Merry Christmas!

For my IF visitors:

As last year, and those before, Christmas is coming. 

The feelings are similar, the card is not.

Merry Christmas!

I know is only 4 of december, but if I don't post this now, I might not have another good chance do it.

And next, for the ones interested, here is the process of doing this year card.

I started with a sketch so basic that is not even worth to post... What I wanted was to do a 3D card, sculpted and constructed, with some post editing, since we wanted my daughter to be part of it.

The image, as you can see on top, is in a room, so I started doing the floor.

I cut and glued balsa wood in a solid surface, and then painted with acrylics until I got the basic tone. Then I used color pencils and then more brush to give it the wood texture.

And, after that, I waxed it with and old candle, until it was shinny and perfect.

As usual, only a little part of all the floor can be seen in the final image, but I couldn't risk it been too small.

Then the window. That was fun, just cutting and gluing different sizes of balsa.

Later it was going to be primed and painted.

Here you can see the sculpted elements, my frog Ruperto, a little RC car, and my daughter's body. In the pic they are primed... I had a problem there, since I was painting with acrylics, and I couldn't find a new primer, I used white enamel painting... a disaster! The enamel never dried, and as expected, it was hard for the acrylics to cover it well. So some thinner... and the enamel was gone. I had to re-primer with white paint. It worked well at the end...

A general test view. The letters are and old set of 3D letters for movie credits that as a kid I stole from my grandfather!

Painting miniatures it's been a big hobby for me, so this was fun. The little RC car ended well.

Same with Ruperto.

Here a finished view of the window and the wall.

In a previous image, you can see a yellow masking tape... I was going to use it to mask parts of the wall and paint a different tone, but the tape was translucent... it looked good... and it stayed.

The floor looks nice, don't you think?

Here an almost complete group, testing lights, perspective and all that stuff.

For the final image, the one that ended in photoshop, I needed the group without the wall and window, ad I needed the wall without the group, so I could edit the image better.

This is the image that went to the final edition. That thing in my hand is a led light with some blue paper to try to create some blue reflections "from the window" in the elements. 

Some times I wish I had a real photographic studio.

And here the selected photo of Olivia.

All the rest is photoshop edition, adding sky and the star in the window, correcting colors, masks and all that stuff.
It was fun, and I think it was worth all the work.
I should start giving away the printed cards this week, but as usual, if you visit this blog, you might get to see things first.

I really hope you like it, and all this info is of some use or amusement to you!

Have a good time this year end, and be happy!

Christmas card WIP 5 (layers!)

A quick peek at the almost final card.

I think I'll left this here for now. Christmas is coming, quickly, so you will have to wait for final image... 

...after that, or maybe at the same time, I'll also post more process images.

Hoping that they are of some interest to you, of course.

Christmas card WIP 4

A partial group shot.

Is looking good!

Yes, is a little out of focus. 

It was taken this morning on the run. 

Sorry.

Christmas card WIP 3

If you come often to this little blog, you will know Ruperto, my frog.

Well, he will be included in this year Christmas card, as a plush toy in the image I'm doing.

But actually not done on plush (I'll love to do him some day in plush!). He is sculpted in sculpey, and I just finished painting it.

I think he will have a matte coat... that's for later.

The light is too harsh here, he is darker than the picture looks.

One piece ready, more to come.

Christmas card WIP 2

Sculpey Creature N1

Number 1 is ready.
Is weird, I know.
I like it.

Sculpey creatures

Well, continuing on my Sculpey saga...
After baking at the same time both little creatures, and waiting to be at the office to be able to take pictures (the batteries of my camera at home died after 4 years), here I'm.

...one thing... I felt that the SF hardened quickly once out of the oven, but I have no proof of that.

Actually, I had to take the pictures twice... why? well...
SS and its translucency is a problem to the autofocus of the camera. SF been flat grey is ok, no problems there.





As you can see in the pictures, the SS creature have like a "glow", is hard to see clearly the details.
Now, as I said, these are small sculpts, 3.5 to 4 cm (1.5 inches).

Don't try to get much sense for the creatures, they don't have a head yet, so they are really weird.

No much more to say, really for now.

Kids, don't do this at home

Or in any other place.



Not pretty, eh?

What I did was some experiment baking two different kinds of Sculpey in a small electric oven I have in my workshop, I selected what I think was the lower setting and put 15 minutes in the timer...
And that is the result. Too much hot, the sculpey almost burnt... well, remove the "almost". The skin tone sculpey is dark brown, and the grey is black. And it have bubbles, and marks... ugly.

Burn and learn.

Super Sculpey vs Sculpey Firm

I'm doing a side by side comparison between Super Sculpey and the new Sculpey Firm.
For that I'm creating a pair of weird creatures, aprox the same size, like 3x3x3 cm. So not really big.

No pictures yet, but soon.

For now, my first impressions.

SS is very nice, I like it a lot. Even with the weird feeling I have while working it. Is soft, and part of me think is too soft, and is going to melt, or fall apart, or deform under its own weight. Of course nothing of that happens, but that is the feeling I have. SO is great, but is taking me a little time to get used to it.
But the big problem I have with SS, and what made me try SF, is the color.
Well, not exactly the color, but the slight translucency it have. I usually work in small formats, and that translucency is a problem. Is very hard to see, for example, my fingerprints, or small irregularities in the surface. I did some very basic shapes to test the material at first, and not until I base coated it, I noticed a lot of details that I didn't want.

On the other hand, SF was created thinking in solving exactly those problems, or at least that is what the box says. The 50% gray color shows without problems my fingerprints and all the other little things I want to avoid, and I can fix before baking. And is soft, but no so soft. I can work with it as easily as SS, but I don't have that weird feeling I described.
For now, Looks like SF is more my style, but I'm just starting to know both, so that last word is far from said.

I'll keep you posted, and I'll try to post pictures of my creatures soon.

sculpting with sculpey

First thing working with Sculpey.
I'll have to post a longer post with my impressions of it.
Anyway, this is obviously a WIP thingy, let's see how it ends.