section of skin. So off it comes!! As no glue was used, removing the piece was as easy as just cutting stitches.  I then replaced it with a dark brown fleece that I had originally bought for this. Not only does it look better but also looks like it belongs for the material texture match.  Not much of a surprise really, as I had matched these different colors of fleece together initially for the different parts. So what happened? Beats me. Having a plan and sticking to it is a lot easier said than done and everything we do can be changed on the fly.

Two days later: Terrance is starting to take on a life of his own and is beginning to dictate his looks. I am now making a hairpiece to decorate the top of his green dome.  Looking for more remnants and supplies, I found some very cool yarn in the bargain bin at a local craft/sewing center.  It immediately attracted my eye for it was also a variegated purple with a slightly fluffy texture and very soft to the touch. I realized then that Terrance was going to have long flowing locks. The yarn was cut into lengths ranging around the 32 to 36 inch mark.

The piece of material that I had used as skin for the back and then removed has a very open weave much  like the material that you would use for hooking rugs.  Placing it on top of the head, I cut a rough triangular piece to follow over the top of the skull with some extra length so that it could be tucked into the body at the back.  Using a crochet hook, I weaved the yarn through the material.  Basically, the yarn was pulled down through one hole and then up through another. I then evened the lengths and knotted the yarn down to the backing material. The slight shag of the backing material blends all this well out of sight. I passed a length of yarn through approximately every fifth hole on every third row until I had the amount of hair that I wanted for the top of the head.

I ran a small stripe of hot glue centrally on the skull and pressed the hairpiece into that.  A tight running stitch along the edge achieved a raised look where the hair meets the skull.  I am really pleased as this looks great and integrates well with the head.  Shaking the puppets head around, the hair looks great as it is flys about. This hair piece process was completed over the course of three evenings.

Next time: We finish up with lips, fingers and eyes.