Weapons of choice

Posted on by
Reply

The little chaps coming along well.
Cthulhu so far
As I’ve had a couple of questions about my work I thought I’d share a photo of the tools I’m using at the moment for my sculpture. I’m mainly using these four even though I’ve a big selection of them that I’ve collected over the years.

From left to right they are:
- A flat blade with a curve to the tip for smoothing out flat areas and on the other end is a rounded halfball for small depressions
- A wooden tool with a shallow bend at one end and a thicker bit to the other end
- A sharp edged scraping tool useful for removing material smoothly with a flat end the other side. I have to say I don’t use the lower end much
- A home made tool which is a brass tube with a piece of wire held in place with a bit of Milliput and the wire is hammered flat like a screwdriver end. This tool has been invaluable for making the wrinkles around the eyes and hands

My other tools include a number of home made ones, shop bought and some dental tools that a very kind dentist gave to me years ago. I was given about a dozen in total as he said he can only use them for a short time before they have to be replaced so rather than chuck them away he donated them to my worthy cause. As a number of them turned out to be the same I traded a few for bits (students work well on barter systems), some I modified to different shapes by hammering or grinding them while the rest are perfectly good tools that I still have the pleasure to own. Over the years I’ve collected quite a few bits with weird and wonderful (if sharp) edges but there always seems to be a basic few I reach for when starting something.

On a related note, HP Lovecraft appears in an article on the BBC site which talks about the recent anniversary of his death. While Cthulhu is obviously one of his most recognisable creations, I’ve always had a soft spot for the Deep Ones. ‘Shadow over Innsmouth’ is my favourite story of his and on a more recent reading I couldn’t help but snigger at a reference to Ipswich (even if it is the one in the USA). While at college I once tried to sculpt a deep one but gave up after struggling with the basic shape, maybe it’s about time I tried again.

Days cycled to work: 55
Days driven all the way to work: 0
Days driven half way to drop the car off at the garage to have a service: 1
Days tramped along in snow and ice: 2

Happy death day to you

Posted on by
3

I find it slightly bizarre that today marks the 75th anniversary of the death of Howard Phillips Lovecraft and I spent the evening sculpting something based on one of his most famous works. I’m also reading The Arcanum which has HP as a character at the moment and once i’ve posted this i’m off for a chapter or two before bed but I had no idea the anniversary was today until my twitter timeline started to fill up with comments so it shows I follow all the right loonies.




In the meantime my sculpture clicked tonight as my lil Cthulhu suddenly took shape due to the eyes being popped into place and something in my mind sliding into gear.

A last quick link to add some more anniversary fun to the mix, Francesco Francavilla’s tribute to Lovecraft http://www.francescofrancavilla.com/gallery/lovecraft_b_w.html

Days cycled to work: 52
Days tramped along in snow and ice: 2
Days driven: 0

Further adventures in sculpting

Posted on by
Reply

I’ve started slapping some bits of sculpey around in the last few evenings so thought I would chronicle my adventures in the creation of my little ‘thulhu.

First up was a night of cranking the sculpey. As this stuff is more than 10 years old its gone a little hard around the edges, fortunately its been kept in an airtight box in my nice dark, cool cellar so its still usable. I’ve heard tales of the stuff being delivered where its like slime, dripping with oils and viscous matter but I’ve only ever seen it ‘soft’, ‘slightly hard’ and ‘don’t drop that on your foot if you want to keep your toes’. In the process of cranking it through I managed to break the gears for the widest setting on the pasta maker so I was reduced down to no3. Fortunately this seems to work pretty well as it pulps the sculpey up well.


Snigger now and get it over with… All done? Good. The armature beneath that item is the top of an old jelly bean dispenser with a rod of metal inserted firmly into the top. It stands around 7″ from base to tip and is nice and firm so there won’t be any sagging. (Impressed I managed to get through all of that without saying erect?)


A couple of hours work gets me to this point where I am starting to block out the basic shape, there is a head, basic position of the legs and bulking out the body. I’m working off a few reference images, mainly a Bob Eggleton painting of squidhead, but i’m trying to get this one to be something that has come out of me rather than someone elses design. I’m basing the design on Lovecrafts description of the statue from the story “Call of Cthulhu” and there are hundreds of other peoples interpretations and they all follow the same basis. Squatting tentacled horror, hands on knees, cryptic runes/text around the base… Fairly normal for your everyday run of the mill ancient slumbering evil god.


While working on the shape I jabbed myself on one of my tools and managed to get blood all over the place. Funny thing is it was only a tiny stab wound but the blood wouldn’t stop, probably because the tool was quite sharp and this morning it was really tingly.


Days cycled to work: 48
Days tramped along in snow and ice: 2
Days driven: 0