Making a Splash

(My apologies to the brilliant photographer who took these amazing undersea shots and to the blogger who linked them where I found them for not attributing them properly.) They give a preview of the look of the Halfland undersea scene in terms of texture, landscape form and lighting that I'm going for.

Be sure to check out the fantastic critters starting to come into to my fishy net now! (see them at right at the top of the side bar) I can't get over what a total THRILL it is to have talented artists, readers, and friends pitching in for the sequence and crafting some witty and wonderful little puppets! Keep 'em coming, everyone! (Details on how to join in are in the sidebar under the slideshow.)

To get you IN THE MOOooooD.... Please dear God in heaven go, go at once to this link for David Gallo's 5:21 minute presentation of footage of spectacular undersea life at the TED Talks (found via Swiss Miss!! Much of it is a revelation of nature's miraculous invention. BUT--the end, the very last few seconds, is such a shock that even after seeing it 6 times, in slow mo, in reverse, my mind cannot grasp the transformation it shows. Go and be amazed.



Cuteoverload.com really got my creativity sparked with the little bird caught in mid-flap on the right above. Believe you me this and the other spread wing images are my inspiration for the Birds in hats scene.



Attention guest artist, Rachel DiRenna! I think I've figured out what type of flowers the Flowering Thoughts should be modeled after... On the left is a photo of a botanical print I bought in Florance that I love very much. I believe they are dandelions (?) and --wait-- DandyLIONS? Should the flowering thoughts become little lion faces? Little feathery manes could be fun. On the right, is a kind of weedy daisy that my favorite all time floral-photoist Kim Carney took. Love this for the Thoughts. So that's it, little daisy-like, dandelion, weeds-to-most-folks beauties it is. How about I send the armature wire and print outs and we give one a try?


Bullets Over Halfland
Cracked studio window with hole from bullet, possibly the same bullet-made hole in a paper partition on the same trajectory Paul figured out all the way across the width of the place. What's that IN BETWEEN THE TWO BULLET HOLES?! Hmm? THAT'S RIGHT IT'S THE HALFLAND Wonder TREE! Not a scratch on her to be found!

Yeah, so a couple weeks ago I look up next to my desk to discover a pretty violent bullet hole in the window right there. I looked back in recent photos taken of the set and sure enough found the hole showing in them as early as the 7th of the month. It's possible it happened over night on New Years as many people around here tend to fire their guns in the air to celebrate things like that. Or it could be a stray off of a gangland shooting that seem pretty frequent based on the bam bam bams and then sometimes the police helio-choppers that hover for a time.

We've concluded that regardless of when it happened that it was not meant as a personal attack and so we plan to stay living here and hope that it was a one-of fluke, not to be repeated, so that no one ever is harmed in any way.

We have installed a new policy to let guests know in advance that the neighborhood is raw and that while we've not had any other brush with danger that we know of, well, other than the AK47 automatic weapons fire at the corner building a couple years ago, and the red dot of a laser site on the window when we first moved in (both of those times we sure as heck hit the ground fast!)
but other than that everything's been pure bliss.