My 3-Demensional Pieces
I'm a very hands-on person and I really enjoy doing 3-demensional things. There's a lot that goes into them, and there's a much greater chance that you'll put actual blood, sweat, and tears into each piece. I don't have many 3-D pieces. I wish I could do more, but time and motivation compromise me.
Clay
Out of all of these, I must say that clay is quite possibly my favorite. I'm very hands-on and I feel like I have the most control over the things I make with clay... That is, until they bake and crumble. In which case, they do their own thing.
I work mostly with Sculptey clay. It's easy to obtain at a craft store and it doesn't require a several thousand degree oven.
Victorious Samnite Gladiator (12-10-09)
This was a project for my Honor's History class. We had to chose from one of the types of Roman gladiators and make a clay sculpture of it, that had to be as realistic as possible.. Poor choice of words when assigning me something. I definitely put actual blood, sweat, and tears into this piece. Not only did I cut my thumb open making the sword, but I freaked when the thing's ankle crumbled and bent backwards during baking and I couldn't fix it. Special thanks to those who calmed me down ever so effectively during my dilemma.
I made each part of him seperately. To bake him, I put his lower half (waste to platform) together first and then put it in the oven. Stupid me neglected to put a toothpick to reinforce the legs in each leg, and after I stopped compulsively checking him every 5 minutes, he fell over in the oven. He was like that for 10 minutes before I noticed, and hardened there. I couldnt fix him and had to let him finish baking like that. After super glue failed, I liquid nailed his ankle to him and in the process broke his other leg (which I managed to cover up by putting a band aid over it and painting it bronze). He hardened at an angle and kept falling backwards and I almost made him a sculpture of a dead, decapitated gladiator.
It turns out later that some douchebag broke my gladiator even further when it was sitting out on the table with the other projects. Oh, I was silently livid... But that means that these are the best pics of it in my possession at the moment. (For a better look, go to
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Plaster
I like working with plaster because I like building the layers up and blending them into each other (but I tend to blend too much and make the pieces fray). Oh, and it's squishy. It amuses me. As much as I like plaster, but I don't work with plaster often for a few reasons... 1) I do not possess any plaster at home. I just use the plaster the school provides me, and 2) I make a complete mess. [Fun Fact: There is either paint, plaster, cat hair, or blood on every item I own]
Darrel the Gorilla (11-2--09)
This is where Darrel would go if I had a picture of him. Right now he's sitting in someone's office but I'll hunt him down for a picture later.
I made Darrel in school out of plaster. He's a gorilla and he has quite possibly the cutest little badonka-donk ever. We had to make an animal and then paint it a neon color with tempera paint (but naturally, I painted mine black.. horrible painting experience: the black tempera paint smelled like what the chocolate of a Klondike bar would if it were made of expired goat's milk. nearly threw up.). After we painted it a solid color, we had to add a few designs. I chose alternating striped triangles and ovals with neon yellow circles inbetween. The neon paint didn't show up that well against the black, so I had to first paint the shapes out in white paint, wait until it dried, then paint over it with a solid neon color, wait for that to dry, and then add the stripes. It took a while.
After I finished, I got him a little hat. I think it suits him well. I'm not sure if he still has it though because I haven't seen him since he was taken out of the school's display case.
I like carving things but I have to be in a patient move to carve. If I'm not, I try cutting large chunks of things off with dull knives and not only hurt myself but mess up what I'm working on. For me, carving takes more skill than working with clay. You slowly shape some random chunk of nothing into something great, with a much smaller margin for error because it's harder to fix your mistakes without it looking like crap.
I don't have many carvings for a few reasons... 1) I shouldn't be allowed to handle sharp objects (and anyone who thinks that it's wise should seriously have their mentality evaluated), and 2) I don't really have many things that I can cut up. I have many things that I would like to cut up... but none that I actually would be allowed to.
Rudiarius (Samnite Sword)
This is the little sword I carved for the Samnite sculpture. It's kinda not really wood.. what I did was I took an old hunk of baseboard I found laying around in our basement, hacked off big chunks of it because of my impatience, spent an hour bleeding uncontrollably from my thumb (which DIDN'T need stitches, so suck it), and then eventually learned from my stupidity and started whitling away at, much more carefully. Imitation wood or not, it symbolizes the Samnite's vitctory because the ultimate prize for a gladiator was to be given the rudiarius, a wooden sword that signified that they had earned their freedom.
Engravings/Etchings
After a recent trip to the craft store, I found this $5 engraving tool. It's built like complete crap but it actually works very nicely. It falls apart and stops working if you drop it (which happens frequently with me) but it gets the job done. I first was trying it out on some scrap pieces of wood and then I took a few cheap, 25-cent-shot glasses (excuse me, candleholders) and practiced on them.
Godsmack "Candleholder" (1-24-10)
This is the second glass engraving I did, and I'm very proud of how it came out. I chose Godsmack because I love their music and thought their sun logo would be perfect for it.
I wish it were easier to see the design in this picture.. I tried editing the lighting to get it to come out better... I'm unfortunately very bad with cameras and don't know how to take pictures of glasses (as if there are any special techniques.) (For a better look, go to http://stephieeee13445.deviantart.com/art/Godsmack-quot-Candleholder-quot-154489384 )
Evanescence "My Immortal" "Candleholder" (1-24-10)
This is the first glass engraving I did, and I'm not as proud of how it came out. I'm not quite sure why... the pieces just don't fit together like I'd hoped. It doesn't look symmetrical, the vertical line in the + that goes through it looks slightly slanted... Maybe someday I'll do it over. I chose Evanescence because I love their music and I was looking through some of their fonts & logos and thought this one they used during the release of their "My Immortal" single looked really cool.
I wish it were easier to see the design in this picture.. I tried editing the lighting to get it to come out better... I'm unfortunately very bad with cameras and don't know how to take pictures of glasses (as if there are any special techniques). (For a better look, go to http://stephieeee13445.deviantart.com/art/Evanescence-MI-Candleholder-154490725 )
