I've Been Silent - But Not Idle!

Wow – what a year!

Remember how I mentioned before that I was moving? Oh wait – I didn’t?

Yes, around the time my sister got married, and my father became seriously ill, my family was also preparing to move. And not just to a different house – to an entirely different city!

However, amidst all the sorting and purging/packing of every item I own, I did manage to sneak in some CJ time. But only enough to either work on the sculpt OR update this blog – not both. Guess what won in the end?

So even though the last time you saw CJ he looked roughly like this:

The last time I saw him he looked like this:

Right down to his cute little Prawn-toes!

Actually that’s a bit of a fib. Last time I saw CJ he looked more like this:

All chopped up and packed in a big Rubbermaid box… :(

Poor CJ!

That’s STILL a bit of a fib since I DID manage to liberate CJ from said Rubbermaid box, (he survived with only minor injuries) in the space in my aunt & uncle’s basement that they are graciously allowing me to use as a workshop.

However right after I did that I went back to my hometown to help shoot a short film…

… and promptly tripped on set and broke my right wrist.

*headdesk*

( Yeah, yeah, Angry!Wikus I know. Trust me - I WISH I were making this up)

In fact, I broke said wrist SO badly it needed surgery. I now have The Right Cast Of Doom and although I’m getting by pretty well I’ve found I can’t do anything, like writing or drawing, that takes any sort of fine precision (so sculpting is pretty much out too :P ).

So for the next week or two while I wait to get this cast off I’ll be getting stuff caught up with the blog here (I did have some very cool fun adventures in addition to the frustrating work-stopping ones ;P) and then we’ll be all set to face a new round of Prawn puppet building!

Christopher isnt going to like me too much...

… I keep decapitating his kid!

I started off the session using the same Photoshop overlay method I’d used with the new armature before to check how my sculpt was doing so far. Sure enough, I still had CJ’s head in too upright a position as well as a few other inaccuracies (like too much build up on the back of his neck)

So I popped CJ’s head off to try again…

Poor little Prawnling – I’ll get it right one of these days! I swear!

This involved hollowing out the underside of the “skull” once more, as well as rounding off the neck again.

I took all the clay “shavings” I’d taken from CJ’s head and neck and warmed them up really well under the hair dryer till they were extremely soft (and managed to do it WITHOUT gassing myself this time! I’ve been much more careful lately about running the hair dryer too long without taking precautions and so far my headache hasn’t returned).

I then used the very soft, and slightly sticky clay “gloop” like glue to hold CJ’s head in its new position.

I filled in the gaps with more “gloop”, just enough to stabilize things as you can see, but I didn’t go overboard in case I needed to reposition CJ’s head again.

I ended off by taking another picture to compare in Photoshop. It LOOKS alright but I think I’m going to have to come up with a way of making sure I take each of these comparison photos from the exact same position and angle to be doubly sure I’ve got it right. I think slight changes in the picture angle are throwing things off.

(And that was, as you can see, nearly a week ago… *scowl*…

I’m trying to take the “you eat an elephant a bite at a time” approach, chipping away at CJ and my other various projects a little every day. Obviously I haven’t QUITE gotten the rhythm down yet – I keep taking little bites but the problem is I have too many elephants!



Yeah, yeah Wikus - I know!

I work on more creative projects each day than I used to… In keeping with a “just do it!” mantra I managed to squeeze in SOME sort of drawing, sculpting or painting practice everyday. I just don’t always get to practice ALL of them. But I’m getting there.

So we’re going to have some quality time together this weekend CJ – I promise!)

Step 3) Faced With A Face Full Of Foil

Bulking out the armature with aluminum foil…

This was supposed to help save on clay and weight by filling out the center of the sculpt (and the rough texture of the foil was supposed to give the clay something to cling to – except I got overzealous with the electrical tape…. That’s ok though, because the clay I ended up using was quite sticky when warmed. I didn’t have any trouble with it falling off the sculpt)

You can see I also wrapped wire around the limbs – again to give the clay something extra to grab onto.

I didn’t want to add TOO much foil though, since, if I needed to, I wanted the ability to carve deep into the sculpt. I tried to leave myself at least an inch (more like two) all the way around.

In the end though I VASTLY underestimated the amount of clay I needed to order. In fact I had to order clay twice because I ran out before I’d even finished roughing out the sculpt the first time.

* * *

This is a short post before an extra long one but since I've got a little time I just have to show you this little bit of D9 fun I found.

I was visiting a friend just in time for her annual, spectacular Halloween party. We were packing up the various bags of treats and decorations to take over to the event hall when she hands me what looks like a green, metallic novelty pen.

"Here," she said. "I thought you might like to have this."

Seeing antennae and guessing as to why she deemed it an appropriate gift for me, I chortle "Oooh! A Prawn pen!"

Then I turned it over for a closer look...


Hey - It really WAS a Prawn Pen! An Angry!Wikus Pen no less! XD

This is why I have awesome friends - they know me MUCH too well!

(Hmm something tells me I'll be commiserating with Angry!Wikus here before this project is out...)