Fossils of the Future...

We started our first proper project at college this week with guest tutor Justin of http://www.justinillusions.co.uk/

We'd been given the brief at the end of last week but it was pretty vague -

'You will design and produce an A3 sized representation of a stone slab featuring selected artefacts from the present day in fossilised form...Each individual panel will form part of a group display which will become a significant display within the college'

As well as the plethora of dimensions and scales we were also told that amongst the ruined 'fossils' we were to have one pristine object (not exceeding 60mm in diameter!) as well.

I can't tell you how excited I was to hear the word 'fossil'. Honestly, it couldn't have been a more perfect project for me - not only do I love fossils and archaeology in general but the chance to do loads of weathering and grime as well, oooft, I was chuffed!

Well, until every possible idea I had for it fizzled out that is.

 I wanted to do a set of keys that had corroded until they were nigh on unrecognisable (and would grant me a huge excuse to go crazy with the rust effects. :P) but aside from that I couldn't really think of anything. We were told on Wednesday that we had to have our ideas sketched out and finalised by Monday and by Sunday I was so stressed it was unbelievable. I genuinely felt like not going in at one point but thankfully I did and all was well in the end as Justin had changed his mind and constructed a new brief, one that not only made more sense but also made me grin with eager anticipation.

We were going to do a fossilised alien.

 The brief was now along the lines of a large scale alien invasion taking place in the very near future (next week I believe, mark that down in your calenders everyone!) and with a large battle taking place in a rubbish dump somewhere in Glasgow. This meant that we could get away with adding a lot of random crap into our designs as well, it's a tip, there'd be loads of stuff buried in there!

We started off with 18 A3 sheets of blue foam - one for everyone in the class.

I was then volunteered by most of the class to copy Justin's sketch out onto it all - in hindsight I'd have changed the angle of the right hand wing/arm/tentacle as it looks horrific here but meh, it obviously got broken when it died. :P (that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!)

We picked our sections at random so there'd be no unfair hogging of all the good bits...but we were allowed to swap if we weren't happy with our bits so it kinda was in a way, lol. I got one of the bits of arm but David very kindly swapped me for the beak which was what I'd wanted to do all along so massive props to him for being awesome.

Once everything was drawn on and decided, the excavation began...

 

  That's how it looked at the end of the day on Monday...



...then on Tuesday things started to look a lot more detailed. I carved out the teeth a lot more and used a very small amount of dichlo to smooth and soften the edges. (too much and it would have melted through the foam like the acid does metal in Alien! )

At this point I was just trying to get the teeth exposed and added in part of the upper jaw to further emphasise the three dimensionality of the whole thing, which I thought was important given that it wasn't really embedded in there at all!

I dropped some dichlo onto the surface of the 'soil' too and hacked away at it with a scalpel to give it a more naturalistic look. Many of the others had carved everything out very neatly which looked great but I felt that if this really was a rubbish dump which had been fossilised or at least in some way preserved there'd be very odd layers of strata and a lot of detritus.

 

I spent today adding in all the crap and bits of junk and retexturing everything with crumbled plaster and very fine sand.

...before giving it a thorough coat of paint.

This is just a first coat - the bones will be a fairly uniform brown/black colour to fit in with everyone else's and the surrounding ground will have loads of rust and grime and stone effects.

We've got next week to finish it which will be plenty of time I reckon. It's nice to have a nice stress-free project at last!

 

I'll probably be back on Friday with my semi-usual base-making updates but until then, EG out!

A history of Julip and why I collect them.

It was the Utterly Horses Hullabaloo the other week and being held at the same time in the same venue was the official Julip Live Show. I would have loved to have gone but it was on just as I was due back at college so there was no way I could have got there and back in time without missing the first day.

Luckily for me however, a fellow collector had filmed Julip owner Annabel's talk on the history of the company and has very graciously allowed me to share it with the rest of the world. It's a little difficult to hear at times but proves to be a very interesting look into the oldest model horse brand in the world!

 

I realised that this was the perfect opportunity to explain just what the big draw, to me at least, there is to these quirky little horses seeing as I'm known primarily for my unwavering loyalty and addiction to them. I'd typed this out about a year ago for something on a forum that I've since forgotten about but thought it still rang true.

Why I Collect Julips.
 

When I first got seriously involved with this hobby in 2005, all I could think about was realism and so Breyers became something of an obsession. Living in Scotland, there aren’t quite so many retailers of them nearby (although there are more now) so whenever I went down south on holiday I’d buy them up eagerly – even ones that I didn’t even like that much but they were Breyers so I couldn’t afford not to get them!

