Month: July 2010

Glistening

And this is what 40 brains look like.  They are going to have pin backs and magnet backs, soon, yes very soon… Muahaha.

You can see that the brains on the left have not yet been antiqued and glazed.  By far the most common comment upon seeing these is “They look like candy!” which means you eat different candy than I do. But I’m not judging you, not at all…

The plasticware defuses the whole sinister vibe.

Steampunk Gallery

I finally put a lot of photos of my more Steampunk-styled pieces into a gallery. There is a tab at the top of this page, but you can also click right here.

I do other styles, but Steampunk is in demand right now. I will expand the gallery later, but I have 18 images so far!

I have decided that I am going to start saving the money I get from commissions, in order to buy a quad-line stunt kite…

Not-so-Wishful Thinking

You know, yes you, YOU know that sometimes you wish for a fantasy life. To live in a beautiful, magical, wonderful, did I mention magical, pseudo-medieval-world, and attend a comfy mage school somewhere, and then go save the world – from behind a brave warrior with more hit points.
But you know what? You’re wrong.
You’re incredibly wrong, and I know. I have four words for you: leaves, rocks, straw, rags and soap. Four of which we have too much of, and one of which was have exactly the wrong sort of. I say ‘we’ because I speak from the perspective of someone living the dream you wish you were living, and by ink and quill, it’s not what you think it is.
 
Leaves: Leaves have far too many uses around here. Especially in the form of personal hygiene. You need a band-aide? You get a leaf. You need insect repellent? You get a leaf. You need air freshener? You get a leaf, or, for variety, a burning leaf. You need toilet paper? You get a leaf. You won’t like the leaf, either. It’s not a quilted northern leaf, let me tell you.
 
Rocks: Rocks are everywhere. Especially if you are on a campaign to save the world. Rocks mysteriously appear under you, whenever you attempt to plough a field, sit down and/or sleep. It’s rather amazing. Magi have studied it for years and are baffled at the spontaneous creation of matter which only seems to happen with rocks, enemy soldiers, and/or occasionally poison ivy.
 
Straw: Straw is not comfortable. Straw smells, itches, moulds, rots, sticks up pointy-bits in all the worst places you can imagine, and is generally the bedding material of choice, because it is better than rocks, see above.
 
Rags: Once a month, you, if you happen to be of the female persuasion, get a very personal and intimate relationship with rags. Let us not discuss this any further.
Soap: Anything rendered from lard and ashes is just plain nasty when rubbed on the body and in the hair.

You sit there thinking you wish you were me, but really, you wish you were me only about 1% of the time – the “potentially beating up the foule goblins at a safe distance by using magic” portion of the time. And that 1% of the time is certainly fun, but the 99% of the time spent wandering around without internet connectivity, smelling of muck and horse and sweat and really bad soap, with no coffee and rarely tea, and even the small beer is beyond consumption because no one ever thought of the idea of a water filter… Well, you can romanticize it and say I don’t know any better but, dear reader, I do know better, for I am staring through the mists of time rolling my eyes at you. I know I have been shafted by having a medieval romantic life that is foot-sore and travel-weary and does not include nearly enough cosseted-up-in-the-corner-of-a-warm-and-not-very-smelly-cozy-homely-secluded-and-did-I-mention-warm-again-hut-reading-a-spellbook time.

So think twice about what you yearn for, and next time you invent a wonderful fantasy world, be sure to dream up some really brilliant soap.

What I’m Up To

(No, not a pun, to those of you who associate me with making flight puns.)

Well, I had a nice Independence day, and I am in the process of sculpting two “mech dragon” wedding cake toppers!

I will have to provide photos later.

Another thing I am working on is a Steampunk necklace incorporating a brass, oil-filled compass.

If you are interested in anything like that, well, please let me know.
Of course you would probably be more interested if I posted some pictures, but I will have to do that later.

The other thing I have been doing is watercoloring a lot on little 4×6 cards. Yet more things I will have to post later.

Finally I am going to put all of my examples of “Steampunk” art into a little gallery page on this site, once I figure out how, since I have actually had people come here and look for it. I want to accomodate you! Especially if you are considering commissioning me!

So that’s a little nutshell look at “things I ought to be doing” and “some things I am doing” and “very few work-related things” when it comes to My Day Job. Which had been rough for awhile, but God got me through, and I am extremely grateful.

PS. To the other Propagator Of Inside Jokes, no I do not do assassinations, and it will not be on the new business cards. I don’t think any version of the word mage, nor any version of balloon-wrangling will appear there either, since I need them for OddMall, and they likely will be interested in actual art skill, as opposed to hypothetical and amusing business card appellations. (Sad, huh?)