Santa and Child in the Storm

Just finished this piece.

CATCH OF THE DAY

Hi all, 

I wanted to share my newest piece (which is still available) in a less edited form than Facebook will allow. The inside scoop is this: I have posted WIP shots on "the book" for days with no problem. These shots included a penis and breasts. As soon as I painted it in skin tones, it became pornography. 

There ya go, lesson learned!

So, here is the finished piece.

BACK FROM PHILLY

Kelly and I had a wonderful time this weekend at the Quinlan's Doll and Teddy Bear Show just outside Philadelphia, PA. I worked up to the last few minutes to get things finished so I thought I would just give you a look at my pieces for the show before we get back to work on sculpting.

That moment when day meets night in one fleeting embrace: "TWILIGHT"

My piece for the signature gallery which won both an Art's Choice and a Collector's Choice Award.

"NEMEAN" will be heading off the the Susan Quinlan Museum in California today.

"THE MORRIGAN" 

I made our hosts a little gift in appreciation of all they do to support the art doll world.

And last, the twins: my awards from the show. These mean so much to me because the are awarded by my fellow artists and collectors, not a few judges with an agenda.

I hope you all have a great day of sculpting. We will get back to work here in the next couple of days!

Mark

STEAMPUNK

Here are two of my newest Steamed Ladies for those who do not go to my Facebook page.

HEAD

The face gets roughed-in while attached to the body in this case because the support rod for the figure   emerges from the skull.

Conditioned clay is applied to the skull to a thickness of about 1/8" thick. The eye sockets are kept open at this point and the main features are roughed-in. 

The features are refined slightly as the upper lip is attached.

The lower lip is attached, features are refined a bit more and beads are dropped into the eye sockets.

Using photos, the features are shaped and refined. You will get a better result by working all the features at once rather than concentrating on refining just one feature at a time.

Once the face is final shaped, the teeth are shaped in the mouth.

Have a great day of sculpting!

Mark

BODY WORK

For this set of observations, I will be using a different figure because I sort of jumped ahead. So  here it is.

The figure is covered with a layer of conditioned clay about 1/4" thick.

The clay is applied in large pieces and compressed onto the armature. 

A central dividing line is laid into the figure on both the front and the back.

The torso is divided starting with a line from shoulder to shoulder which will become the collar bone. The second mark is one head height down from the collarbone. This will be about the location of the  base of the sternum. The next mark will be a head height lower and will denote the waist. The last head height will end at the front of the crotch ( the back side will be slightly lower).

Depressions are made from the sternum to the side of the body even with the waist mark. This is the bottom of the rib cage. A depression is created from the crotch to the side of the body slightly lower than the sternum/hip marker. This is the leg fold.

The armpit is formed by pressing below the armature wire for the arm.  This runs from the armpit to the small of the back along the latisimus muscles in the back and from the armpit toward the sternum in the front along the base of the pectoral muscles.

The back is completed by depressing a line down the spine and between the buttocks. This depression will stop below the small of the back then start again after it passes over the sacrum or the base of the spine.

The main fat, muscle, and bone structures are defined with the sculpting tool.

Next we will do the smoothing of the muscles after adding the head.

Thanks for joining me, have a great sculpting day!

Mark

ARMATURE CONSTRUCTION

As you can see, the design of the piece is very simple: the armature for the figure need only support the figure's weight just as if it was sitting directly on a base. All we have done is add an additional support to this basic armature to raise the piece of the plane of the base.

The two sides of the armature are shaped and cut to match the layout. In addition, a longer piece of wire is added to the group to support the prebaked polymer skull.

All the parts of the armature are ready to assemble. I have switched from a steel rod to a brass rod for the support post and added the brass tube with a flattened end which will be installed in the spine of the figure.

The two sides of the armature are foil taped together. (These can be soldered if you wish however, the weight of the figure is less than one pound so that really isn't needed)

The body armature is shaped to the final shape of the figure with arch in the spine and twist to the torso before the support is added.

The brass tube is attached to the spine with the open end protruding from the armature far enough to allow for the depth of the finished clay.

The armature is padded with foil and taped to keep the clay clean.

Clay is conditioned and applied to the armature.

Next we will sculpt the figure.

Have a great day of sculpting!

Mark