Even though I don't actively collect much other than Julips these days,
EA Would-Be-Weston is one of my never sells.

 I’d heard of Julips from seeing adverts for the HOTYs in magazines but I didn’t really pay them too much attention, assuming that they were aimed at kids and weren’t really all that popular. (back then I just followed the majority of collectors and went with what was all the rage at the time) I didn’t realise that there was a difference between the mass produced plastic HOTY range I’d seen and the handmade, poseable Julip Originals that I now can’t get enough of. I don’t remember who was painting them at that stage but the paintjobs were pretty plain and unappealing so none of them really tickled my fancy and I didn’t realise that you could do special orders.

Years passed and I started to get really into photography which led to my first photo stories with Breyer Trads and Schleich scale models.

EA Calico Jack, ridden by Alex

I really enjoyed setting up scenes and making tack and props and things but something was missing.

I couldn’t put my finger on it but there was definitely something. It took me a while but I eventually pinpointed the problem. While the models I used were realistic, they remained in a static position; virtually scuppering any plans of using the same model for both a relaxed stable scene and a flat out galloping cross country one!

Sherrick the Schleich custom is still one of my favourites, despite being one of my oldest!

I toyed with the idea of painting an array of models in different poses but for horses with more complicated patterns it would end up being more trouble than it was worth. I carried on regardless but all the while I was thinking of the alternatives. More interesting colours were emerging from the Julip workshop by this point and the day I saw Espiridion, a gorgeous mulberry grey Lipizzaner - one of Georgie’s special orders - I was convinced that I had to get a Julip, at least to see what they were like. My parents (mainly my mum – my dad doesn’t really mind what I buy, so long as he’s not paying for them!) were against them from the start because of the price and especially seeing as I could get ‘one of those nice realistic ones’ for a lot less.

I wasn’t sure what to expect or indeed what to order so when a Lippi was listed on the spares page (in the days before they put up photos) as a ‘shaded battleship grey with chocolate mane and tail’ I just had to get him as he sounded just like Espiridion. Although he turned out to look absolutely nothing like what I’d expected, I loved him instantly and it wasn’t long before Tamarind as he became known, was joined by several others and the EA Equestrian herd started to grow.

Tam met his spiritual 'sire' Espiridion last year at the 2011 Richmond Live.
As you can see they don't look particularly alike! XD

 I soon realised that what my photo stories had really been lacking in was character. Although they had personalities in the stories, on the shelves they were little more than ornaments and often I’d forget names or breeds I’d assigned them for showing and stories alike. The Julips on the other hand... Even though at their core they are little more than wired rubber horses, each of them has a distinct individuality about them – some are quiet and calm...

EAE 'Callisto'

...others are bolshy and a bit difficult...

'Cool Crusader' AKA Roscoe - that's his long suffering owner Dawn there...

...some like getting attention from their favourite person...

EAE 'Freya'd at the Edges'

...or people...

EAE 'Simba'

Some are full of beans...

EAE 'Dancing with Shadows'

...while others are full of rather more in the way of pigheadedness.

'Archipelago' doing his best impression of a dead fly.

 
No matter who they are, if I catch their eye from across the room it never fails to bring a smile to my face. Being able to order customs or ‘special orders’ is a brilliant advantage and many of mine were ordered, not as portraits of real horses I know (although that is of course possible too) but of characters I had waiting in my head that needed a body to inhabit. Making tack and props for them is great fun and especially bridle making because you have the added bonus of being able to fit them with an actual mouthpiece.

Being poseable means that they are much more adaptable for photo stories and things but the main reason I collect them, when all’s said and done is simply because I like them.

If you’re a hardcore resin collector who lives for realism then Julips probably aren’t for you but don’t just dismiss them after one look, give them a chance, they might surprise you. In recent years the quality of the paintjobs has shot up and they’ll attempt pretty much any colour you like.

 If you’re only used to one kind of model then Julip Originals will come as a bit of a shock to the system but they are scarily addictive and you can’t just have one...

Collector's tables at the Oxford Live 2010

   

Back to college...

I've been back at college for two weeks now, although it feels like forever! Everyone from last year who applied got through (even those we didn't think would make it!) and all the new additions to the class are integrating themselves rather nicely. The tutor we expected to get has now left so we're still a little unsure actually who'll be teaching us for the majority of this year but for now we've got Simon so we're all pretty chuffed. We arrived back in good spirits; full of pep and enthusiasm which was soon after extinguished when we learned that during the holidays the janitors had thrown out many of our bits and pieces (some in boxes, others left out) and - most frustratingly - parts of some people's final projects! Luckily the actual models were alright but some of the accessories were binned. All that paled in comparison to what happened to Rodney...

