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Showing posts from July, 2012

How to Build a Dinosaur, part II

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Links to the other posts in this series: Part I Part III Part IV Part V Part VI Having done the top of the head, the bottom jaw came together much faster.   Once I put 'em both together I had proof of concept and some reassurance that I at least had the skills to make something look the way I wanted it to.  What I didn't have was any assurance I'd have the ability to finish the whole thing. After a heck of a lot of carving and sanding, and a garage floor that looked like this: I managed to assemble some of the torso. At this point the body was still a little too large, the neck was mostly unfinished and I didn't have a clue how I was going to attach the legs and tail yet.  I was still entertaining the idea of allowing the legs, tail and possibly the arms to be detachable to make the whole thing a bit more portable.  That didn't eventually happen.  I should also mention by this point I had the aid of some hot-wire sculpting tools I had ordered to

How to Build a Dinosaur, part 1

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Links to the other posts in this series: Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI It seems like every year since my thesis year (2008 for those keeping score) I've been able to manage at least one major project.  In 2009 I completed my Bozeman Main Street sketchbook .  In 2010 I finished the San Antonio panoramic sketchbook .  In 2011, I had a solo show at East Central University thanks to my good friend  Aaron Hauck , for which I had to build a ton of frames and shadowboxes.   But this year I had to do something pretty far outside my comfort zone.  I built a dinosaur.  Deinonychus, to be precise.  Obviously, I'd never built a dinosaur.  In fact, I'd never really done any kind of organic sculpting before outside of grade-school ceramics.  So naturally I decided to tackle a life-size, museum-quality dinosaur for my first-ever major sculpture.  So where did the idea come from?  My boss Xavier texted me with a link to a guy named Ken Forbister who carved a T. rex

Welcome to Denver

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So, here I am in Denver.  A bigger, younger city than San Antonio, with a fantastic collection of older building stock as well as a bunch of sleek, modern buildings in the CBD.  With the surrounding landscape, and the sprawling city and burbs, it's almost as though I've moved to a combination of Bozeman and S.A.   Lots to explore. Got me a membership at the Museum of Nature and Science Our new living room Concert at Red Rocks, courtesy of Linda's brother.  Unfortunately it got too dark too soon to capture the stage and surrounding landscape.  Maybe next time.

What's been going on

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Yup, it's been a while.  A lot has changed.  I no longer live in San Antonio, Texas.  I'm now in Denver, Colorado.  Linda got an amazing opportunity to work here for Craftsy.com   so we relocated in May, and I had to leave my dinosaur job behind.  But not before I finished a huge project, which I guess I need to blog about soon.  I've also been published in a couple of books  since the last blog post, and I'll blog about those, too.  I've done some commercial work, some I can talk about and some I can't, and tried to adjust to living in an even bigger city with only one car and a very busy girlfriend who works long hours.  We've seen a lot of cool stuff here in Colorado, and survived a record fire year along the front range. But first I should include some stuff I did before I moved.  This stuff's from way back... At Pete's Eats, Six Flags Fiesta Texas in San Antonio By dad and friend Meghu at the house 'round Christmas time. Christmas