This is what he looked like at the end of year show...

 

...and here's how he looks now - sans arms.

The bloody jannies had chucked out his arms! I know they were only made out of blue foam and paper cups but they all had gripping hands - it was obvious they were things to be kept! The rest of the set was dismantled and stored away, with Rodney himself firmly installed in one of the classrooms which is fantastic ...but now rocking only one limb. :(

This was taken during morning break - we're normally a much more studious looking bunch!

All that aside, it is good to be back. :)

As with last year, we spent the first week on an 'icebreaker' - last year involved making bridges out of paper straws - but this time round we had to make some basic card models (of the type used for setting the scene and highlighting new builds) of the buildings surrounding George Square; smack bang in the centre of Glasgow and only a few hundred yards away from the college.

The building at the back is the place - City of Glasgow College. Alas, our rooms are on the other side so we don't get such a nice view.

Card is deceptively tricky to work with - I'd have much rather been using styrene - but produces consistently good models as long as you're accurate. which I'm not but let's just pretend I am for the sake of argument..
We chose the City Chambers - a gigantic victorian leviathan of a building with more turrets and towers than a turrety towery thing, (I say we, it was my rather more capable boyfriend who did the choosing to our initial despair but it actually worked out better for us in the long run as we managed to find architectural plans online far more easily than the other groups as it was such a well known building!)

 

Plans were printed out and scaled...

...card was cut and glued together...

...and gradually...

...it started to take shape.

Not bad for just three days work, eh?

(the cenotaph sadly didn't make the cut as we ran out of time)

I left at lunchtime on Wednesday as my best friend was being admitted to hospital with acute kidney failure (something which we've since learned is now chronic and has left her with either a lifetime of treatment ahead of her or a kidney transplant.) and I wanted to go in and see her with the rest of the gang and give her some moral support. That more or less put a dampener on the entire week as, well, I'm sure you can imagine.:/

This week we got a brief for our first proper project but before we could begin on that, we had to do a simple - heh - exercise to make sure we could all still wield a scalpel correctly. While all the newbies set to work on a basic styrene cube, all us NC veterans had to make this...

Fun.

Mine wasn't too bad all things considered but some of the angles were a little off and one edge has bowed really rather badly. (luckily it can't be seen here, so shhhhh!)


The next project is RIGHT up my street but you'll not hear a word out of me until at least Monday when I've finalised my idea... ;)

I've a few more things to blog about soon however, so watch this space!

EG out!



 

A couple of new props...

I should really be doing a massive ironing or putting on another load of washing or doing the hoovering but...

Anyway, I made these...

First up is a yard/bucket trolley thing I saw in one of my tack catalogues the other day and randomly decided my 1/12th scale yard needed. (The 'Requisite Manure Basket Trolley' available here if anyone's interested. ;))

I neglected to take many WIP photos but here's one at least.

I tweaked the design slightly to allow for separate handles at the back rather than an all in one thing simply because it was easier to make. The main structure is thick copper wire (liberated from my grandpa's garage, which is proving to be a gold mine as far as interesting materials are concerned!) and the hollow plastic  tubing used in cotton buds made for an excellent addition as these ones have a slight texture to them which looks quite nice.


I haven't a clue where the wheels came from but they'd been knocking around for years so I thought I'd put them to some use with this project. I mounted them onto the rest of the thing with superglue (after the axle was fed through a seperate bit of tubing so the wheels would still turn) and then painted it!

Please ignore the awful, awful state of the office here; it had been on my desk for weeks and had accumulated a rather large quantity of crap. XD

Here's the finished thing, complete with some sawdust from the stable bedding for extra accuracy, lol.

I made these yesterday - the containers are just pritt stick lids and some plastic tubing cut to size with labels cut out of the aforementioned tack catalogue.



Hey, what's David reading?



 A magazine?

I'd noticed that many horse magazines often have little mini shots of their double paged articles on the first couple of pages as a sort of preview and, when combined with the obligatory front cover shot they nearly always have there...





Alas, I appear to have combined two entirely different magazines as the pages look more like Horse & Rider to me than Your Horse but oh well, no one's going to notice really. :P
The next one I make is going to have pages in better order as the articles don't actually match up here because of the way I stuck it together.

Now, I suppose I'll have to go off and do some actual work now.

EG out!